[digital.global] in dialogue

Latitude59 2025 in Nairobi, Kenya, gathers entrepreneurs, investors, ecosystem leaders and policy makers from across Africa and beyond. It is organised with the support of the Team Europe Digital and Green Innoovation Action (DGI) partners (the European Union, BMZ, GIZ, Agence Française de Développement, Expertise France, Enabel, Estonian Centre for International Development and the Netherlands Enterprise Agency RVO).

The German Ministry for Development and Cooperation (BMZ) will engage through the #TeamEurope initiative Digital and Green Innovation Action (DGI). The Digital and Green Innovation Summit Africa, integrated into the Latitude59 event, will explore key themes of carbon markets, circular economy models and digital social and green innovation ecosystems. Through keynotes, workshops, and pitches, participants will co-create solutions on these topics and engage in ideas for cross-border collaboration.

By connecting Africa’s innovation ecosystem with policy makers, Latitude59 aims to support the growth and global recognition of Africa’s startup ecosystem.

Stay tuned for more information on the
Digital and Green Innovation Summit Africa

Find more information about the Latitude59 event here:
Latitude59 x Kenya

The World Telecommunication Development Conference (WTDC-25), organised by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), will take place in Baku, Azerbaijan, from 17 to 28 November 2025 under the theme “Universal, Meaningful, and Affordable Connectivity for an Inclusive and Sustainable Digital Future”.

WTDC-25 will bring together ministers, regulators, industry leaders, and development partners from across the world to set global priorities for advancing equitable access to digital technologies. Building on the outcomes of the Kigali Action Plan (2022), the conference will define the next cycle of the ITU Telecommunication Development Sector (ITU-D) and adopt the Strategic and Action Plans for 2026-2029, aligning with the Sustainable Development Goals and the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) agenda.

A High-Level Segment will open the conference, providing a platform for Member States to share national visions, policy innovations, and strategies to accelerate meaningful connectivity. Delegates will engage in discussions on policy, regulation, and investment to close the digital divide and strengthen cooperation across regions.

On 16 November 2025, a Global Youth Celebration will precede the conference, highlighting youth leadership and innovation in digital development. The same evening will feature a 30+ Years of ITU-D Impact Dinner, marking over three decades of work to advance inclusive digital transformation worldwide. Throughout the conference, an exhibition will showcase global and regional initiatives driving digital development and innovation.

WTDC-25 will culminate in the adoption of a WTDC Declaration, a Strategic Plan (2028-2031), and an Action Plan (2026-2029), setting the direction for how global stakeholders collaborate to achieve universal, affordable, and sustainable connectivity for all.

The Transform Africa Summit (TAS) is Africa’s leading forum for advancing digital transformation. Organized by Smart Africa, it unites leaders from government, business, and international organizations to shape and accelerate the continent’s digital future.

The seventh Transform Africa Summit will be held from 12–14 November 2025 in Conakry, Guinea, under the theme “AI for Africa: Innovate Locally, Impact Globally.” It will gather Heads of State, ministers, private sector executives, and innovators to define a shared vision for Africa’s progress in artificial intelligence and digital technologies.

The programme includes high-level forums, an investment platform linking innovators with investors, and an exhibition presenting cutting-edge startups from across Africa. Highlights include the Ms. Geek Africa Competition, Connect Dialogues, and a Cultural Gala combining art and networking.

The Transform Africa Summit 2025 will build on years of collaboration and shared progress, reinforcing Africa’s position as a global leader in digital innovation and ensuring that emerging technologies like AI serve the continent’s development priorities and its people

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The Africa Tech Festival 2025 brings together leading voices from across the continent and beyond to explore how technology can drive inclusive, sustainable development. Taking place from 10 to 14 November at the Cape Town International Convention Centre, the festival serves as a meeting point for innovators, policymakers, and investors shaping Africa’s digital future.

Now in its third decade, the festival celebrates the creativity and collaboration that define Africa’s digital transformation journey. From connectivity and telecoms to artificial intelligence and emerging technologies, it highlights how inclusive innovation can deliver real impact for communities and businesses across the continent.

Team Europe at Africa Tech Festival 2025

Team Europe and the Digital4Development (D4D) Hub will host a full programme of sessions exploring how Africa–Europe cooperation can strengthen digital infrastructure, investment, and innovation. Through high-level discussions, workshops, and info sessions, Team Europe partners will share approaches to financing, skills development, and inclusive digital growth.

• Strengthening Africa’s Digital Backbone – Innovation, Investment & Integration
  11 Nov, 10:25–11:05, Auditorium 2, CTICC 1
  Exploring how governments, telecoms providers, and investors are reinforcing the continent’s digital foundations—from fibre networks and subsea cables to 5G and data centres.
• Strategic Priorities for the Future of Telco – Partnerships, Investment & Opportunities
  11 Nov, 12:30–13:30, Room 1.41 & 1.42, CTICC 1
  Examining new business models, financing mechanisms, and cross-sector partnerships driving Africa’s digital economy.
• Bridging Continents – Strengthening Africa–Europe Collaboration through Digital Innovation
  11 Nov, 13:45–15:00, Freesia Meeting Room, CTICC 2
  Presenting the Africa–Europe Digital Innovation Bridge (AEDIB) and highlighting successful collaborations between African and European ecosystems.
• Mobilising Private Capital for Digital Transformation and the Benefits of Greening Digital Transformation
  11 Nov, 15:30–17:30, Freesia Meeting Room, CTICC 2
  Exploring how blended finance and sustainability principles can catalyse private investment in digital infrastructure.
• Developing Equitable, Secure and Trusted Connectivity through Strategic Partnerships with Team Europe
  12 Nov, 9:30–10:45, Freesia Meeting Room, CTICC 2
  Discussing how Team Europe’s joint projects promote secure, inclusive digital connectivity across Sub-Saharan Africa.
• Info Session: Introduction to the D4D Hub Private Sector Advisory Group (PSAG)
  12 Nov, 10:00–10:45, Freesia Meeting Room, CTICC 2
  Presenting opportunities for companies and business associations to engage in D4D Hub activities and partnerships.
• Driving Connectivity in Africa – The Power of Blended Finance Partnerships
  12 Nov, 11:35–12:05, Main Stage Hall 6, CTICC 2
  A fireside chat on how blended finance mechanisms—such as EIB Global’s $100M investment in Axian Telecom—are expanding inclusive connectivity.
• Unlocking Opportunities – The EU Tech Business Offer for a Reinforced EU–Africa Partnership
  12 Nov, 16:15–17:00, Freesia Meeting Room, CTICC 2
  Showcasing innovative European technologies and partnerships that support Africa’s digital transformation under the AU–EU Digital Economy Partnership.

Find out more here: D4D Hub activities

Digital Investment Facility (DIF) activities

The Team Europe Action (TEA) Data Governance in Africa, the Digital Investment Facility (DIF) supported by the D4D Hub, will convene a series of three strategic sessions, targeting the persistent challenges facing Africa’s digital infrastructure ecosystem, while also leveraging new tools, partnerships, and business models for scale. These sessions build on the momentum from key regional dialogues, including the high-level forum at ITW Africa 2025 in Nairobi, and align with the EU’s Global Gateway Strategy.

• Leadership Roundtable: Unlocking Financing for Green Digital Infrastructure in Africa
  12 Nov, 13:30–15:00, Freesia Meeting Room, CTICC 2
  A high-level dialogue tackling financing challenges for bankable green data centres, demand generation, and edge facilities.
• DIF Catapult Accelerator: Connecting Digital Infrastructure Entrepreneurs with Finance
  11 Nov, 13:00–15:00, The Old Pier Café
  An accelerator-style session connecting African entrepreneurs and infrastructure developers with DFIs, impact investors, and other key stakeholders.
• Cybersecurity Guidelines Validation Workshop: Localising Digital Security Norms for Africa
  12 Nov, 13:00–15:00, The Old Pier Café
  This validation session reviews draft Cybersecurity Guidelines for Digital Infrastructure developed under the Team Europe D4D initiative.

Participants can register here: Registration link

The Global Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) Summit 2025 gathers leaders, policymakers, and innovators from over 100 countries to drive collective action toward inclusive, resilient, and trusted digital systems.

Co-hosted by the World Bank Group, Co-Develop, ITU, UNDP, and the UN Office for Digital and Emerging Technologies (UNODET), the Summit will take place 4–6 November in Cape Town. Building on the 2024 Cairo edition, this year focuses on turning alignment into measurable progress and ensuring digital public infrastructure delivers real benefits for people and economies.

Germany will engage through a main-stage presence and a digital.global Pavilion showcasing flagship initiatives such as GovStack, FAIR Forward, Digital Transformation Centres, and Data to Policy, advancing open, interoperable, and inclusive digital ecosystems.

Sessions will explore how digital ID, payments, and data-sharing systems reduce costs, foster innovation, and expand opportunities for inclusive growth. High-level and technical dialogues will feature country examples, regional priorities, and approaches to embedding trust and safeguards in digital systems.

By connecting governments, partners, and the private sector, the Global DPI Summit 2025 aims to set global standards, strengthen cooperation, and shape the next generation of inclusive, secure, and people-centered digital infrastructure.

More Information

Between September 22 and 26, senior government officials, representatives from the private sector, civil society and academia from Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) and the European Union (EU) and its Member States will come together for the 2025 EU-LAC Digital Alliance Week in Antigua, Guatemala. The EU-LAC Digital Alliance was launched in 2023 to boost  digital cooperation between the two regions.

On day 1, the D4D Hub and the European Space Agency are co-organising a policy dialogue on Earth Observation that will review lessons learned from ongoing Copernicus initiatives in the region.

On day two,  the D4D Hub is facilitating a multi-stakeholder forum on digital investments. As a highlight of the forum, the Team Europe Digital and Green Innovation Action will host an interactive workshop discussing how to unlock the full potential of Earth Observation data for climate resilience and sustainable innovation.

The multi-stakeholder forum will be followed by high-level policy dialogues on cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, meaningful connectivity, e-governance and data governance. These form part of a series of EU-LAC Digital Alliance High-level Policy Dialogues.

Committed to strengthening EU-LAC digital cooperation, the EU-LAC Digital Alliance Policy Dialogues, Digital and Green Innovation Action, and the D4D Hub are all co-funded by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). 

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Over the past months, GIZ’s regional project Strengthening Information Integrity in West Africa has supported UNESCO in organizing the Regional Conference on Information Integrity in West Africa and the Sahel, taking place from 3 to 5 September 2025 in Praia, Cape Verde. 

Uniting government officials, civil society, media, academia, and digital stakeholders to strengthen policies on information integrity and digital platform governance, the conference represents a key milestone in advancing regional approaches to counter disinformation and hate speech. The project collaborates with a diverse range of partners from all sectors of society in Côte d’Ivoire, Senegal, and the broader region. It has facilitated the participation of key partners from Senegal and Côte d’Ivoire and led national consultations, the outcomes of which directly inform the policy documents and action plan to be adopted at the conference. In cooperation with its partners, the project will also showcase good practices and address challenges related to information integrity through the following sessions: 
  

Whack-a-Mole: how do we ensure fact-checking survives the current existential crisis?  examines the future of fact-checking as tech giants and donor agencies withdraw critical support, threatening the sustainability of independent verification efforts—especially in regions like West Africa. The panel includes representatives of Pesacheck, SoleilCheck, CJRS and CESTI 

 Fake News – Real Money: the ‘digital mercenaries’ who profiteer from information manipulation  explores the hidden economics behind disinformation and the influence-for-hire industry, highlighting the critical role of addressing ‘dark money’ that fuels hate speech and manipulative content. Panelists Justin Arenstein (Code for Africa) and Katharina Lobeck (GIZ’s Strengthening Information Integrity in West Africa) will discuss strategies to disrupt these covert operations and strengthen information integrity in West Africa and beyond. 

Weaponised Words: how do we combat transnational extremist polarisation, incitement and hate speech?  focuses on combating digital incitement and radicalization by exploring grassroots early warning systems and community-based peacebuilding efforts. Frontline practitioners from Code for Africa, Resilience for Peace, Search for Common Ground, GRADEC, and Conseil National du Laïcat share successful local strategies to counter hate speech and online extremism, emphasizing the importance of context-specific approaches over external solutions. 

Regulatory Innovation Incubator: Learning from emerging promising practices in the regulation of digital platforms from across the globe  highlights innovative, design-centered regulatory approaches to digital platform governance in West Africa, emphasizing prosocial technology and resilience. It promotes regional peer learning by drawing on global best practices to develop a roadmap aligned with UNESCO’s Model Policy on Information Integrity. The panel will include representatives from Search for Common Ground, RIARC, REFRAM, ANP, and CORED. 

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Under the motto ‘The new Federal Government invites you’, we warmly welcome all visitors to the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development in Berlin on Saturday 23 and Sunday 24 August 2025, between 10:00 and 18:00.

Join us for a rare glimpse inside Berlin’s oldest high-rise – the iconic Europahaus – home to the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development. Enjoy fair coffee with a stunning 11th-floor view over the city.

Expect inspiring round-table talks on global challenges like poverty, migration, and development – with Federal Minister Reem Alabali Radovan attending on Saturday, 23 August.

Explore interactive exhibits from BMZ and its partners, dive into the topic “Why international cooperation”. digital.global will also be presenting its activities on site, together with the political initiatives Fair Forward and Govstack.

The visit is free of charge and no registration is required.

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In July, UNDP and Data2Policy on behalf of BMZ Data Lab organised a session to unite policy makers from around the globe and exchange perspectives on the contributions of policymaking to the SDGs on the sidelines the High-level Political Forum on Sustainable Development (HLPF) in New York.

Together with UNDP, Data2Policy co-hosted the event “Data to Policy: In the Age of Polycrisis“. The event elevated diverse perspectives from thought leaders in the innovation and policy space, including representatives from UNDP, BMZ, the governments of Guatemala and Ethiopia and LinkedIn, providing real-world examples and learnings from the Global South.

The event further saw the launch of the Data to Policy Champions; a global community of government officials advancing data-driven policymaking to institutionalize data use, build strong data cultures, and leverage emerging technologies like AI for the public good.

Three key takeaways from the event:

• Responsible use of innovation (and AI) can open up new avenues for governments to shape policies that are both inclusive and sustainable.
• If used responsibly and strategically, data can drive progress on all SDGs.
• In times of growing crises, global learning and communities remain among the most effective tools for resilience and progress.

The full event recording can be accessed here:
zur Aufzeichnung des Events

The ‘Creative Bureaucracy Festival’ (CBF) will take place in Berlin on 5 June 2025. This conference will bring together representatives from administration, politics, civil society and science to rethink administration and present creative approaches to solving social challenges.

German development cooperation is actively represented in the CBF programme and addresses the following questions: How can data and artificial intelligence (AI) support policymaking in tackling global challenges? And what do innovative approaches look like in practice?

Link to Festival Website

Together with the Data Labs of the German Federal Ministry of Transport (BMV) and the Federal Ministry of Education, Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth (BMBFSFJ), the BMZ Data Lab is organising the following events:

Interactive Panel: Game Changer Data—How Data Labs Make Smarter Policies

11 AM – 12 PM CEST | Transformation Stage

Innovative approaches and applications developed by the data labs of BMZ, BMV, and  BMBFSFJ for the German administration will be demonstrated. The Federal Chancellery’s data lab will also be part of the event, presenting the role of data labs in ministerial administration.

LINK to the PANEL

Workshop: Translating Data into Policy—Mapping Challenges, Crafting Solutions

12 – 13:30 PM CEST | Forum

Following the panel, participants can learn how data can be incorporated into political decision-making processes through practical use cases in the workshop, organised by the GIZ global project Data2Policy. The aim: to make policy more transparent and evidence-based.

LINK to the WORKSHOP

The UNESCO Conference on ‘Capacity Building on AI and Digital Transformation in the Public Sector’ will take place from 4–5 June in Paris to address capacity-building needs for public sector officials related to artificial intelligence (AI), digital technologies, and data governance. Over the course of two days, panels, keynotes and interactive sessions will bring together stakeholders to foster multi-stakeholder, multilateral digital cooperation and discuss how the global digital transformation can be advanced through capacity building of a key sector—civil servants.

Panel: ‘AI policy in practice: AI & data governance from the ground up’

June 5 | 12 AM–1 PM CEST | UNESCO Headquarters and online via livestream

Opening remarks by Yannik Sassmann from the Data Lab of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) will set the scene for a panel discussion moderated by Deshni Govender from the FAIR Forward initiative. A highlight will be the launch of the AI Policy Playbook, which was jointly produced by the Africa-Asia AI Policymaker Network and GIZ.

François Fonteneau from PARIS21 and Maxwell Ababio from Ghana’s Data Protection Commission will explore inclusive and fair AI implementation in the public sector drawing on the AI Policy Playbook and a series of policy briefs produced by PARIS21. The conversation will invite questions from the floor so that participants can test the ideas against their own national contexts.

Join the Livestream here Conference Website

Hands-On Workshop: ‘The AI advantage: Smarter data, smarter decisions’

June 6 | half-day workshop | OECD Boulogne

The discussion will continue in a more hands-on format on 6 June 2025, when PARIS21 hosts the half-day workshop ‘The AI advantage: Smarter data, smarter decisions’ at the OECD premises in Boulogne, Paris. Guided by facilitators from PARIS21 and the BMZ Data Lab, policymakers will work through simulations, data-mapping exercises and generative-AI demonstrations designed to sharpen their evidence-informed decision-making skills.

Spots are allocated on a first-come, first-served basis. Secure your spot here:

Workshop Registration

The Hamburg Sustainability Conference (HSC) is a global gathering of leaders and changemakers from governments, international organisations, businesses, civil society, and academia. Together, they co-create innovative solutions for a sustainable and fair future. The next conference is scheduled for 2-3 June 2025.

HSC is organised by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the Michael Otto Foundation and the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg.

One of the focus areas of the HSC is responsible artificial intelligence (AI) and digitalisation. This initiative promotes responsible and accessible AI that fosters sustainable development, is human-centered, advances gender equality and protects the climate and environment. During the 2024 conference, UNDP, BMZ and partners announced a global platform to harness the potential of responsible AI for sustainable development.

Key milestones include:

• Agreement on shared principles for the human-centric design and use of AI to support the SDGs.
• The launch of the AI SDG Compendium, a global database showcasing how AI can contribute to sustainable development.

The upcoming Hamburg Declaration on Responsible AI for the SDGs represents a collaborative effort to define how AI can create meaningful development outcomes for all. The Declaration promotes an optimistic vision: fostering equal partnerships across all sectors and societies, with a special emphasis on empowering emerging communities. It includes a set of voluntary commitments endorsed by a diverse group of stakeholders and will be finalised at the 2025 HSC.

more InformationWatch 2024’s Panel