>> MODERATOR: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. I'm announcing that the NRI session will start in five minutes.

>> MARILYN CADE: Ladies and gentlemen, we are going to get started. So, again I'm going to make a plea to you. Please move as far down front as you can. The acoustics and the lighting will be much improved for us to be able to see you. So if it's not too convenient, if some of you that are in the back don't mind, move down closer to the front. The first two rows here are reserved for the speakers, and you'll see their tent cards, but any other seat behind that, we'd love to have you move closer, and we'll get started in three minutes.

My name is Marilyn Cade. I'm acting as the floor manager for the NRI session, which means I may come and solve technical problems on the floor at any point, but let me ‑‑ I'm going to turn this over to our two co‑moderators. I just want to remind everyone that this session is going to be very fast‑paced, and the speakers will be speaking for a very short, concise statements before we go to the Q and A period, and you will be able to ask questions during that period using the microphone that is in front of you, which will light up.

We will be relying on being able to recognize that you have raised your hand to ask a question. So bear with us during the Q and A period to make sure we get all of your questions. When we get to that period, we'll take all of the questions at one time, and then we will allocate the responses. You will have no more than one minute to ask a question, not a statement but a question. Please make sure that you can write out your question so you can be concise and we can get to as many questions as possible. That's the logistics.

I would like to turn it over to our co‑moderators, Ambassador Benedicto Fonseca and Anja Gengo.

>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you, Marilyn. Let me start by welcoming you to this session and to state that it's a great honor and privilege to co‑moderate this session. Being from Brazil, we take pride in the Internet governance for the model we have adopted in Brazil back in 1995, which precedes in 10 years the World Summit Information Society recommendation that this should be the way to address Internet governance. It's a great pleasure for me. And also being from government, from the diplomatic career, I should say it has been a learning experience all those years working in a multi-stakeholder ambiance. This has convinced me of the value and the strength of the model towards making good on the promise that Internet governance brings to all of us.

With those very brief words, I would like to turn to my co‑moderator to guide us through and set the stage for this session.

Anja, please?

>> ANJA GENGO: Thank you very much, Ambassador Fonseca. Thank you very much for joining this very important session that was prepared over the course of a couple of months by more than a hundred national, regional, and youth IGFs on a very important topic. I would also like to thank on behalf of the NRIs to the Ambassador Fonseca for giving us this honor to be with all of us today.

Let us very briefly open this session with learning maybe a bit more for those that are not familiar. Who are the national, regional, and youth IGFs, as we use the acronym NRIs? And what do they do? What is the value of the very large network? So I hope that you can see the slides that the Secretariat ‑‑ IGF Secretariat prepared.

Maybe to start from the very beginning, from the origin and background of the NRIs in relation to the IGF. As you know, the IGF stems its mandate from the agenda from the paragraph 72 where there is no specific call for something that we call the National Regional and Youth IGFs. Yet, they exist. They exist as organic initiatives that spontaneously started emerging since 2006, since the beginnings of the IGF itself. The IGF Secretariat started the formal recognition process in a bottom up manner in collaboration with two NRIs from 2011. And we'll come later to the final records of the currently existing NRIs.

What do the NRIs do? Probably given the fact that you're here at the IGF, you are aware of what the IGF is doing and what are the principles, the core values, that the IGF adheres to. There is no difference when it comes to the NRIs. They all adhere to the same principles. They are multi-stakeholder. They are bottom up, open, inclusive, transparent and non‑commercial in establishing the IGF processes for discussing the Internet governance pertaining methods on a level of a country or region.

There's the NRI tool kit, which is a very important document developed in a bottom‑up manner by all NRIs that describes better these principles and procedures.

Thanks to the NRIs, this is the only still document that is available to all six official U.N. languages on the IGF website.

Today, as you can see, we're speaking about a very large group of countries and regions that have their own successful IGF processes. In 2011, we started with 37 NRIs. Today at this present moment, we're speaking about 111 officially recognized NRIs.

As you can see, we have now 80 countries that are running their processes, seventeen regions that are running their IGF processes. There are huge communities on a level of country and region that are particularly trying to engage young people in Internet governance discussions. And currently six countries are under formation, and we're trying to finalize altogether these processes.

In this year, more than 70 IGFs happen. They were all very much successful. And on the IGF website, we do share their annual reports where you can learn more about their valuable meetings.

As you can see, geographically speaking, there is a well‑balanced coverage when it comes about the presence of the national and regional IGFs across continents or if you want across the U.N. regional group, which is how we track the number.

The NRI's process in being integrated into the IGF annual program was a journey. Today I think we can speak about several very important segments of their integration. The first one is this main session that we are currently organizing. It is focused, as you know, on the evolution of Internet governance, and the topic was agreed in a bottom‑up manner by all NRIs.

There are also five collaborative sessions where NRIs try to work on a topic of mutual interest, respecting the regional diversity. So far three happen. I think we have two more in the schedule, and I encourage you to look at the IGF schedule and attend these very interesting sessions.

The NRI's coordination session is probably ‑‑ long‑term speaking about the objectives that the NRI, as a network, would like to achieve ‑‑ the most important session for the NRIs, but I would say for the wider IGF ecosystem. It will happen today at half past 1:00 in Room 2. You are all very much invited and welcome to join. This is an open work meeting between all the NRIs, between the chair of the MAG, between the interest of MAG members, between the representatives of the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, and between the IGF Secretariat.

We will be discussing how the NRIs can improve the IGF, help advance the process, and how the IGF can help the NRIs. There's the NRI's joint booth at the IGF Village. It's a meeting point of all NRIs with external stakeholders, and I hope you will stop by to chat a bit with the NRIs. And, of course, I also spend some time there.

 And, finally, very importantly, the NRIs are probably the largest group that collectively and individually contributes to the IGF's intercessional work, best practice forums, and connecting and enabling the next billion but also advises on how the process can be approved. That would be very quickly about the NRIs.

I would like to turn to Ambassador Fonseca to officially open up the substantial part of the session.

>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you. We will address four sets of questions. Those questions, the substance was chosen by the NRIs themselves. So in order to allow for very substantial exchange and very focused exchange, I would like just to remind the intent and the need for us to be very strict with the time limits of 90 seconds for each intervention.

So I will read out the first question, which is examples from the NRIs on how the application of the multi-stakeholder model to discuss Internet governance‑related matters contributed to the development of Internet governance.

 Is there an impact on policies from the Internet Governance Initiatives?

 First to speak on this topic will be Brazil IGF followed by Nigeria and UK IGF.

 Brazil, you have the floor, sir.

>> FLAVIO WAGNER: Ambassador Benedicto. So the Brazilian IGF is organized by CGI.br, the Brazilian Internet Steering Committee, which is a multi-stakeholder body in charge of recommending standards and guidelines for the development and use of the Internet in the country. And under that umbrella mission, CGI also runs many other public interests, activities, and projects that are related to Internet governance.

The Brazilian IGF already issued its eighth edition this year. It was held last week in the city of Goiania, and within its history, the forum was held in different regions of Brazil, always attracting hundreds of attendees. The forum has plenty of great achievements in its history, and I will highlight some of them here, which will illustrate how its multi-stakeholder model brought very concrete contributions to public policies in Brazil.

As a first example, the forum was an important platform in a discussion of the main Internet regulation framework in Brazil, a law known as Marco Civil serving as a fundamental arena for debates and society mobilization to influence legislative proceedings. Government representatives participated in forum with other stakeholders to learn about society's expectations and to interact with multiple actors before and after the approval of the law.

 The second edition of the forum held the first public reading of a Marco Civil drafted report by a representative of the Brazilian parliament. As an additional example, the fourth edition of the forum was a very important moment for evaluating the Net Mundial event held in Brazil in 2014. In that year, the Brazilian IGF took place right after Net Mundial and became the main arena where the local stakeholders discussed the Net Mundial results, dynamics, and challenges.

As a third example, in 2015, civil society individuals and organizations gathered at the fifth Brazilian Internet Forum, consolidated a final statement on the future of Internet in Brazil where stakeholders expressed all their concerns about policy and regulation of the Internet in the country, especially with regard to governmental decree that was about to be approved at the regulation of Marco Civil roles envisioned in the law previously enacted.

As a final example, in 2017, the forum was the main stage for a national public consultation on the Brazilian Internet Governance model with an all‑day long public hearing dealing with the consultation access.

 Also in 2017, the event was an important place to foster the multi-stakeholder dialogue on privacy and data protection issues. Also serving as a platform for disclosing a civil society campaign about privacy and personal data. Those activities were crucial at that time. Ongoing discussions of the Brazilian Privacy Data Protection Bill which was finally approved in 2018 by the Brazilian parliament.

 Thank you.

>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you, Brazil. Thank you for providing those examples on how the National IGF has been closely linked to developments taking place in Brazil in regard to Internet governance.

Next on my list is Nigeria. You have the floor, sir.

>> MARY UDUMA: Okay. Thank you, Ambassador. I am Mary Uduma from Nigeria Internet Governance Forum. First, I want to say that the Nigerian Internet Governance Forum MAG is composed of people from the ministry, private sector, civil society, academia, and technical committee. That is the first. And it's endorsed by the Ministry of Communication which supervises the ICT industry.

2015 recommendations made by Internet Governance Forum, Nigeria Internet Governance Forum, led to the establishment of a task force that would look at all the recommendations and implement them. Some of them have turned to policies in our country.

The model is now adopted in child online protection process. So there's a multi-stakeholder model coming together to look at the policies and programs of the child online protection in Nigeria. Then the separate security policy and strategy was a multi-stakeholder process. So all the players, actors, were there to be able to make contributions to that.

There are stakeholder engagements that nowadays, in whatever Nigeria does, policy development, they want to invite many people to be a part of it. As to date, there's a separate group on data protection, GDPR, and is a multi-stakeholder program. In regulating, the regulator cannot complete a regulation without inviting all of that so a multi-stakeholder model is also accepted.

Policies on our .ng (?) is a multi-stakeholder process. When the .gov.ng policy was developed, that is the one that would involve the government. The government had to invite the stakeholders to be part of that process. Thank you.

>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you, Nigeria. Thank you, Madam, for giving those concrete examples. They are very constructive of the value of the National IGF.

U.K. is next on my list.

>> NICK W. SMITH: Thank you, Ambassador. My name is Nick W. Smith. I'm representing the Secretariat for the UK Internet Governance Forum. Our National IGF for the United Kingdom is a multi-stakeholder discussion forum. We have participants from many parts of civil society but also importantly from business and from government. So we have the Internet Society Local Chapter. We have the British Computer Society, and we have sort of leading consultancies and opinion formers as part of our organizing committee.

We are, obviously, a discussion forum. We don't formulate policy or set recommendations for our government. So I think the first question speaks about what examples have there been of direct impact on policy. We can't say that there has been a direct impact on policy, but what we can say is we're in the same room as our government which does make the laws in the U.K., and we do have discussions with them.

And so if we look at the modern sort of scandals and topical issues in the U.K., we talk about Cambridge Analytica and Facebook. In the last years of IGF, we did actually have a panel including representatives from Facebook where they could explain their position and be subjected to questions from everybody, including civil society and government actors as well. So it's a very open and transparent process, free to access. Anyone can attend. And topical issues are obviously given full oxygen and light.

And we don't know yet what is going to be the response in terms of the policy on those difficult questions, similarly Russian funding of the Brexit referendum. That was another topic of discussion last year. We know these are in debate and discussion, and there will be initiatives come forward and put forward by our government, and we do know that the people making those decisions will have been at the Internet Governance Forums. So there will be a direct impact, even if it's quite a small one.

Thank you.

>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you, U.K. Although you said there is no maybe direct link, but we can see from your report, they are relevant to the work being done in this context. I also commend you for that.

I will turn for my co‑moderator to guide us through the next question.

>> ANJA GENGO: So it goes without a doubt that we all face challenges, and that is the focus of the second policy question that reads: What are the challenges we face while engineering or developing and implementing the multi-stakeholder model for discussing the Internet governance pertaining matters?

And on this very complex question, I would like to invite the colleagues from the Asia‑Pacific Regional IGF to share their inputs.

>> YANNIS LI: Thank you, Anja. This is Yannis from the Secretariat of the Asia Pacific Regional IGF. I also would like to speak on behalf of the Asia Pacific Youth IGF as well on this topic.

So we mentioned last year as well when we talk about the access. So in terms of in the Asia Pacific region, there are actually the cultural and social factors that played a very strong role in it. So this year we had our ninth meeting in a Pacific Island in Vanuatu. Vanuatu is the Pacific Island. And so we witnessed that there are some Pacific cultures there that they will adopt a very traditionally hierarchical approach when it comes to the decision‑making processes and discussions. So there are some challenges with how the society and the public can participate in these discussions and also the gender inequality issues as well that we solved there.

And particularly with the youth participants, the Pacific Island participants, they also highlight that there's a need for increased access, education, and the capacity effort because many of them actually were unaware what the Internet actually was and how it worked so let alone how the governance were managed. Since most of them there, their experience with Internet is only with specific platforms that they could use and limited to that. So therefore if we need a true engagement, we need some knowledge and capacity in order for a meaningful engagement to happen.

Thank you.

>> ANJA GENGO: Thank you very much, the APrIGF.

If we could move to the Colombia IGF to see if whether you share the same inputs or you have differences.

>> JULIAN CASABUENAS: Thank you, Anja. I will speak in Spanish.

During the fifth Internet Governance Forum in Colombia, there was a dialogue on challenges to many stakeholders. In order to answer the question of the political influence with the participation of representatives of government organizations, universities, private sector, and civil society, each of the sectors reported on the challenges that it faced. From the private sector, the main challenge has to do with the model of multiple stakeholders and their ability to have an impact on public policy. In general, there's a framework of recognition for Internet governance and how to improve the dialogue and strengthen the dialogue and how to organize in order to discuss with society in an organized way for the construction of public policy in addition to the constitutional framework so that those policies are accepted by the multiple stakeholders.

From the government's point of view it's recognized that one of the challenges was to achieve participation by many sectors in defining public policy. However, it's important clearly to say that it is a multi-stakeholder model. For example, a single civil society organization cannot represent all of civil society. It is therefore important to strengthen the bodies in which the multi-stakeholder approach is expressed and the implications on Internet governance should reach the different stakeholders, train them, and invite them to participate so that more voices could be heard from.

From the university point of view, the main problem is lack of knowledge on the Internet. It's important to raise as a challenge how to integrate the different regions of the country and how to reach the public that's impacted and how to involve them in participation. It's important to involve universities to a greater extent in the definition of public policy to achieve cooperation between public and private universities.

And when it comes to governments, the participation of different faculties is essential. When it comes to groups of youth, there is a lack of confidence on the part of youth due to a lack of experience. However, this has begun changing. There are young people who cannot participate for financial reasons, which limits the activities that require content creation or the provision of meeting rooms.

The Internet should address subjects of interest for the youth, for example, cybersecurity, the blockchain, social networks. All that needs to be addressed in order to build new capacity and draw the attention of the youth. From the civil society, it should be recognized that models of representativity are at times empty who are the representatives of those who aren't connected of people in remote areas. Often these are the populations that are in greatest need of public policy.

The Internet government initiative should have ‑‑

     >> MODERATOR: ‑‑ floor monitor role and comment that we really need the comments to be limited to 90 seconds so we can get to the rest of our colleagues.

 And, if we could, move to the next speaker.

>> ANJA GENGO: Thank you. Maybe, Julian, you can wrap up in the 10 seconds if there's something that should be also addressed.

Thank you very much. I do think that you raise very important points, capacity building,raising awareness. How do you ensure that you have full inclusivity in the country or region is very difficult and challenging, but I know, for example, the Italian IGF is rarely in the capital of the country for those reasons.

So can we hear from the Italian IGF colleagues on this?

>> FRANCESCO PIRRO: Good morning. My name is Francesco Pirro, and I work for Italian digital agency that (?) remote IGF initiative. In the past years, the debate on Internet governance in Italy, while based on a multi-stakeholder approach, was limited to a specific number of reference. In 2018, there have been efforts to have an event that would be more adherent to international principles of openness, transparency, and inclusiveness. It was a day zero event dedicated to Italian Youth IGF initiative and a general effort of a greater involvement of the underage citizen. The results have been positive with 22 workshop proposals presented with a bottom‑up process, but there are still challenges. These are: One, add more donors and funds for the events. Without funds, the forum cannot grow and reach its potential.

Two, they need for better communication and advertisement of the event through platform in order to increase awareness.

Three, better involvement of high‑level politicians and government representatives.

Four, availability of tools and platform for spreading Internet Governance topic and collecting the results from the debate.

Thank you.

>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you. We will continue hearing statements in regard to the second policy question. I have on my list Japan followed by LACIGF and Southeastern Europe IGF.

I'd like to just recall the ground rules that were set by you were that it should be restricted to 90 seconds to ensure time for all of you to intervene.

So, Japan, you have the floor.

>> KEISUKE KAMIMURA: Thank you, Ambassador. My name is Keisuke Kamimura. I am professor at Tadunki University in Tokyo. I am speaking here to represent Japan IGF.

We have, of course, many challenges, but I don't run through all of them. Let me focus on one issue which is of much importance to my observation.

The challenge for us is scalability and engagement. As the IGF and NRIs are coming to embrace a variety of issues, particularly newer technology driven policy issues. The substance of the policy discussion can be highly technical and specific. NRIs may not provide the best opportunity for discussion and decision making. We already have, in Japan, thematic policy groups and forum, whether official or not, who may better deal with these specific issues.

This is particularly true in national Internet governance context where you need to discuss specific details considering local regulatory, industry, and societal environment. As a result, it may be difficult to have a peak national and regional forum dealing with all the Internet governance pertaining issues. For the last several months in Japan, we have seen an extensive discussion over the introduction of network level blocking of heresy content. The discussion was conducted in a multi-stakeholder manner, but it took place out of sync with a traditional NRI format.

I do not mean to say that all initiatives should come under one umbrella, but we need to engage. We, as an NRI, need to engage and connect these thematic and other initiatives in a flexible and scaleable way and have them talk to us and to each other. NRI should ideally act as a contact point between the ‑regional voices and the global IGF.

Thank you very much.

>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you, Japan. Thank you for bringing to the discussion the need to make sure the complexity of the issues involved may require format that involves beyond the National IGF, other groups that will address thematic issues.

Next on my list is LACIGF followed by Portugal.

LACIGF representative can take the floor.

 If LACIGF is not ready to take the floor at this point, I'd like to turn to Portugal. You have the floor.

>> OLGA CAVALLI: Thank you very much. So we had the eighth Portuguese initiative of the IGF which took place in the city of Aveiro, Portugal on the 17th of October. Well, my challenge is several stakeholders have difficulties and characterize themselves, meaning in which a stakeholder group, they can be categorized. Different stakeholders don't cover IGF, so it's very difficult to replicate such discussions at national level. People discuss the several themes but not from the point of view of the governance. Even the governance of the Portuguese organizers is very difficult, being the financial component one of the challenges.

On the other hand, Internet governance is a difficult concept, and it is very difficult to attract people for the discussions. So scalability and engagement are great challenges as well. Eventually we don't try to find consensus as we are still at the stage where people seek to understand what the governance of the Internet is and what is expected from them. And we had this year eighth of the Portuguese initiative. Still, we have always messages coming from each Portuguese session on Internet governance, which I think it's a valuable thing.

Thank you.

>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you, my colleague and friend from Portugal, for your statement.

Last on my list for this policy question two, I was told Southeastern Europe will not intervene anymore, but in case the representative is in the room, I could give the floor, those with LACIGF.

So the last remaining speaker would be Chad. Chad, you have the floor.

>> ABDELDJALIL BACHAR BONG: Okay. Merci beaucoup, Monsieur Ambassador. Thank you very much, Mr. Ambassador. Executive secretary of IGF Chad. With respect to our contribution ‑‑ Let me cut right to the chase, respecting our contribution in awareness raising and engagement, during the IGF, we always organize workshops on cybersecurity, for example. The contribution of the Internet to communities, we had our first IGF in 2015. There was a lot of participation. We had crucial support from the Ministry of the post. There were nearly 483 participants. So we could see that there was a lot of enthusiasm in our country to the IGF.

The third meeting was held on November 27th, 2017, and that was on Internet governance in Chad. What is the system of Internet governance in Chad? We had support for the IGF Secretariat and other members. It was a total success. 200 participants, they learned about Internet governance, security, and eCommerce, which is very important to give more job opportunities to our youth.

After the first IGF, we set up a local organization with 23 members involving different ministries, the regulators, the academy, the University N'Djamena. In terms of specific problems, there's the problem of financing and also hosting. Where is the Secretariat to be hosted? That's a big problem. The Secretariat is currently hosted in Aouzou, Chad, but we're currently working with the ministry in order to get an official headquarters, which would lend greater weight to the IGF.

We have to organize training sessions as well for people willing to understand what the IGF is all about. We can share our experience of this meeting with the local community. We have to report back to the communities. We have to organize small training sessions with the different stakeholders. What is the impact of the government? What is the impact of the private sector? Involving the private sector is the real problem, particularly the mobile operators. If we have the support of the government and universities, well, they offer us rooms to hold our workshops.

So that is what I can add in a few words. Thank you very much.

>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Let me thank you for your comments. At this point to summarize all the comments we have been listening to, there will be a moment we'll do that.

I'd like, then, to turn to my co‑moderator to get us through question three.

>> ANJA GENGO: Thank you very much. So continuing with the third policy question, we will be discussing how can we improve the implementation of the multi-stakeholder model on international and regional levels. And we have quite a number of the NRIs that will share their valuable input with us.

So I advise that we start with the Spanish IGF.

>> ZORAIDA FRIAS: Thank you, Anja. My name is Zoraida Frias, and I'm here on behalf of the Spanish IGF. I would like to start with something that came up in our last meeting because we held a special session to celebrate our tenth anniversary. In that discussion, we were talking about ‑‑ well, throughout all the event, we were talking about our new and emerging technologies. So the concept I would like to introduce is the idea of technology governance. We were discussing whether we need to introduce this concept, like moving from Internet governance to technology governance.

We thought it would maybe be helpful to reach a wider audience working in emerging things that are not only identified with the Internet but with ‑‑ and I'm talking about artificial intelligence, blockchain, connected cars, and other emerging technologies. These technologies pose additional challenges for the multi-stakeholder model. In a moment, we are discussing if we need to move to more concrete outcomes.

 So that wouldn't be an easy path. So our view is that these technologies are out there, and we need to do something. So meanwhile, we may want to focus on developing light and flexible approaches to governing these new technologies, not only the Internet. In that regard, the Code of Conduct, something more general may be helpful.

Thank you.

>> ANJA GENGO: Thank you very much to the Spanish IGF.

If we could hear from the Ukrainian IGF now.

>> UKRAINE IGF: My name is (?). I work for (?) Intermusic Crane. I represent Ukraine IGF. The next year it will be 10 years since the first IGF Ukraine happened. We decided, as a commodity of IGF Ukraine, to transform the nature of the event to make it more appealing to the general public. In fact, this year, we conducted both IGF Ukraine and UCGF. It was two days of events, and we decided to name it under the brand of days of Ukrainian Internet, and still the core of the events were IGF in it's former and multi-stakeholder approach. But we decided is that if you're talking in public about IGF, nobody understands what is happening. It's very complicated name for the general public, and we wanted to bring more attention to journalists and human defenders new government institutions suggested to make it more popular branding for our events, and the core issues for the discussions in Ukraine were the issue of security and freedom.

There are more and more regulations of Internet. That's why stations which took place in Ukraine address the issues of technical part but also as the policy issue. There were a couple of stations regarding advocacy of free Internet, digital rights. That was for the first time when we raised these issues. As always, we talked about (?), child protection, and all the issues which shape Internet governance in Ukraine.

There were representatives of all stakeholders, including government agencies, IT community, and more and more civil society organizations participate in Ukrainian IGF.

Thank you.

>> ANJA GENGO: Thank you very much.

If we could maybe stay somehow within the region and move to the IGF for Southeastern Europe, SEEDIG.

>> SU SONIA HERRING: Hello. My name is Su Sonia Herring, and I'm a member of the SEEDIG executive committee. In response to the third policy question, what we're trying to do to improve the implementation of the multi-stakeholder model, first of all, we're working on improving our annual meetings to strengthen it as a platform for multiple stakeholders and specific discussions on more focused topics.

Also, we're increasing the content and the outreach of our capacity development programs which are towards youth, university students, master students, and professionals, working in digital policy and Internet‑related topics.

Also to engage with different countries in our wide region, we're working on road shows where we will organize events apart from our annual meetings that will focus on the topics which are on the agenda of specific countries in our region.

 And, finally, improving our outcomes, we already have specific messages from each topic and workshop that we have each year, but we want to make it more specific and evolve them into policy recommendations.

>> ANJA GENGO: Thank you very much, the SEEDIG, with this important message that we start from our homes, first of all.

Could we now move to Argentina IGF and just hear the improvements on that side of your national IGF?

>> CAROLINA AGUERRE: Yes. Thank you. My name is Carolina Aguerre. I'm a representative of the IGF Secretariat of Argentina, which has had three editions already.

In terms of the improvement of the multi-stakeholder model, in our experience, we see that connecting policy discussions with other national and regional IGFs is a relevant outcome to enhance the visibility of this multi-stakeholder model particularly because in many countries in South America, the idea of transparency and accountability in the policy development process is not embedded in many of these institutional developments.

And one thing we have discussed ‑‑ two things that we have discussed in the last year with great prominence is really to start focusing now on the National IGF as a process rather than as an event. We raised this already last year within this main session, but we are now really seeing that if we don't work in this format, we will become obsolete as an initiative because so many relevant Internet governance discussions are not being part and feeding into the National IGF process.

And, lastly, it's a difficulty to frame the interest of a particular stakeholder group within different themes. Sometimes we find that it might be a framework that is not necessarily working when you want to engage with certain Internet governance topics and saying, Oh, we have a representative from civil society here, and somebody from this other sector might not be the best way to promote a discussion, and maybe theme‑based discussions with experts and orientation to guide those discussions might be another interesting principle which we need to address in order to get more feedback but also to take into consideration the balance and the diversity that the multi-stakeholder model is a key asset of the multi-stakeholder Internet governance model.

Thank you very much.

>> ANJA GENGO: Thank you very much to the Argentina IGF.

We're going to go back to Europe since Europe is most interested to address this.

Belarus IGF.

>> BELARUS IGF: Thank you, Anja. My name is Helen (?). I represent the organizers of Belarus IGF, hosted by company.

Belarus IGF was held this year for the third time, and in our country we are overcoming the stereotype that Internet is the responsibility of only the technical community. Understanding of this fact that rising youth in our country gathers around 500 representatives of different stakeholder groups on the Belarus IGF each year.

Speaking about the improvement of multi-stakeholder model implementation, I would name three main points: Raise awareness, development of local IGF community, and enlisting the support of government authorities. These are the ways of improvement that are more than relevant for Belarus as well as for other initiatives that thought in the ways that we do.

Thank you.

>> ANJA GENGO: Thank you very much.

Going now to Armenia IGF.

>> LIANNA GALSTYAN: Thank you. My name is Lianna Galstyan. I'm from the Armenia IGF. This year we had our fourth annual meeting. We all in NRI network understand and value the importance of raising awareness and building capacity about the IGF and effectiveness of multi-stakeholder model, and we think a very good way of doing that is the schools on Internet governance. We have run already two editions of the schools in Armenia dedicated for the university students within the country. And the rewarding result was the actual involvement and participation of young people in the process of the National IGF. They are raising interests toward emerging issues in the region and the world.

Another important aspect is the collaboration between the IG initiatives in the region. We closely collaborate with our colleagues from the neighboring country, Georgia, by sharing the agenda with each other, speakers,delegates. We also collaborate successfully with colleagues from Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus. We coordinate the time of our annual meetings, share the good practices and success we've achieved and try to have a common understanding of the challenges we face in the region.

And this collaborative network lends to widening the applicability of the multi-stakeholder principle in various areas demonstrating the value of considering the views and interests of all stakeholders while taking decisions and leading towards new ideas and projects.

 Thank you.

>> ANJA GENGO: Thank you, very much, Armenia.

Our host country has a very good national process and the government is also very supportive, and I'm glad they are here with us. So we'll hear inputs from them.

>> FRANCE IGF: Yes. Thank you, Anja, for your organization.

I am the co‑chair of the organizing committee in France and Secretary General of the French Internet Society. We held our last IGF last July. The main issue was to ensure the participation of all.

Just to mention two initiatives that we took, first of all, to have a hack‑a‑thon on operational problems which was a way of operationalizing the initiative and calling on new initiatives to take part. We also asked each workshop to make concrete proposals for the digital future. That global forum 2018 is being held in Paris with strong support from the community.

The first issue was to publicize the specificity of the IGF and the very concept of Internet governance. In particular, this is why we felt it was important to espouse a multi-stakeholder model which makes it possible to draw links between the different national initiatives and to initiate a thorough cooperation and to allow for an open‑ended discussion that can bring forth new subjects and new questions which otherwise might have remain unknown. It is also a way of learning from other local initiatives, and, thus, initiating a comparative approach.

Finally, it's a way of bringing the local specificities to the global level. That's why in France we would like to make the IGF a central platform for exchange amongst the different stakeholders on the digital issues. In other words, a way of ensuring diversity of points of view.

 Thank you.

>> ANJA GENGO: Thank you very much to the France IGF. This policy question will be concluded by the inputs coming from the China IGF.

>> CHINA IGF: Thank you, Anja. My name is Lori (phonetic). I am from China IGF.

I will now switch to Chinese.

I want to thank the host country, France, for extending such a warm welcome to us all. We want to thank you for your cooperation. And, in fact, we're counting on all of us to cooperate to solve problems.

China has seen the democratization of the Internet, bolstering quality of life of Chinese people. However, deliberations are not in and of themselves. Our goal is to increase living standards in China. And we understand that there's a difference between different members. We don't want to export our standards. We recognize the fact that there's diversity across different countries. This is why we're in favor of the multi-stakeholder approach espoused by the IGF. This year the president, Xi Jinping, spoke of a multipartner, multi-stakeholder governance.

Governments, private enterprises, and civil societies all have a role to play. Members of all the mechanisms need some kind of platform for brainstorming, and 90 seconds for each and every one of us to report is not sufficient. We need a different mechanism that's more effective and more efficient. We need an Internet Governance Forum that allows and offers opportunities for greater cooperation.

A common problem we're all facing is financing NRIs, and we need some kind of mechanism to resolve that issue instead of counting on transfers of funds.

 Thank you.

>> ANJA GENGO: Thank you to the colleagues from China IGF.

This concluded the third question. I think you've sent very important messages that we should primarily improve the local levels, our homes, national levels, regional levels, and that's basically the key for improving the local IGF.

But I will turn to Ambassador Fonseca for the fourth question, which I think we probably don't have a better person to moderate this question because he's been with the IGF from the beginning.

>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you, Anja. That's very kind of you.

Actually, policy question four is more a theme for reflection than a question in itself. We'll hear four representatives speaking to that topic, which is: Multi-stakeholder model on a global level, current stages and recommendations for improvements.

We will hear Africa IGF, followed by EuroDIG, IGF‑USA, and Russia.

 First on my list, Africa IGF. You have the floor.

>> MAKANE FAYE: Good morning, everybody. My name is Makane Faye from the African Regional IGF.

We had an annual conference from 4 to 6 November in Khartoum, Sudan. On this question which is reflection as Ambassador Fonseca stated, we will start by saying that there is no need for a global government but for a global governance. In the past, the U.N. worked like a federation of governments as it was a primary international (?) for governments to make decisions and collective action with little or no involvement from other stakeholders on the decision‑making process. However, this has been changing since 2002, even though the changes are slow. And we'll give examples.

The members of the NGO committee on financing for development who ultimately affirm their support for the multi-stakeholder financing for development follow‑up and implementation process set out in the (?) census. This will also (?) In the (?) Declaration. The purpose of the (?) census to fully include involvement of civil society was (?) repeated in other U.N. conferences.

 (?) The World Summit on Information Society stands out. After, the U.N. general assembly decided in Resolution 56 183, that this conference should be organized as a multi-stakeholder event. I think this was the first time this had happened. And the summit was labeled as innovation in critical juncture in global government. The underlying view was that the (?) provided an unprecedented design for political access of non‑(?) actors and decision‑making bodies (?) in the U.N. That has never happened before. And the U.N. being the only (?) Global organization, it surely embeds the WSIS model in history and provide and analytical framework for its generalization in the U.N. arena.

On the future of IGF, multi-stakeholder is growing in the U.N. This is held by all actors, including the U.N. Secretary General who indicated yesterday, You must be more than a multi-stakeholder. You must also be multidisciplinary.

 When talk about the future of IGF, I think the future is good clear. France has invited this year's conference. Next year, Germany has invited. This shows a sign for vitality and advance for IGF.

 In addition, the president ‑‑ the French president, Mr. Macron, had requested yesterday the U.N. Secretary General to make sure that the IGF is anchored at the highest level of the U.N. system. You have all heard that.

The secretary general wants to transform our platform to the IGF. Said, Discussions on Internet governance cannot just remain discussions. Policy and relevant normative frameworks must be developed to ensure impact. So I think if you hear what the Secretariat has said, we need to go further and make sure that we put up decisions which are implemented or used by (?).

Finally, he further indicated, You have support from UNDESA and from a wide community of regional and National IGFs. You can count on my support in this journey towards a prosperous and digital future. And, most of all, know that you are making a difference. So I think the future of IGF is clear.

Thank you.

>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you for your comments.

I'd like to turn immediately, in the interest of time, and hear comments from EuroDIG followed by IGF‑USA.

EuroDIG, you have the floor.

>> SANDRA HOFERICHTER: Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. My name is Sandra Hoferichter. I'm the Secretary General of EuroDIG, which is the European IGF. I would like to reflect on the current status and maybe give some recommendations for improvement, but I think this actually needs a broader discussion on the improvements.

I joined a lot of discussion about Internet governance and sustainability of the multi-stakeholder model this year, and I learned that in some languages, the term "Internet governance" is difficult to translate, even misunderstood or, even worse, it keeps people away from discussing it. "Governance" is just very close to "government," and this is really an issue in some languages.

Also, I found out that when discussing two people that are not in our governance bubble, it's hard to explain what we are actually doing; and so I started to change my language a bit, and what I found so far is we are shaping our digital future. It's a bit broader than just Internet governance. It includes all aspects like ethical, economical, technical, regulatory, but it's not limited to a network of computers, but it includes a human aspect and is also a bit forward‑looking.

I cannot yet tell you if I will ‑‑ if this change in terminology will help to attract more stakeholders to commit to the multi-stakeholder model. I'm just convinced that this model is the best to move forward with. In this respect, I want to urge all of us. We cannot miss one stakeholder group when developing our digital future.

The WSIS definition has not lost its actuality, and I would just read them again to recall this definition because I really think it's very important. Internet governance is the development and application by governments, the private sector, and civil society in their respective roles of shared principles, norms, rules, decision‑making procedures, and programs that shape the evolution and use of the Internet.

This definition leaves, of course, space for interpretation. For instance, what are the respective rules of stakeholder? Do we need for each discussion for each decision every stakeholder on the table? Or can this be distributed? But to define this question is part of the open‑ended multi-stakeholder process as well as to agree on the principles, norm, rules, and decision‑making procedures.

I think we, as the NRI, have the power to make a difference and make the outcomes of the IGF more relevant. I think we should build a bridge from one IGF to the other, in this respect, from Paris to the IGF in Berlin next year. EuroDIG as the regional forum will certainly be a pillar of that bridge, but such a bridge needs much more than one pillar to be stable. And, therefore, I call upon all NRIs to help making a difference.

How can we build a bridge? I have some ideas, but I continuing reaching out to my colleagues and getting more ideas. We have some tools with the message of best practice forums that allow for intercessional work.

And then the last point, I think we should also promote more actively the concrete examples, how corporations started at the national or regional IGF and bring that to the attention of others. The U.N. Panel on Digital Cooperation is just calling for input, and I think for us, as NRIs, that's a great opportunity to submit which kind of concrete examples came out of the national debate and would like to concrete action.

Thank you, very much.

>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you for your comments.

I turn to IGF‑USA.

>> MARILYN CADE: Thank you, Ambassador. My name is Marilyn Cade. I'm going to speak as the chief catalyst of IGF‑USA for the next 90 seconds.

I'm going to focus just specifically on the two questions that we were asked to consider and look ahead. There are many, many things that I could say, some of which are very consistent with what has been said; but I just want to make a very clear point that we understand at IGF‑USA that we're very different from any other national and also regional or subregional IGF just by nature of our location of being in North America and having a concentration of resources of think tanks and other entities that do not exist in a lot of other parts of the world.

We also have a very strong presence of technical corporations and other resources. That puts us in a very unique position sometimes to consider what the future holds.

The other thing that may be unique about us is that many of the policy representatives of major corporations work in any way that they are able to in the U.N. organizations when stakeholder engagement is allowed. So we tend to have a lot of presence and experts who are experienced in working with UNESCO UNDP, ITU, and on and on and on, which is a challenge in a lot of places where the business interest is not well‑developed enough to want to focus on also working at the global level. I think the functioning of the multi-stakeholder model in the U.N. context is, I would say, embryotic and varies from U.N. agency to U.N. agency. There's been some experimentation going on, and Ambassador Fonseca, himself, chaired two working groups at the Commission on Science and Technology for Development that were a pilot including stakeholders in a board that was previously government only.

But I think we're just at the real beginning stage of how we evolve the multi-stakeholder model for participation in the U.N. context. I do think the future of the IGF is at a stage when we all need to consider the changing Internet ecosystem around us. And, again, I'm speaking as a position that has been discussed within the IGF‑USA and consider what changes we can make while protecting the core that was the commitment of launching the IGF but also consider how the model evolves to be responsive and takes into account more inclusion, more participation, and particularly more informed participation and diversifies it and makes it more localized. We're not in a position to comment, at this point, on speeches that were made in only the last few days, but I am in a position to say that “we be gonna study it.”

 Thanks.

 (Switching captioners)

>> BENEDICTO FONSECA: Thank you, Marilyn. Thank you for your kind reference to previous work. And let me just comment briefly that I am very comfortable in working in the multilateral and multi-stakeholder setting, and I think we can just refer to the position the present Government takes on these.  There is no inherent contradiction, because we want to make sure that we can use the resources available.  And the same effort we make to bring more Government participation, multi-stakeholder performance, we bring into -- we invest in the same effort into trying to make multilateral performance also more permeate to the NonGovernmental Stakeholders.

So thank you very much for this reference. 

Last on my list would be Russia IGF.  And then I think my  co-moderator will guide us through the second part of our meeting. 

Russia, you have the floor.

>> RUSSIA:  Thank you.  I'll speak in Russian. 

Esteemed colleagues, the multi-stakeholder model is today , deservedly so, considered to be the best way for managing distributed structures at the global level.  In Russia, the Internet is developing, thanks to our talented engineers, our young people, and the Soviet School of Science.  As a result, we have services that are well-known far beyond Russia's borders.  Technology has a lot of potential for countering potential cyber threats.  However,  countering potential cyber threats requires technology companies, the Government, International organisations, and Civil Societies to act in concert and to communicate better. 

Russia is open for dialog.  All Russian stakeholders are taking a very active part in our efforts to cooperate with International organisations.  We are also working at the parliamentary level.  Our law enforcement authorities are cooperating with our international and foreign counterparts, and of course we are taking part in the work of International organisations, including the InterGovernmental Group of experts under the auspices of the UN.  We took part in the UNGA work and, in fact, Russia's Resolution on Governing the Internet was adopted just last week.  It calls on us to take into consideration the UN charter when regulating the Internet to combat cyberattacks and other illicit activities  carried out on the Internet. 

On many occasions we have heard proposals for a new cyber UN, a new International organisation working in cyberspace to protect us from attacks.  The Russian Federation has been an unswerving  supporter of efforts to discuss the idiosyncrasies of the Internet, especially efforts to counter cyberattacks.  And these efforts fall under the auspices of the UN, especially the ITU.  We believe that current efforts are insufficient, especially the role of the Government needs to be bolstered as we discuss these very sensitive, pivotal initiatives. 

Thank you very much. 

>> BENEDICTO FONSECA:  Thank you, Russia, for your statement. 

Anja? 

>> ANJA GENGO:  Thank you very much for the inputs.  The purpose is to learn from each other, and I think you gave a lot of subjects on this particular session.  We will be thinking more also in the future. 

We don't have a lot of time left, to be honest, in terms of the formal reserved time, but I think we can -- there is nothing after us, so we can stay a couple minutes more just to hear whether you have questions. 

Now we are opening the floor for the questions, including the speakers, and of course those that did not speak but would like to ask questions to the speakers.  Please raise your hands.  That will be easiest to follow the queue. 

And our floor manager is advising me that we may not be able to respond to all questions, but we will try to take all the questions at once, try to aggregate them, summarize them, and maybe respond to as many as possible. 

>> MARYILYN CADE:  Let me just remind you, because it's so dark in here, if you want to ask a question, I would suggest that you both wave and turn on your microphone so we can try to recognize you. 

>> ANJA GENGO:  Of course, you can also comment or suggest. 

I do see one hand there.  So we give the floor -- sorry, I don't see whether you have the nameplate.  Say your name and share your comments.

>> AUDIENCE:  Yes, please.  Hello?

Anja, I'm Amessinou Cossi from Benin.  I'm the Vice Chair of the Internet Governance Forum in Benin. 

It's very interesting to hear us discussing the challenges looming over us, future challenges, looming over Internet Governance. and the fact that we are doing this through different prisms.  As a representative of a Developing Country, we believe that we still need to think about who the Internet belongs to.  A governance participating in Civil Society discussions, the private sector believes that this doesn't concern them, because it's not about earning money.  So there are all sorts of assumptions that all of the players, all of the actors, harbor about each other.  Therefore, do you think that this model will remain viable unless we restore trust, or what we like to call trust?

After all, governments don't want to do any evil.  They don't want to harm the Internet.  They don't want to harm Civil Society.  Civil Society is, after all, acting in the public interest, which the Government also seeks to promote.  And as for businesses, businesses are the main service providers offering services to the populace at large.  Very often we're told that the Internet boils down to promoting the interests of us all.  But what about businesses?  Will businesses earn money by coming to the IGF?  We want to be able to respond to businessmen and women asking us this question.  What do businesses get coming to the IGF if they don't make additional revenue? 

Of course, States might be reassured that the IGF addresses issues related to the state sovereignty. 

>> ANJA GENGO:  Thank you very much.

Is there a next question or comment?  If I could ask you to limit your comment to one minute.  We are very short on time.

>> LILIAN NARUGA:  Hi.  This is Lillian Naruga from the Uganda IGF.  Mine is just an additional comment that I should have probably submitted earlier.  I coordinate on the Internet Governance Forum and I want to respond to my colleague from Benin. 

The issue of multi-stakeholder is, I think, just to give a bit of a history, that Uganda has had the Internet Governance Forum around since 2006.  And with time, we see different entities coming on board and dropping off. This year, we had the business coming in.  Usually business stakeholders come in as individual entities.  So, yes, there is still a challenge of interesting businesses, like telecoms or ISPs, to be able to fit into these discussions.  But, from our region, what we usually see from Uganda is the actual involvement of the Government into -- fitting into these processes. 

And for us, that is a positive.  Because when you look at Internet Governance in our country, we usually see that most of the negative issues usually arise from Governments.  So I think from Africa, I think we need to get more involvement from Governments to fit into our processes. 

Thanks. 

>> ANJA GENGO:  Thank you so much, Lillian. 

Of we could go here, up front.

>> AUDIENCE:  Good afternoon.  My name is (?). I'm with the African Union Commission. 

I hear that there is a lot of discussion about IGF reform.  And I'm just wondering from the UN standpoint, is it -- are we going to have some recommendations?  And if so, what would be the timeline for these recommendations about the reform?  Or this is just an initial discussion?

>> ANJA GENGO:  Thank you. 

Could we have the next question?  We will respond later to that one.  I don't see any raised hands, whether somebody would like to make a comment or question. 

Yes, sorry. 

>> AUDIENCE.  Peter Tonali from Electronic Frontier Australia.  We in Australia are looking at starting a regional IGF.  Again, one thing that I noticed in the work that I've done, and from what I've heard from today's session, is that perhaps the term "Governance" is dated.  It worked in the past.  But perhaps we need to consider a rebrand to garner bigger contributions from the public, Civil Society, Government, and private enterprise, and have a greater alignment with what an IGF actually does. 

>> ANJA GENGO:  Thank you.  I think we have from Alejandra a comment.

>> ALEJANDRA ERRAMUSPE:  Thank you, Anja.  I'm Alejandra Erramuspe from the Government of Uruguay and I’m a member of the Executive Secretariat of the Uruguian IGF.  I want to come back to something that Carolina from Argentina said that's very important. 

The national IGFs need to consolidate.  We are getting more and more IGFs, and it's important to take care of the quality of the dialog within the IGFs.  Carolina referred to this.  It's important for the discussions to be held within the IGF.  And I think that this is just as important as the dialog with outside parties regarding Internet governance.

Thank you. 

>> ANJA GENGO:  Any other last questions?

>> AUDIENCE:  Hello.  My name is I'm Natasa Glavor.  I'm coming from Croatia IGF.  And I just wanted to mention that we had our national IGF a few weeks ago.  And I'm happy to say that this year's IGF, this is the first time that we had highly positioned Croatian officers, Government representatives, and I hope that it raises the awareness of the IGF on the national level and the importance of the IGF principles, primarily multi-stakeholderism and equal footing, that hopefully could be introduced into our national and local debates on collaboration and on important issues. 

Thank you. 

>> ANJA GENGO:  Thank you, Natasa. 

Any other questions or comments?  I see one hand there and after that Sonja. 

>> AUDIENCE:  Yes.  Thank you very much. I am Isabel Vilate (?).  I'm a student studying Internet Governance issues.  And I wanted to pick up on what was said by the EuroDIG delegate.  I completely agree.  It's right to underscore this issue of terminology, vis-à-vis our collective thinking of it.  These terms, this terminology, might scare off certain people, resulting in distrust, something that was flagged up by some of the speakers. 

And it's true.  I think if -- I think if we debunk these misconceptions, that could be most useful for Civil Society, for all of us, so that the word "Governance" is no longer associated with "control" but rather with "collaboration, multiplication and participation.”  So I think it might be worthwhile to think about the terminology that we use, the terms. 

Thank you. 

>> ANJA GENGO:  Thank you very much. 

Sonja.

>> SONJA:  Thank you.  I want to ask a question with my Youth IGF Turkey coordinator hat on. 

I know that there are 14 recognized youth initiatives, which are also available on the IGF website.  But there are also other Youth IGF movements who -- I mean, different movements, but I was thinking how can we streamline this for better effectiveness, the way that NRIs are streamlined?  Because there are youth interest sessions or Youth IGF movement sessions that were communicated to IGF, recognized Youth IGFs, et al.  And I think this compartmentalization is harming increased impact, considering that there are only a few of us anyway. 

>> ANJA GENGO:  Thank you very much, Sonja. 

I do see one hand up.  Yes.

>> AUDIENCE:  Thank you. 

My name is Thomas Gunn (?).  I'm from the Pan Africa University, governance and social sciences. 

My comment is to the African IGF.  Of course there is good progress on the African IGF by conducting continuous IGF forums, particularly in the last five or six years.  But my point is in Africa, almost only 2 percent of the population have access to the Internet or the cyber landscape, and I think for Africa -- the main point has to be on how to bridge the digital divide. 

So, what is your comment on this?  Or what are the initiatives on this, on the bridging the digital divide in the continent? 

Thank you. 

>> ANJA GENGO:  Okay.  I know, Marilyn, you're giving me guidance that we should maybe wrap up.  Can we take this as the last comment from you, yes.  And then I think Marilyn will summarize everything for us.

>> AUDIENCE:  Thank you so much.  I'm Roman Chukov from the Russian Federation.  Newly elected MAG member. 

So it was really important on several points about the Internet Governance, and I really think that we need a universal code of conduct on Internet or a framework and legal basis and framework agreements which will really fix the responsibilities of all stakeholders with regard to Internet Governance. 

Thank you. 

>> ANJA GENGO:  While Marilyn is turning on her microphone, there was a question there.  Can you be very quick in a couple of seconds?

>> AUDIENCE:  Hello.  My name is (?). I'm representing a youth group from Gambia. 

We have been attending the IGF for a couple of times.  And it has been really helping, because we have been having these programmes encouraging the young girls in Gambia, including technology introductions and (?).  But I understand that the IGF is that strong in Gambia.  And I'm also working with an Internet company whereby Internet is very expensive in Gambia due to the liberalization of the day rates and they are not competing.  So with that, I don't know how IGF would really help in making things easy. 

Thank you. 

>> ANJA GENGO:  Thank you very much. 

Now over to Marilyn.

>> MARILYN CADE:  So in the next three minutes I'm going to try to summarize how I propose that we address the questions we received. 

I'm going to make an observation.  We designed -- the NRIs themselves designed in a bottom-up way this session.  And the limitation of time was always on our mind as a major barrier.  Yet, the networking -- I should say the exchange of views and the building of the NRI network is strengthened by each of these engagements that we have had. 

What you've provided to us to think about is that we will need to go into the messages that come out of the -- we provide messages, each of the sessions provide messages that reflect into the Chairman's summary.  But there also will be a summary of this meeting.  And what I'm going to propose to the co-chairs is that we can't respond individually to each of these, but that we make a commitment that we will put into our report the questions and statements that were made, that have come forward.  And then we will also take them, Anja, into the NRI network for a specific call that you would establish where we could discuss these topics and others.  And then there would be a report coming out of that session that all of the participants would be able to access online and read.  It would also give us a chance to take more inputs. 

I'm going to make a comment about one specific question.  There has been an ongoing process of evolving the IGF.  There has been a process within the Commission on Science and Technology for development at the request of the UN Secretary General to put together a Working Group, and that has -- that took about 18 months.  There were two other working groups that I made reference to.  And I think one of the things that we might want to discuss -- because we cannot change a negotiated document from the Heads of State, the Tunis Agenda.  But we can certainly make recommendations for evolution in how the next seven years of the IGF evolves.  And the enhancements that have been identified here are the kinds of things that can be discussed in a broader more inclusive environment.  So it would be a look at what the multi-year strategy is for evolving both the global IGF process and the national IGF process. 

>> ANJA GENGO:  Marilyn, thank you very much.

I would just like to say that we had a number of interventions from the online participants, but due to the, unfortunately, lack of time, we will not be able to address them.  But we will take them all in the written report that Marilyn was talking about.  This is basically the output of this session to the wider community.  And we will expand on this topic. 

>> BENEDICTO FONSECA:  Thank you.  I’d like to very briefly comment.

I was very glad to participate in the session. I'd like to thank the organizers for inviting me.  Having been part of the organising team in NETMundial, it just occurred how complex it is to put in place a formal multi-stakeholder format that leads to published outcomes. 

And I think when we are seeking to advance the national and regional IGFs, we are looking to make them a mechanism or a tool for the discussions.  And I think what we have been listening in to this session, it lists the complexities involved, involving more participants beyond the national participants, those that are insiders of those discussions, and also how to address topics although in comprehensive ways, but also with some very focused approaches, because Internet Governance involves everything. 

And we have seen some different approaches. We heard some people say we don't need global governance on the other parts.  It calls for specific mechanisms to be instituted.  And those discussions also relate to what is going on in the intergovernmental fora. 

So I would like to abuse my position as the Chair, this being my last IGF, I'd like to just share my reflections that what you've been doing has availed itself.  Even in the face of the complexities and challenges, it is, as we look at evolution and the numbers and quality of nationals, national and regional IGFs, in itself, it is something of tremendous success from the perspective of ensuring and providing the platform for the decisions or actions to be more inclusive, more sustainable.  Because they are grounded not in one perspective, in one stakeholder perspective -- even if it's the Government's perspective that has the public, the role to make sure that the public interest is served -- but any discussion, any process that will be reached, it can benefit from the other stakeholders institutionally.  And on the contrary, if this is lacking decisions, may fail and may be strangled.

So, again, I'm very happy.  I think the value of what you've been doing is tremendous.  I'd like to thank Marilyn for this proposal to provide some way forward in the discussions that we have here, to provide for more interactive debate.  We have not had debate until this point in time, due to the limits we have to follow, but I would certainly encourage you to go on.  And being from a country that has been implementing the multi-stakeholder model that precedes even the consensus that emerged from the work from the information society, I'm more than glad from what I see today and I encourage you to move forward. And I applaud and commend your work. 

Thank you.

(Applause)

>> ANJA GENGO:  I will give you the final word. 

I'd like to thank you all for honoring us to moderate this challenging session in terms of a very difficult topic and also the number of speakers after that.  But I think it ended up being an excellent session. 

And I'd like to thank to all the NRIs for being here, for participating actively in this session, but primarily for working very hard throughout the year to prepare this session.  This session is prepared in a bottom-up manner across 100 NRIs.  It's very difficult.  But it gives the hope that the Internet Governance really has its own sustainability when it comes to the long-term future. 

And, finally, I said this session is very complex to prepare. It's probably even more complex to report out from it because you said many things that may be different.  So I'd like to thank our Rapporteurs, Nick Vanden Smit and Dustin Phillips, that will help us to produce a complete set of messages from this session that will go out tonight probably to the larger IGF community as messages from NRIs collectively on this important topic. 

And, finally, giving the final say to Marilyn and thanking her for helping us manage the floor.

>> MARILYN CADE:  I hope this microphone is working.  Yes.  Please stay in your seats.  For the next minutes we will have a surprise event. 

My name is Marilyn Cade.

>> EDIE: And my name is Edie.

>> MARILYN CADE:  We are joining with others from the community and the NRI community to ask you to join us.  And Ambassador Fonseca, will you join us, please.?

Almost ten years ago, Leonid Fodorov and I and others collaborated together to create a special recognition for Marcus Kummer when he retired as the Executive Secretary of the IGF Secretariat. 

A few years ago, we also joined together to present a recognition for Ambassador Janis Karklins, who had been the Chair of the IGF MAG.  Many of you participated in those recommendations. 

>> EDIE:  Ambassador Fonseca has been an extraordinary contributor to the IGF itself as well as to the NRIs. 

The Ambassador has served in many other roles in the Internet --

>> INTERPRETERS:  Interpreters are very sorry, but they have to stop working now. Thank you.

>> EDIE:  (missing audio) – committee as well as information for science and technology (?) corporations.  Both were (?) itself and benefitted greatly from his excellent leadership. 

During his tenure as a messenger, he has helped to ensure that the Brazil local IGF flies, and he has served as a vice chair and a present MAG chair during the inaugural year. .And also as a special adviser for engagement with the Government. 

Also, Mr. Forseca has played a pivotal role in promoting NETmundial, a unique multi-stakeholder (?) also spearheaded and hosted by Brazil. 

>> MARILYN CADE: We all learned recently that Ambassador Fonseca is taking a different post on behalf of the Brazil Government and will not be continuing his direct engagement and attendance at the IGF and with the NRIs.  And while we wish you very well in your new assignment, your consummate diplomatic and professional contributions will be missed by all of us.  We have all learned from you as we have all worked together. 

We intend to consider you the role model for the rest of the Diplomatic Corps as we look forward.  In recognition of your contribution and to illustrate how much we all respect and honour you and your leadership and your commitment to the multi-stakeholder engagement of the Internet Governance Forum and the NRIs, we jointly present the third recognition award. 

(Applause).

>> FRANCESCO FORSECA:  Thank you. 

Well, I must say it's a surprise to me, and I'm deeply honoured to receive that comment.  Thank you very much. 

I'd just like to say that I don't want to take the credit for -- I really appreciate receiving credit for the the things that I've done, but I'd also like to give credit to what has been done in Brazil, by the Brazilian Internet steering community. 

I think maybe I take credit for having operated in a way, the spirit, that Brazil has been able to develop over 20 years to the Brazilian Internet Steering Committee.  You mentioned the first IGF.  It was back in 2007.  I was not there.  It was an initiative of the Committee.  I was there the second time we hosted IGF a few years ago in Joao Pessoa and they had there the NETmundial as well.  Those were tremendous experiences. 

Being a professional diplomat, it has certainly been a rich experience working in this environment.  I worked previously with environmental issues, climate change, ozone layer, and in those issues, of course, we also need input from nongovernmental stakeholders. 

But the institutional format you have developed in IGF and other Internet Governance related fora, is something unique.  It's something that we cherish.  As I said before, we think it allows us to inform sustainable decisions.  It's beneficial from the perspective of Government and from the stakeholders.  It's a win/win game.  It's something that should be championed and nurtured.  And you honour me, but I'd like to honour you for initiating this.  And I'd like to thank Marilyn Cade and other organizers for this. 

Thank you very much.  It's really an honour for me.  I take this as a major moment in all the periods that I've been involved in Internet Governance related issues.

Thank you very much.

(Applause)

>> MARILYN CADE:  We are going to take a photo.  And I'll ask any of the NRIs who can get to the stage in the next 30 seconds to join us, please.