United Nations Development Programme

The government of Uganda is planning to create 15 new cities from existing towns by the end of 2023. This will create new opportunities, but it will also put a strain on infrastructure and services. As a result, data and evidence use in decision making at this urban level, together with sound governance of that data and evidence, will be critical to these new cities' success. To prepare for this, three current Hewlett Foundation grantees based in Uganda — Sunbird AI, UN Global Pulse Lab Kampala, and ToroDev — will work together with the new city authorities in Fort Portal and Jinja to identify these cities' core data and evidence needs; train city officials on how to use data and evidence to make decisions; support the institutionalization of data use at the city level; and pilot new data and AI technologies to aid in decision making. This grant is for UN Global Pulse Lab Kampala's portion of the collaboration and plays an important role in ensuring a clear through line between the government of Uganda's national data strategy (which Pulse Lab Kampala is coordinating), and this emergent work at the local (urban) level.

The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) works to eradicate poverty and reduce inequality by helping countries develop policies, leadership skills, partnering abilities, and institutional capabilities. Under its Gender Equality Strategy 2022-2025, UNDP aims to help shift the economic and social structures that generate and perpetuate discrimination including via gender responsive fiscal and economic policies. This grant will support UNDP to organize a Dialogue on Gender Equality and Taxation aiming to generate awareness and shared knowledge of gender issues in tax systems. (Strategy: International Women’s Economic Empowerment)