South-South Learning Gateway on Social Protection

This initiative uses information and communication technology (ICT) to expand the knowledge base and capacities of developing countries to design and implement nationally owned poverty reduction strategies, bridging the gaps between theory, policy, and practice with social protection information, as well as providing a space where practitioners can share ideas, experiences, and resources. This online collaborative tool is an effort to create open, independent networks to exchange experiences across regions and countries. The website has been set up as a "virtual bookcase" with a searchable database of social protection materials from across the world. The collection includes tools, case studies, policy papers, and research. In addition to the library, there is a section featuring a social protection mapping of developing countries.

Social Protection, Intercultural Communication.

The idea of the website has its roots on the Africa-Brazil Cooperation Programme on Social Protection, which started in 2008 to support the development and implementation of effective social protection policies and foster South-South learning with partner African countries. At that moment, the cooperation was in need of effective channels that would help on sharing its findings, including more actors on the debate and enabling other developing countries to learn and contribute with their own experiences. The response to that demand was designed throughout a year, and has been globally launched in the shape of an internet gateway as described above.

Social protection in this gateway is understood as a range of policies which help to protect people in situations of vulnerability, with a view to empowering them to lead their own lives according to their choices. Vulnerability may arise due to loss of income, old age, disability, sickness, or early childhood. Click here to read more.