Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) is increasingly being recognised as a key enabler of modern economies, enabling financial inclusion, governance efficiency, and digital innovation. If DPI is the future, debates on DPI must spread to the mainstream, and enter discussions about the future societies decide to pursue.
This roundtable will bring to the Clermont Innovation Week 2025 a sampler of discussions originating across the global South and the global North, starting from India, on the topic, to engage local, national and international actors around this emerging new paradigm. The event is designed as an accessible conversation open to the general public, aimed at spreading the awareness about the promise, the reality and the implications of DPI as a new building block of our states, economy and society.
The event will focus on the following questions:
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What does Digital Public Infrastructure look like? What justifies the use of this new term, after decades of debates on digitalisation?
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What do we know about the socio-economic impacts of DPI, based on the experience of countries in the global South where it is spreading rapidly?
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What does DPI and its promise mean to different actors in our society, including the private sector, government, and civil society, in Europe?
The roundtable will engage a select group of speakers, and leave plenty of space for questions and answers with the audience.
MEET THE PANELISTS
Moderator:
- Jean-Louis Arcand, President, Global Development Network (link to bio)
Speakers:
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Joël Cariolle, Researcher, Foundation for Studies and Research on International Development (FERDI) (link to bio)
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Cecilia Emilsson, OECD Directorate for Public Governance, Digital Government, OECD (link to bio)
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Sabrine Tebessi, Digital Project Manager at AFD (link to bio)
BACKGROUND READING
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The work of the Global Development Network on the socio-economic impacts of DPI
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The work of Co-Develop on mainstreaming DPI across sectors and countries
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Digital public infrastructure for digital governments, a Policy paper by OECD
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Accessible contributions on the existing research on DPI on the blog GlobalDev
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Mobile Phones and Development in Africa: Does the Evidence Meet the Hype?, a book by FERDI’s Chaire Confiance Numérique
