Petition to António Guterres

Democratic Republic of the Congo

Democratic Republic of the Congo
Environment in Kinshasa, Kinshasa, CD
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National Working Groups (NWGs), established by the Global Centre for Risk and Innovation (GCRI) in over 120 countries, provide structured, inclusive platforms for advancing disaster risk reduction (DRR), innovation acceleration, and systemic resilience-building.

In the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), the NWG strengthens national resilience by:

  • Localizing disaster risk foresight frameworks and operationalizing DRC’s climate adaptation, biodiversity protection, food and water security, and sustainable development strategies aligned with the Pact for the Future;
  • Enabling early warning systems, anticipatory governance, and innovation-driven systemic resilience to address vulnerabilities linked to severe flooding, prolonged droughts, extreme rainfall patterns, biodiversity loss in the Congo Basin, and climate and conflict-exacerbated food and water security pressures;
  • Uniting ministries, research and environmental institutions, food and water security agencies, peacebuilding organizations, renewable energy developers, private sector innovators, and civil society organizations into a national resilience and policy innovation ecosystem;
  • Serving as a nexus of policy, research, and innovation to strengthen disaster risk governance, peace and resilience building, and systemic foresight.

The Nexus Ecosystem (NE), developed by GCRI, underpins NWG operations by providing a sovereign-grade, open, and interoperable digital public goods infrastructure.
NE empowers the DRC to deploy disaster risk modeling platforms, anticipatory policy simulation environments, innovation ecosystem foresight tools, and sustainability governance monitoring systems.

Together, NWG–Democratic Republic of the Congo and NE form sovereign critical infrastructures for disaster risk governance, systemic foresight, responsible digital innovation, and sustainable development.

We call upon the Government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, United Nations agencies, multilateral institutions, and global partners to formally recognize, support, and resource NWG–Democratic Republic of the Congo and the Nexus Ecosystem as essential infrastructures for systemic resilience, sustainable innovation, and anticipatory governance.

Support NWG–Democratic Republic of the Congo. Advance Risk-Informed Policy Innovation. Secure Digital Public Goods for Systemic Resilience.

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Letter to
Secretary-General of United Nations, António Guterres

Excellencies,

We, the undersigned institutions, experts, and stakeholders committed to systemic foresight, responsible innovation, and sustainable resilience governance, respectfully submit this appeal for the formal recognition and institutional support of the National Working Group for the Democratic Republic of the Congo (NWG–Democratic Republic of the Congo) and the Nexus Ecosystem (NE), developed by the Global Centre for Risk and Innovation (GCRI).

The Democratic Republic of the Congo today faces overlapping and accelerating systemic risks:
Severe flooding and droughts, biodiversity degradation in the Congo Basin, extreme rainfall variability impacting agriculture and infrastructure, food and water insecurity driven by climate shocks and conflict, and energy access and transition challenges.
These vulnerabilities align directly with the foresight imperatives outlined in the Pact for the Future, requiring sovereign, anticipatory, and innovation-centered resilience strategies.

The DRC’s global significance as home to the second-largest rainforest on Earth and its immense freshwater resources, biodiversity, and mineral wealth underlines its critical role in the planet’s ecological stability and sustainable futures. Protecting and strengthening these capacities requires foresight-driven disaster risk infrastructures, anticipatory governance, and open digital public goods.

The National Working Group for the Democratic Republic of the Congo (NWG–Democratic Republic of the Congo) addresses these systemic needs by:

  • Embedding systemic foresight, disaster risk governance, and anticipatory policy innovation into DRC’s national climate resilience, biodiversity conservation, water and food security, energy transition, and peacebuilding strategies;

  • Strengthening early warning systems, dynamic risk scenario simulation infrastructures, and systemic foresight platforms aligned with the operational mandates of the Emergency Platform;

  • Mobilizing distributed expertise across ministries, peace and resilience institutions, climate research networks, agricultural innovators, renewable energy stakeholders, private sector actors, and civil society organizations;

  • Institutionalizing sustainability and systemic foresight governance frameworks aligned with the Declaration on Future Generations.

NWG–Democratic Republic of the Congo’s operational foundation is the Nexus Ecosystem (NE) — a sovereign, cloud-agnostic, open-access digital public goods platform that:

  • Provides disaster risk modeling, anticipatory policy simulation infrastructures, innovation ecosystem foresight mapping, and sustainable development governance monitoring systems;

  • Embeds responsible digital governance standards, cybersecurity resilience protocols, sovereign data protections, and AI ethics aligned with the Global Digital Compact;

  • Supports the development of holistic resilience, sustainability, and well-being indicators aligned with the Beyond GDP Initiative, reinforcing DRC’s leadership in systemic foresight and sustainable governance.

Together, NWG–Democratic Republic of the Congo and the Nexus Ecosystem provide DRC with sovereign, scalable, and future-ready infrastructures to operationalize systemic foresight, sustainable innovation ecosystems, and resilient governance.

Accordingly, we respectfully request:

  1. Formal Recognition of NWG–Democratic Republic of the Congo as a national and international platform advancing systemic disaster risk foresight, anticipatory governance innovation, sovereign digital resilience, and sustainable development leadership under the Pact for the Future;

  2. Institutional and Financial Support, enabling NWG–Democratic Republic of the Congo’s full integration into multilateral resilience financing frameworks, anticipatory governance hubs, and sovereign digital public goods initiatives;

  3. Recognition of the Nexus Ecosystem (NE) as a sovereign digital public good essential for DRC’s disaster risk intelligence infrastructures, anticipatory policy simulation platforms, innovation ecosystem monitoring, and sustainable governance frameworks;

  4. Framework Integration, ensuring systematic inclusion of NWG–Democratic Republic of the Congo and NE outputs into global disaster risk dashboards, anticipatory governance hubs, innovation ecosystems, and Pact for the Future foresight monitoring mechanisms.

The systemic resilience and sustainable development challenges facing the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the broader Central African and Great Lakes regions demand sovereign, anticipatory, and digitally sovereign infrastructures.
NWG–Democratic Republic of the Congo and the Nexus Ecosystem offer a transformational, scalable, and future-ready pathway for systemic foresight, responsible innovation ecosystems, and resilient governance.

In full alignment with the Charter of the United Nations and the transformational ambitions articulated in the Pact for the Future, we submit this appeal and reaffirm our commitment to collaborative action, systemic foresight leadership, responsible innovation, and sustainable governance for the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Respectfully submitted,

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Started this petition 1 year ago

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