More than 50 representatives of NGOs, UN organisations and the private sector have joined the Geneva Global Goals Innovation Day (g3id.org) info session that took place at IMPACT Hub on the 16th of November. g3id.org is an association of different organising partners with the goal of bringing innovation into the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) agenda and capitalising on the potential offered by international organisations in Geneva and beyond.
This informative session comes after several run-up events already took place to generate awareness and meaningful partnerships. One example is the POP UP Muse which recently brought together magicians, mind readers and organisations leading on innovation such as the Global Humanitarian Lab, Pangloss Labs and THE Port. The first g3id.org info session for newcomers has been structured around co-creation exercises, that are at the core of the non-conventional approach of the main g3id.org event planned for the 24th of March 2017. The incredible turnout shows that the international community is ready to act, innovate and collaborate to achieve the SDGs and that people are willing to speed up the process thinking outside of the box. Participants were given much more than a box, as different materials were provided to them to come up with prototypes to inspire solutions with the goal to collaboratively overcome current challenges.
In particular, participants were asked to provide proposals to tackle some of the main critical aspects of the run toward the SDGs and were informed on the opportunity to use g3id.org as a platform for co-creation and knowledge sharing. Among these more concerning areas of work there are sustainable and productive “partnerships” – at times just bureaucratic and hierarchical breaks, but also a powerful opportunity to work effectively toward the SDGs.
Participants were able to hear about the scope and structure of the main g3id.org event and to discover what are the opportunities to get involved during a short presentation. Once again they were called to contribute to the day by proposing info sessions or workshops , with the objective to scale-up best-practices for innovation across other organisations. The info session attendees were also able to indicate their interest in joining the “solutions fare” where they could have a stand to showcase their work as g3id.org is planning to welcome more than 300 innovation leaders.
The original contributions that different groups were able to provide on the spot, when presenting the result of their work, already displayed the unique access to knowledge and skills that Geneva has to offer and their potential to unlock the power needed to achieve the SDGs all around the world, thinking “2020” rather than “2030”.