SDG16 is central to all of the SDGs because it gets to the heart of the way governance happens, decisions are made and policy is implemented across everything from public services to climate change. In Nigeria, governance is weak, institutions are dysfunctional and justice is partial. We developed an SDG16 Innovation Challenge for 2019 to support young people to develop new, innovative ideas to issues related to SDG16; and to provide them with the support they need to build communities around them and make them functional over time.

The objective of the SDG16 Innovation Challenge was to source, develop and support new, creative ideas for challenges related to SDG16. The Challenge began in Pakistan and has since spread to Nigeria, where it is ongoing. To achieve the SDGs we need to be resourceful and bring through ideas from young people in particular to the manifestations of these problems that they see in their daily lives. This means bringing them into the conversation, harnessing their ideas and supporting them to find innovative ways to change dynamics. The SDG16 Innovation Challenge has been effective for a few reasons. First, it finds these young people from across Pakistan (and now Nigeria) and brings them into efforts to address SDG16- it is not a top-down process led by government. Second, it is closely aligned with ongoing efforts- the winners come into the Accountability Lab's ongoing Accountability Incubator, for example, through which they receive a year on hands-on support, mentorship and guidance to build out their efforts. And third- it brought together a multi-stakeholder coalition- with the UN system, civil society, youth and corporations- to solve these challenges over time.

The Challenge was run by the Lab with the support of UNDP but we also brought in a variety of government agencies (Ministries of Interior and Planning and the Young Peace and Development Corps); along with corporations and businesses (as mentors and resource people). We garnered significant media coverage (in Pakistan and Nigeria) which also took the conversation around SDG16 to new audiences across these countries. Feedback from participants has been almost uniformally positive.

The SDG 16 innovation competition in Pakistan focused on seven thematic areas (or research questions). Each participant developed a proposal to address one of these questions:
• How can we make sure the most vulnerable people in Pakistan are included in the process of development?
• How can we help people report violence?
• How can young people fight corruption?
• How can we increase women’s participation in elections?
• How can we make sure everyone is included in conversations about the future of Pakistan?
• How can we make sure government policies include young people?
• In FATA, how can we support the voices of women?

We asked for creative ideas from anyone under the age of 35 and encouraged participants to think “out of the box”- using tools like the media, culture, arts and technology. The winning ideas were simple, practical and address one of the questions above directly. We carried out outreach events in 5 major cities across the country which attracted hundreds of young people. They applied online and we picked the top 20 ideas for a 2-day workshop in Islamabad to further refine their concepts. The culmination of the campaign was a pitch competition in front of a panel of judges, from which we chose at least one winning idea in each of the 7 categories mentioned above. The winners were be eligible for an internship at UNDP to further develop their ideas; a place within the Accountability Lab’s incubator; and possible financing from external partners. We are now carrying out a similar process in Nigeria, with the questions and approach adapted to context. In terms of monitoring, we collected feedback in an ongoing way- to understand the progress the participants felt they were making; and for the winners we are now working with them to implement their ideas/collect data on impact/learning.

- Over 1,000+ applications for the SDG16 Innovation Challenge including hundreds of diverse applications (women, people with disabilities, youth, minorities);
- 60 winners chosen across Pakistan and Nigeria;
- The development of some pioneering new ideas for governance, using the arts, technology, media and film to address SDG16 challenges;
Positive spill-overs:
- Engaged coalitions of young people pushing for change;
- New collaborations between young people and the Accountability Lab/UNDP around SDG16;
- Greater awareness around SDG16 and the centrality of the goal to achievement of the SDGs more broadly;
- Now spread to Nigeria with significant engagement ahead of the elections.
Negative spill-overs:
- Some challenges of implementation given political changes and new administration in Pakistan, which some participants have been unable to overcome.
Longer term results include ongoing conversation and support of SDG16. In Pakistan, the SDGs have been adopted as the national development goals, and this has been a part of implementation of that plan.

Enabling conditions included support from UNDP and the government of Pakistan. Constraints included the logistics and safety concerns in certain parts of Pakistan; the process of engagement with the participants over time (we have been coordinating through Whatsapp and social media, and in person where feasible). We leveraged new technologies to host the event and to follow-up on progress such as KoboToolbox; and we used Basecamp to manage and organize the process.

The SDG16 Innovation Challenge is a highly cost effective way to source and support new ideas for SDG16. Each idea that came through the Challenge had to pass questions and tests related to environmental, social and economic sustainability. We pushed the participants to think about these issues through the way they designed the ideas and thought about their impact and longer-term application. They looked at revenue models or user-fee type set-ups; and the Accountability Lab has supported the best ideas through our Accountability Incubator, which provides additional support around these issues. As mentioned, the idea has already spread to Nigeria and is ongoing there, and we aim to repeat the challenge every year in Pakistan going forwards.

Here are our top 5 take-aways for organizations supporting innovation within development in Pakistan:

Young people feel excluded- and that the government is not willing to listen to them. This isn't a question of voice- many of them are very active on social media and in youth groups of various kinds. It is an issue of the government' s ability- and desire- to listen to them.

But there is some amazing creativity- despite the challenges. We received hundreds of ideas- from a plan to introduce social credits for honest public officials in Punjab province, to making use of "Hujra“ the informal community spaces in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa- to inform and meaningfully include the less educated in governance and conflict resolution processes

The challenge is engaging them- at a scale that is large enough around these issues. Over half a million Pakistanis are graduating from high school universities every year, with about 1.3 million people entering the job market annually. This has serious implications for peace and the rule of law, as idle young people- without a sense of upward social mobility- can be recruited into criminal or extremist networks. Shumile Fatima is addressing this for example, through an idea to extend essential training and freelance work opportunities to hundreds of women in Gilgit Baltistan.

We built discussions into the three-day event- as we do during our Accountability Incubator- around core management processes such as budgeting, work-planning and monitoring and evaluation. This was because we have seen how essential these are to implementation of good ideas. It is often a lack of process that prevents these ideas from moving from paper to practice in a sustainable way. Ultimately, innovation has to be matched with organization.

Finally, gender is central to everything- because without the strong voices of women, achieving SDG16 will be impossible. Half of the participants in this challenge were young women, and they developed some fascinating ideas that have real potential for transformative change. For example, Mareeha from Lahore wants to make sure women from poor and marginalized groups are more easily able to register the birth of their children- which could transform their conception and experience of citizenship. And Mishel Ijaz from Punjab developed a participatory urban planning method that can be used to ensure shared, collectively managed public spaces.

http://www.pk.undp.org/content/pakistan/en/home/presscenter/pressreleases/2018/04/05/undp-the-government-of-pakistan-and-accountability-lab-launch-sustainable-development-goal-16-innovation-challenge.html

https://dailytimes.com.pk/224252/pakistans-first-sdg-16-innovation-challenge-launched/

https://www.techjuice.pk/undp-accountability-lab-pakistan-sdg-16-innovation-challenge/

http://www.accountabilitylab.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/Innovation-Challenge-1-Pager-March-2018.pdf

http://www.accountabilitylab.org/