Uzbekistan joins 50-in-5 fold as DPI initiative nears 1st anniversary

Uzbekistan, last month, officially announced its membership of the 50-in-5 campaign as the initiative inches toward the first anniversary of its launch.

The campaign was launched on November 8 last year with eleven first-mover countries.

It is a country-led advocacy, with several international partners, that intends to help no fewer than 50 countries to design and rollout, with a short time, at least one component of DPI in a safe, inclusive an interoperable manner in the next four years.

Uzbekistan and six other countries joined the fold at a time when the initiative organized a Milestone Event on the sideline of the 79^th United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in New York.

On September 18, the Uzbekistan Ministry of Digital Technologies announced the country’s membership of the initiative during a forum held as part of the Uzbekistan ICT Week 2024. This makes the country the first in Central Asia to do so, according to the government announcement.

The ministry said the country’s membership of the initiative is a big opportunity for knowledge-sharing and reflects the nation’s “commitment to developing safe, inclusive, and interoperable digital public infrastructure to build resilient and innovative economies and enhance the well-being of its people.”

Uzbekistani President, Shavkat Mirziyoyev, said DPI is a tool on which is premised the “sustainability of our economy, the quality and effective activities of all sectors, the convenience of life for the population.”

Meanwhile, the 50-in-5 Milestone Event, as it was tagged, brought together high-level representatives from member countries and other important actors in the DPI ecosystem to explore ways through which the UN-proposed Global Digital Compact can be successfully implemented, as explained by the UNDP.

Government representatives of some DPI countries such as Brazil, France and Lesotho who attended the event, all lauded the initiative, highlighting the transformative force of appropriately designed DPI systems which can scale up digital offerings and allow people seamless access to a wide spectrum of public and private sector services.

Those at the forefront of the 50-in-5 New York event included the Digital Public Goods Alliance Secretariat, UNDP, UNICEF, the Inter-American Development Bank, Office of the Secretary-General’s Envoy on Technology, and the Co-Development Fund. It also had support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Centre for Digital Public Infrastructure, GovStack, USAID, and UN Women.

Uzbekistan’s digital transformation engagements include a facial recognition project that seeks to improve urban security and facilitate search for missing persons.

Article Topics

50-in-5  |  digital ID  |  digital public infrastructure  |  Global Digital Compact  |  UNDP  |  Uzbekistan