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Sense making sessions in field

March 2022

The ALC team visited the Maldives Social Innovation Platform, a project that is being developed together with the UNDP Accelerator Labs in Maldives. During the visit, possible areas of collaboration with key agents have been identified, all related to the needs identified in the deep listening process.

According to the Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI, 2019) data for the Maldives, almost one third of the population is multidimensionally poor. This is higher for women, old people, people with disabilities and those living in remote areas of the atolls. With the evolution of the Covid-19 pandemic, and with the Maldivian economy deeply affected by the high dependence on the tourism sector, this economic growth has become vulnerable and the economic and social inequalities have widened, especially for women . In line with this, as almost half of Maldives’ population and more than 70 percent of its critical infrastructure lie within 100 meters of its shoreline and this close proximity to the ocean makes the island nation a prime location for the Blue Economy (refers to the sustainable use of ocean resources for economic growth and better lives) has been selected as main entry point within the SIP Maldives and Future of Work.

During the last year, ALC has developed, in collaboration with UNDP Accelerator Labs & UNDP Maldives, a listening process in 20 islands. In this process, the narratives that are operating in the territory have been collected, that is, the underlying values and behaviors, as well as the emerging needs and challenges, to take into account in future actions for the economic recovery of the country.

Starting from the listening process developed last year, the Platform agents organized different face-to-face sessions of collective interpretation. These sessions consist of sharing the results of the listening process with a wider local community, in order to contrast and enrich them. Each sensemaking session happens after the completion of each listening iteration. The objective is to share the challenges and opportunities identified with the agents and representatives of the community , so we can gather ideas of what is missing.

 

 

 

Sense making sessions

On March 22, the first collective interpretation session took place at B. Goidhoo. Different people from the community and key agents came from three islands of the Baa atoll (Goidhoo, Fehendhoo, Fulhadhoo), where the listening process took place in December. Participants included members of the council, the women’s development committee, members of local tourism, local NGOs and the women’s and youth community, who contrasted the profiles presented and discussed possible solutions in the framework of the future work. An important thematic focus has been the empowerment of youth and women, sustainable tourism and blue economy.

 

 

 

 

On March 24, the second collective interpretation session was organized with local agents from Dhiraagu (main telecom company in the country), Women in Tech, Business Center Corporation (BCC), Maldives Authentic Crafts Cooperative Society (MACCS), Ministry of Economic Development and UNRCO in Male, the country’s capital. In this session they shared the main challenges and opportunities in relation to the existing initiatives that operate in the Maldives. Thanks to the collective interpretation sessions, it has been confirmed that the Maldives has the capacity to transform and, more importantly, that the community is collectively committed to achieving it.

With the information collected in the listening and collective interpretation sessions, as well as in the field visit, the main thematic areas identified in the Social Innovation Platform on the Future of Work in the Maldives are the following:

• Youth and women empowerment

• Sustainable tourism (community tourism and traditional livelihood activities)

• Blue economy (fisheries, marine ecosystem)

These three thematic areas are interconnected and correspond to all challenges and opportunities identified. The portfolio that will be generated from these conclusions will include interventions and initiatives at 5 different levels that address all the thematic areas, which will be worked on in the next co-creation sessions.

Areas of opportunity identified

Most existing initiatives in the Maldives operate at the community level and aim to empower youth and women. Depending on each island, there are initiatives that address skills development and training programs. However, and as confirmed in the collective interpretation sessions, these initiatives don’t have a significant long-term impact. Vocational training courses are needed to facilitate entry into the labor market. As for other thematic areas related to sustainable tourism and the blue economy, traditional agriculture, fishing and domestic work are the main activities that lack a fixed market system. The opportunity to interconnect traditional subsistence activities with the tourism value chain as a form of local community development has been identified.

To do this, there’s a list of initial ideas that could be considered for the co-creation process of new prototypes in these 5 levels of intervention. Once we have collectively devised these new actions, we will prioritize and co-design their routes to start prototyping (prototyping allows us to evaluate and correct them in real time). All of them need to be integrated and conceptualized as an interconnected portfolio.

Among the large-scale productive and business projects with a community component, such as SEEDs and the MEERY project are a good example that could be replicated in other atolls, since some of them currently concentrate their activities in one atoll or specific island.

The interconnection of these initiatives and cross-sector collaboration are crucial to achieve a sustainable impact. On the other hand, it should be noted that during the collective interpretation sessions, a space for collaboration and joint discussion was created where the participants showed their enthusiasm for the next phase of the Platform. These types of sessions could be a great opportunity to bring together different stakeholders and try to find the best way to combine their competitiveness with collaboration.

ALC also visited the island of Fulhadhoo together with the local UNDP Maldives team, where we were able to speak with home-based workers, marine activists and other members of the community. The visit made it possible to see up close the activities of the community on the islands and deepen the listening carried out in the last year.

Next steps

  • Deeper listening. A second iteration of interviews and channels that enrich the listening process. After the first co-creation sessions, missing information will be identified and the second iteration of interviews will be designed accordingly.
  • To systematize open spaces for deliberation and collective interpretation. 
  • A co-creation process based on profiles, in order to build a portfolio of multilevel initiatives focused on people.