Petition to António Guterres

Ethiopia

Ethiopia
Environment in Addis Ababa, Addis Ababa, ET
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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 Ethiopia, the NWG strengthens national resilience by:

  • Localizing disaster risk foresight frameworks and operationalizing Ethiopia’s climate adaptation, food and water security, biodiversity conservation, 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 droughts, floods, desertification, biodiversity loss, energy transition needs, and urbanization pressures;
  • Uniting ministries, scientific and agricultural research institutions, water and food security agencies, energy innovators, private sector leaders, 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, food and water security, 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 Ethiopia to deploy disaster risk modeling platforms, anticipatory policy simulation environments, innovation ecosystem foresight tools, and sustainability governance monitoring systems.

Together, NWG–Ethiopia and NE form sovereign critical infrastructures for disaster risk governance, systemic foresight, responsible digital innovation, and sustainable development.

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

Support NWG–Ethiopia. Advance Risk-Informed Policy Innovation. Secure Digital Public Goods for Systemic Resilience.

March 5, 2024

1,098 Supporters

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

Ethiopia today faces severe and interconnected systemic risks:
Prolonged droughts, flooding, desertification of arable land, biodiversity loss across highland and lowland ecosystems, food and water insecurity, urban growth pressures, and energy transition needs.
These vulnerabilities align directly with the foresight imperatives outlined in the Pact for the Future, requiring sovereign, anticipatory, and innovation-centered resilience strategies.

While Ethiopia is advancing efforts in climate adaptation, food security, green energy development, and sustainable infrastructure, the scale and speed of evolving systemic risks demand deeper systemic foresight infrastructures, anticipatory governance platforms, and sovereign digital public goods.

The National Working Group for Ethiopia (NWG–Ethiopia) addresses these systemic needs by:

  • Embedding systemic foresight, disaster risk governance, and anticipatory policy innovation into national climate resilience, sustainable development, agricultural innovation, and biodiversity conservation frameworks;

  • 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, agricultural and environmental research institutions, energy developers, urban planners, private sector leaders, and civil society organizations;

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

NWG–Ethiopia’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 Ethiopia’s leadership in systemic foresight and sustainable governance.

Together, NWG–Ethiopia and the Nexus Ecosystem provide Ethiopia 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–Ethiopia 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–Ethiopia’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 Ethiopia’s disaster risk intelligence infrastructures, anticipatory policy simulation platforms, innovation ecosystem monitoring, and sustainable governance frameworks;

  4. Framework Integration, ensuring systematic inclusion of NWG–Ethiopia 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 Ethiopia and the broader East African region demand sovereign, anticipatory, and digitally sovereign infrastructures.
NWG–Ethiopia 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 Ethiopia.

Respectfully submitted,

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Started this petition 1 year ago

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