Community Engagement
SDGs-EYES aimed to create a range of data products designed to simplify the tracking and reporting of specific SDGs. These service-oriented products were developed, showcased, and co-designed in collaboration with a community of users and dedicated stakeholders within five designated pilot areas.
The user engagement in the SDGs-EYES Copernicus-based Service development was integral to the achievement of the project through mobilisation and interaction with the relevant community of users, co-design of the pilot methodologies and services, as well as the facilitation of the uptake of these services. The user engagement was a continuous process that lasts during the project’s lifetime and was adjusted taking into account input from the various community of users and stakeholders. It was essential to ensure the success of the SDGs-EYES project engagement with users but also its uptake.
Within SDGs-EYES, the stakeholders were international bodies, public authorities, community groups, corporates, interested in the outcomes of the project, but not necessarily active on the co-design of the activities (indicators, methodologies, platform, or pilots). They could become users of the project outcomes within the project timeline (during co-design) or after. Users were active stakeholders during but also after the project lifetime.
In brief (different user’s needs when designing, developing, and delivering the SDGs-EYES services):
- Users (direct relationship providing needs and challenges, focus interest on data, access, validation): Organisations involved in the co-design activities which provided needs and requirements (they have had a direct relationship with the evolution of the indicators calculation methodologies, the metadata used, the “geographical” area of interest, the thematic perspective, the access of the information through the platform, etc. Some of the users shared the needs and challenges of their communities and were used to provide access to the secondary, tertiary users (including private sector).
- Stakeholders (indirect relationship and wide interest on outcomes): Organisations that were potentially interested in the project outcomes (products, platform, evolution of the services, etc). Stakeholders took part in the uptake exercise of the SDGs-EYES services and some of those were identified through the primary or the secondary community expansion.
Engagement of users in the SDGs-EYES Copernicus-based Service development had the aim to:
- mobilise and interact with the relevant community of users;
- assess user needs, support the workflow design of indicators with involvement of users, and collect feedback to the decision support tools in pilots; and
- facilitate the uptake of the services by users and promote the SDGs-EYES Service tested in pilots, at national and international scale, across vertical markets and amongst key user communities.
