South Africa

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 South Africa (NWG–South Africa) and the Nexus Ecosystem (NE), developed by the Global Centre for Risk and Innovation (GCRI).

South Africa today faces a complex landscape of systemic risks:
Climate-induced droughts, floods, and extreme heat events, energy infrastructure fragilities, biodiversity loss, urban and rural development vulnerabilities, food and water security pressures, and emerging digital risks.
These systemic challenges mirror the global foresight imperatives outlined in the Pact for the Future, necessitating anticipatory, resilient, and innovation-driven governance strategies.

While South Africa continues to demonstrate leadership in climate policy, sustainable development, and digital innovation, opportunities exist to strengthen disaster foresight infrastructures, anticipatory governance systems, and sovereign digital public goods ecosystems across sectors.

The National Working Group for South Africa (NWG–South Africa) addresses these strategic needs by:

• Embedding systemic foresight, disaster risk governance, and policy innovation frameworks into national, provincial, and local strategies;

• Strengthening early warning systems, dynamic scenario simulation platforms, and anticipatory governance infrastructures aligned with the operational principles of the Emergency Platform;

• Mobilizing expertise across government agencies, scientific institutions, indigenous knowledge systems, innovation hubs, civil society organizations, and diaspora networks;

• Institutionalizing sustainable development, systemic resilience, and intergenerational stewardship consistent with the Declaration on Future Generations.

NWG–South Africa’s operational foundation is the Nexus Ecosystem (NE) — a sovereign, cloud-agnostic, open digital public goods platform that:

• Provides real-time disaster risk modeling, policy simulation tools, innovation ecosystem mapping, and systemic foresight monitoring architectures;

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

• Supports the development of resilience, well-being, sustainability, and inclusive innovation indicators aligned with the Beyond GDP Initiative, strengthening South Africa’s leadership in holistic development metrics.

Together, NWG–South Africa and the Nexus Ecosystem provide a sovereign, scalable, and future-ready infrastructure to foster systemic foresight, sustainable innovation ecosystems, and resilient governance futures.

Accordingly, we respectfully request:

1. Formal Recognition of NWG–South Africa as a national 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–South Africa’s integration into multilateral resilience financing frameworks, anticipatory governance platforms, and sovereign digital public goods ecosystems;

3. Recognition of the Nexus Ecosystem (NE) as a sovereign digital public good essential for South Africa’s disaster risk intelligence systems, policy simulation environments, innovation foresight infrastructures, and resilience monitoring platforms;

4. Framework Integration, ensuring systematic inclusion of NWG–South Africa and NE outputs into global disaster risk dashboards, anticipatory governance frameworks, policy innovation hubs, and Pact for the Future foresight monitoring architectures.

The systemic resilience and sustainable development challenges facing South Africa require sovereign, anticipatory, and digitally integrated infrastructures.
NWG–South Africa and the Nexus Ecosystem offer a transformative, practical, and future-ready pathway to secure systemic foresight leadership, responsible innovation ecosystems, and resilient governance futures for South Africa and the global community.

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 collective commitment to collaborative action, systemic foresight, responsible digital innovation, and sustainable development leadership for South Africa.

Respectfully submitted,