Hands-on Learning Brief February 2023

HANDS-ON Experience Learning

Issue 23: February 2023

The legacy of Douglas and Eleanor Murray Invest in South Africa’s Potential

IN THIS ISSUE WE FEATURE:

LEARNING BRIEF 1

Building coalitions: the power of synergy

Apartheid’s legacy continues to divide us in deep and undeniable ways, but civil society coalitions across class, race and economic sectors can inspire new ways of accelerating change. This learning brief explores communications and advocacy campaigns that demonstrate the power of coalitions to effect transformation. It includes case studies of: Messages for Mothers (M4M), Youth Capital’s Part of the Action and Real Reform for ECD (also known as Real Reform).

LEARNING BRIEF 2

Effective digital communication starts with understanding your audience’s digital use and behaviour

Like any innovator, civil society organisations (CSOs) have two main levers to drive change: technology and human behaviour. The way we communicate and how we access and process information about the world around us is changing as technology evolves in the 21st century. Those that fail to adapt to innovative new ways of communicating may struggle to keep pace.

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LEARNING BRIEF 3

Lessons from zero-rated websites: putting the user first

Zero-rating means that a user can access a specific website for free. Civil society organisations know that having their digital content zero-rated is a major advantage because zero-rating democratises access to information and resources online. But the zero-rating advantage can only be fully realised once CSOs meet the needs of their target audiences. This means that audiences must know where to find free resources and feel comfortable using them. This learning brief looks at the experience of three zero-rated websites (CareUp, OLICO and Zibuza) to discover how they became more accessible, more user-friendly and better known.

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HANDS-ON Experience Learning

BUILDING COALITIONS

BUILDING COALITIONS: THE POWER OF SYNERGY

Apartheid’s legacy continues to divide us in deep and undeniable ways, but civil society coalitions across class, race and economic sectors can inspire new ways of accelerating change. This learning brief explores communications and advocacy campaigns that demonstrate the power of coalitions to effect transformation. It includes case studies of: Messages for Mothers (M4M), Youth Capital’s Part of the Action and Real Reform for ECD (also known as Real Reform).

There is a growing gap between the pace of innovation and the ability of governments and civil society to harness it for the public good. Its monetisation has concentrated global wealth and widened the gap between the top 10% and the rest of the world’s population. The pace of innovation continues to accelerate,1 largely due to the instant synergistic power of advanced technologies such as the Internet, 5G and big data analysis.2 Government and civil society must be at the forefront of ensuring that the energy and power of this knowledge capital is harnessed for broad societal benefit, but that can’t be done at a snail’s pace and in the same old ways. The speed of compound innovation – and its desirable and undesirable social impacts – requires rapid synthesis and adaptation of technology as well as changes in human behaviour.

1

https://www.kurzweilai.net/ the-law-of-accelerating-return

2 Canning,

https://www2.deloitte. com/content/dam/Deloitte/br/Documents/public-sector/Deloitte-Future-ofgovernment.pdf

While in the past many civil society organisations (CSOs) made great strides by putting their heads down and staying singularly focused on addressing the need at hand, their ability to influence broader social change now largely depends on their connectedness. Within this context, the power of synergy comes from the:

› creative energy that sparks from unlikely networks;3

› the superlinear scaling properties of social networks –each time a social network doubles in size, the number of connections increases roughly fourfold;4 and

› the influence of bottom-up “political” constituencies in shaping public demand for change.5

Drive public innovation by reigniting civil society

Kurzweil, R. 2001. The law of accelerating returns.

M. et al. 2020. Creating the government of the future: uncovering the building blocks of change to become more anticipatory, human-centered, and resilient. Deloitte Center for Government Insights.

3 Krishna, A. 2002. Active social capital: tracing the roots of development and democracy. New York: Columbia University Press.

4 West, G. 2017. Scale: the universal laws of life, growth and death in organisms, cities and companies. New York: Penguin Books, p. 317.

5 Acemoglu, D. and Robinson, J. 2012. Why nations fail: the origins of power, prosperity and poverty. New York: Crown.

Civil society coalitions may emerge organically for a variety of reasons:

› to make the most of limited resources and to pool the expertise available to CSOs working on similar objectives;

› to avoid duplication of effort;

› to ensure effective communication among key CSO actors; and

› to avoid disunity on an issue.6

Working in coalition also provides a coordinated way for CSOs to forge and maintain strategic partnerships with external actors. It is easier for governments to relate to a coalition as a single partner representing a range of civil society organisations than to work out whom to interact with from a range of players.7

The power of coalitions is clearly illustrated by civil society’s prompt response to the Covid-19 pandemic in South Africa.

CASE STUDY #1 MESSAGES FOR MOTHERS

A unique collaboration between South African CSOs and government was one of the first in the world to create a Covid-19 information platform for pregnant women during the pandemic. Messages for Mothers (M4M) was launched to provide credible information to mothers about the coronavirus and the impact on their families.

As the pandemic tightened its hold on South Africa in March 2020, Julie Mentor – leader of Embrace, a national movement for supported and celebrated motherhood – realised there was a dearth of reliable Covid-19 information for mothers. She consulted Dr Simone Honikman, director of the Perinatal Mental Health Project (PMHP), Dr Kopano Matlwa Mabaso, executive director of Grow Great – a campaign that aims to galvanise South Africa towards a national commitment to zero stunting by 2030, as well as Buhle Mabaso, campaign manager for Side-by-Side, a National Department of Health (NDOH) campaign for pregnant women and caregivers aimed at ensuring children under five receive nurturing care. At the time, all agreed there was urgent need for a dedicated maternal response that tapped into the most qualified maternal, physical and mental health experts in the country.

Very soon, M4M was born, and the four women became the executive team, providing strategic direction to the initiative and pouring their complementary skills, available capacity and resources into the project. All content was open-source and 6

Diverse groups came together to reduce the risk of new infections, help feed millions of hungry people during the hard lockdown, lead advocacy work for the reduction of alcoholrelated harms and support for foreign nationals and migrants, among other initiatives.8

Arguably, in a resource-constrained environment, new synergy is the most likely source of accelerated change over the next decade. The challenge for civil society (and for governments and multilateral institutions) is to move beyond collective talk to convergent action.

unbranded to ensure information was accessible and easy to share. This information was made available across a range of channels, such as: NDOH platforms, including the Covid-19 WhatsApp line; community radio stations; the M4M website; the M4M newsletter (sent to 2 700 organisations working with caregivers and mothers); and pamphlets distributed in the Western Cape.

“Something about M4M appealed to moms of different races and different economic backgrounds, which as a national programme, you always hope for but don’t always get quite

right.”

Dr Kopano Matlwa Mabaso, executive director, Grow Great

CASE STUDY #2

YOUTH CAPITAL’S PART OF THE ACTION

Nearly two-thirds of South Africa’s youth are unemployed. Youth Capital advocates for youth-centred and evidencebased solutions to deal with youth unemployment.9 In 2020, it launched an Action Plan that prioritises 10 key levers to address youth unemployment. These 10 levers connect young people’s lived experience of unemployment with available quantitative and qualitative data about the barriers to finding employment.

In 2021, Youth Capital consolidated the main learnings from two years of youth-centred campaigning and concluded that despite many stakeholders in government, the private sector and civil society investing resources to address youth unemployment, their efforts were too fragmented to make a big difference. It became evident that South Africa lacked a unifying strategy to tackle the problem. “No single organisation can tackle all 10 points in isolation, let alone the government. We are calling on individuals and the sector to be Part of the Action,” explains Kristal Duncan-Williams, project lead, Youth Capital. To date, 70 organisations have signed up, rallying around one or more levers in the Action Plan which resonate with their area of expertise.

9 Odayar, L. 2022, Forging the leaders of tomorrow amid South Africa’s youth unemployment crisis. The African, 10 August. https://theafrican.co.za/politics/ forging-tomorrows-leaders-amid-sas-youth-unemployment-crisis-f63154124c80-41d9-97fb-7a975a9c4705/

Figure 1: Youth Capital’s Action Plan covers the entire journey of a young person from places of learning into places of earning

CASE STUDY #3

REAL REFORM FOR ECD

Real Reform for ECD is a broad-based alliance advocating for holistic, well-funded, inclusive and quality early childhood development services. Of the approximately 7 million children10 aged 0–5, just over 4 million receive the child support grant11 and 626 574 benefit from subsidised early learning.12 Real Reform was launched in August 2020 in response to the tabling of the Children's Amendment Bill,13 a draft piece of legislation aimed at strengthening protective measures for children. The Equality Collective14 acts as the secretariat of the coalition supported by more than 200 organisations, with elected representatives forming a steering committee to lead Real Reform’s work.

Real Reform aims to organise a strong base of ECD practitioners that will spearhead its advocacy campaigns at grassroots level.

Tshepo Mantje of the Equality Collective explains: “Real Reform is developing a strong network of ECD practitioners who are active participants in advocating for holistic access to ECD services for all children. Additionally, we aim to create sustainable collaborative relationships between ECD practitioners and local government, noting the role of local government in the provision and expansion of ECD services (as mandated by the Constitution15).”

10

11 Ibid.

12

13 The Children’s Amendment Bill (B18-2020) proposed amendments in relation to a wide range of issues impacting on children, including amendments regarding partial care and ECD. The Bill did not address reforms needed for strengthening the ECD sector. It had the potential to create additional burdens and challenges for ECD providers.

14 The Equality Collective is an activist and community-centred law project based in the rural Eastern Cape. It believes that building collective power and constructive advocacy can transform systems and build a more equal South Africa.

15 Schedule 4, Part B of the Constitution of South Africa.

Hall, K. 2022. Children in South Africa. Children Count, Children’s Institute, University of Cape Town. https://tinyurl.com/53f4scnn

Department of Social Development. 2020. Social Development sets up workstreams to conduct risk assessment and state of readiness for the early childhood development (ECD) centres. Media statement, 5 June. https://tinyurl. com/e4hwhbvw

Figure 2: Real Reform has proposed five changes to bring about access to well-funded, inclusive and quality early childhood development services for all children

COALITION MILESTONES

REAL REFORM FOR ECD

Although it is not always easy to measure the impact of communications and advocacy campaigns, it is possible to trace the connection between campaign outputs and specific outcomes.

Below are examples of positive outcomes related to specific coalition outputs:

Messages for Mothers

Moms felt supported by M4M because the messages had an empathetic quality engendering connection and care, rather than panic and fear. Nomalizo Jaxa, a mother from Dunoon in the Western Cape, received the messages through a WhatsApp support group. She said they had built her up and helped her emotionally through a difficult period. The alliance also contributed to numerous radio and TV interviews and an international webinar, focusing on mental health responses to Covid-19 in Africa. 16

Youth Capital’s Part of the Action

Under the “Certify Us” lever, Youth Capital connected Ukhanyo Foundation17 – a small NGO in Philippi, Cape Town, which supports young people rewriting matric – to Dr Sandy Malapile, director of the Second Chance Matric programme at the Department of Basic Education.18 Youth Capital also teamed up with Harambee Youth Employment Accelerator,19 to create a Second Chance Matric hub on SAYouth.mobi, a zero-rated website.

Real Reform for ECD

In March 2021, the Portfolio Committee on Social Development issued a statement announcing its decision to reject the proposed amendments that relate to ECD in the Children’s Amendment Bill. A technical team was later established to ensure that the amendments to the Second Children’s Amendment Bill were more appropriate for the ECD sector, and thanks to the coalition’s lobbying, Real Reform has a presence on the technical committee. This is a clear example of the potential of advocacy to influence legislation.

The power of lobbying

In response to Real Reform’s call to reject the ECDrelated provisions of the Children’s Amendment Bill, over 1 200 submissions were made to Parliament in November 2020 across seven provinces, with 90% of those submissions coming from ECD practitioners. These submissions were largely attributed to the mobilisation work of the coalition.

Civil society organisations can benefit from the following five lessons shared by the coalition case studies in this learning brief.

Top coalition lessons

1. Have a clear ask

2. The moment matters

3. Break free of silos

4. A bird’s-eye view makes a difference

5. Adapt as you go

1 HAVE A CLEAR ASK

“Being clear about what we wanted to do, how we wanted to do it and having practical next steps was important in getting organisations to make the time to meet with us and other stakeholders around particular points. If there are no practical steps and no clear end goal, coalitions that start strong can peter out over time as people’s priorities shift.”

Kristal Duncan-Williams, project lead, Youth Capital

To have an engaged coalition, it is important to set realistic objectives and a clear implementation plan. The value of having a coherent plan is that organisations can easily understand where they fit in and how best they can contribute. For instance, the Youth Capital team explain that their action plan is not a nebulous agreement to address youth unemployment. Instead, it consists of 10 points laid out in clear, simple language that organisations can get behind.

Similarly, Real Reform advocates for five key changes to strengthen the ECD sector, and there is a simple “call to action” button on the coalition’s website inviting people to make their voices heard.

M4M asked their partners to provide easily accessible and digestible Covid-19 information, verified by experts, to pregnant women and mothers.

17 Available at: https://www.ukhanyofoundation.org/

18 The aim of the Second Chance Matric Programme is to provide support to learners who have not been able to meet the requirements of the National Senior Certificate (NSC) or the extended Senior Certificate (SC).

19 Available at: https://www.harambee.co.za/

16 Ayuso, J.L., Honikman, S. and Chibanda, D. Mental health aspects of the Covid-19 crisis in Africa. Alan J Flisher Centre for Public Mental Health and AMAR, 14 April 2020. https://www.cpmh.org.za/mental-health-aspects-of-the-covid-19crisis-in-africa/

Successful coalitions are often born out of a confluence of circumstances that occur at a particular moment. Traditionally, coalitions take months to establish because of multiple meetings aimed at finalising a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) around roles, responsibilities, resources, accountability, etc. The pressing nature of the pandemic meant there was no time to spare on administrative procedures – M4M had to seize the moment and hit the ground running. In April 2020, less than two weeks after initial consultations, M4M was helping mothers. This was largely due to the high level of trust and adaptability demonstrated by the partners involved, who bypassed timeconsuming administrative tasks and worked remotely to keep the momentum going when successive levels of lockdown came into effect.

In the case of Real Reform for ECD, the moment was hastened by the impending threat of constraining and ineffective legislation.

NGOs are usually short-staffed. With programmatic interventions, staff are often so focussed on delivering a reading programme, or conducting HIV testing, that they do not have time to reflect on their experience. They may write a report for funders, but this is not always shared. Youth Capital can help partner organisations break free of their silos by sparking collective connectedness.

Youth Capital regularly shares qualitative and quantitative data with coalition partners, some of which are small organisations that do not have the resources to carry out such research on their own. For instance, Youth Capital commissioned a review of government’s Second Chance Matric Programme, which has been used by Philippi-based organisation, Ukhanyo Foundation, at a district level to build support for their own work.

“Real Reform has achieved so much in two years – way more than one organisation could have achieved working alone. Through a coalition we are able to leverage far-reaching networks and collaboratively find solutions on issues.”

A BIRD’S-EYE VIEW MAKES A DIFFERENCE

Activism sparks a coalition

Pandemic conditions initiated ECD activism, which influenced Covid-19 relief grants and legislation, and ultimately the formation of the ECD coalition. Kayin Scholtz, chair of the Real Reform steering committee, says the coalition was born on the back of the success of the Save Our ECD Workforce campaign, which mobilised more than 4 500 ECD practitioners to come out in support of over 350 pickets across all nine provinces in South Africa. More than 12 000 people signed the petition and over 2 000 social media posts with the hashtag #SaveOurECDWorkforce reached more than half a million people. He says: “We believe we influenced the allocation of the R497 million directed to the ECD Economic Stimulus Relief Fund.”

When organisations sign up to be Part of the Action, they are required to share which areas of youth development they are working in. This action filters for aligned missions and gives Youth Capital a bird’s-eye view of youth organisations and their focus areas. When a topic comes up that is relevant to a particular point in the Action Plan, Youth Capital can easily bring relevant organisations and stakeholders together.

“The Action Plan is like having ‘Google maps’ in your ear. No matter what happens we can always come back to the map and ask: ‘Are we on course, is this what we said we were going to do?’” explains Duncan-Williams.

Crucially, Youth Capital knows which development organisations and government departments to canvas around a particular issue. Whether it be the cost of jobseeking, or the challenges associated with rewriting matric, Youth Capital is in a strong position to bring the right stakeholders to the table.

Tshepo Mantje, Equality Collective

“Sometimes it might be an unlikely partnership: people who have never met each other but who are actually working toward a common goal. Our role is to act as a coordinator of organisations doing the work.”

in reality, coalitions often lose momentum because members’ individual projects take priority. A driving force is needed to keep the partnership on track, such as a steering committee or a single organisation responsible for coordinating the action.

Mantje, of the Equality Collective, stresses that it is important to establish clear roles and responsibilities, and to track action items assigned to coalition members. All of these factors depend on open and strong communication channels to ensure that coalition members are clear on what is expected of them.

2

PULLING DIFFERENT STRENGTHS INTO THE COALITION

ADAPT AS

M4M had to adapt rapidly and respond to an ever-changing pandemic. There was no time for developing a perfect plan. As new evidence came to light, the team had to be quick on their feet, updating messages – sometimes there were several revisions a day. Each partner contributed what they could, when they could, while working from home. Mentor explains: “We had to move quickly and trust each other. There was empathy and understanding with regards to childcare and maintaining a work–life balance. A lot of initial decisions were made during WhatsApp conversations.”

COALITION CHALLENGES

Coalitions tend to have a louder voice and greater reach, enabling them to make significant gains. However, they do struggle to maintain momentum; constrained by limited time, resources and bureaucracy. These are some of the main challenges to consider when forming a coalition:

5 1

Coalition members recognise the value of collaboration and agree voluntarily to give their time to the coalition. However,

It is important to partner with organisations that are missionaligned, but also to ensure that they can bring something different to the table. Real Reform deliberately ensured diversity in its steering committee, with representatives from ECD forums, NGOs, legal organisations, a funder (DGMT), and a policy-focused organisation (Ilifa Labantwana).

Another critical point is that coalitions need actors who have influence. Influence can be in the form of one’s ability to mobilise a large membership, the ability to influence policymakers or the ability to engage the media. Scholtz warns: “When coalitions do not have members who can generate influence, you are in danger of setting yourself up to fail.”

As an advocacy organisation, Youth Capital brings experienced government lobbying and research to the table but relies on partners with on-the-ground experience to drive the Action Plan. When pairing research with community-specific experience, Youth Capital can make a much stronger case to the government.

A missing piece of the puzzle for Youth Capital is extending the network beyond the civil society space. It is trying to make inroads into the private sector as that partnership could help address challenges that inhibit employment for young people. “I think including the demand-side is the missing piece in a lot of youth development work,” says Duncan-Williams.

Kristal Duncan-Williams, project lead, Youth Capital

FINDING THE RIGHT RESOURCES 3

Coalitions have been described as a “necessary bureaucracy” and every coalition an NGO joins brings with it another set of communications, another email list and another set of conference calls and meetings.20 While collaborative problemsolving has been welcomed by many partners, it does stretch individual and collective resources.

Bridget Hannah, an Innovation Director at DGMT, points out that meaningful collaboration requires having a dedicated person who spends time understanding the problem to contribute effectively to solutions. A key issue with collaborative problemsolving in a new venture or advocacy campaign is that often one is not sure what type of expertise should be brought in at the onset.

EFFECTIVE COALITIONS

Coalitions bring together organisations that are on a similar mission or have similar values, with complementary resources, a clear ask, defined goals and a structured path to implementation. Perhaps the most imperative requirement is a sustainable driving force to keep the coalition on track and moving forward.

This is the learning experience of:

Learning brief developed by Daniella Horwitz with contributions from Messages for Mothers, Youth Capital and Real Reform for ECD, edited by Rahima Essop.

20 Moyes, R. and Nash, T. 2011. Global coalitions: an introduction to working in international civil society partnerships. Action on Armed Violence. https://article36. org/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/Global_Coalitions_published_Dec_2011.pdf

OPPORTUNITY

HANDS-ON Experience Learning

EFFECTIVE DIGITAL COMMUNICATION

EFFECTIVE DIGITAL

COMMUNICATION

STARTS WITH UNDERSTANDING YOUR AUDIENCE’S DIGITAL USE AND BEHAVIOUR

Like any innovator, civil society organisations have two main levers to drive change: technology and human behaviour. The way we communicate and how we access and process information about the world around us is changing as technology evolves in the 21st century. Those that fail to adapt to innovative new ways of communicating may struggle to keep pace.

Consumer broadband consumption in North America reached a milestone in the fourth quarter of 2021 as averages hit 536.3 gigabytes (GB) per month – surpassing half a terabyte (TB), according to a new study. This figure represents an increase of 165% when compared to the previous average of 203 GB per month.1

Undoubtedly, this figure will be higher today. Back home, a similar picture is emerging. According to a survey of 18 to 26-year-olds in South Africa, young people spend a quarter of the day on their phones.2 This is not hard to believe considering that Internet access using mobile devices is the most common form of access to the Internet (69.4%)3 in this country.

Although the use of mobile devices in rural parts (59.2%) lags urban (73.7%) and metro areas (73.4%), it keeps growing.4

Smartphone proliferation is bringing more people online globally from Soweto to South Carolina. This is having a profound impact on how we access and consume information, and affects our attention spans, memories and cognitive processes.5

So, what does this mean for civil society organisations focused on behaviour change? And what can they learn from other organisations utilising the power of digital technology? This learning brief explores these questions by centring the experience and learnings of the #keready campaign and other DGMT-funded initiatives, such as: Youth Capital, Nal’ibali, the Zero Dropout Campaign and Amplify|Mobilise|Change (AMC).

1 Baumgartner, J. 2022. Average data consumption eclipses half a terabyte per month – OpenVault. LightReading, 3 Jan. https://www.lightreading.com/ cable-tech/average-data-consumption-eclipses-half-terabyte-per-month--openvault/d/d-id/775689

2 Nair, N. 2022. Young South Africans check their phones at least 30 times an hour: survey. Sowetan Live, 10 May. https://www.sowetanlive.co.za/s-mag/ living/2022-05-10-young-south-africans-check-their-cellphones-at-least-30times-an-hour-survey/

3 Statistics South Africa. 2021. General household survey, p. 47. https://www. statssa.gov.za/publications/P0318/P03182021.pdf

4 Ibid.

5 Wolf, M. 2008.  Proust and the squid: the story and science of the reading brain. Thriplow: Icon Books.

Drive public innovation by reigniting civil society

FOLLOW YOUR AUDIENCE

While many young people use mobile phones to communicate and access information, it must be acknowledged that lots of South Africans struggle with access and connectivity. This learning brief focuses on the use of digital communication, but it must continue to be supported by other forms of communication (such as radio and face-to-face communication) in order to reach as many people as possible.

“Follow your audience” is the basic principle.

CASE STUDY #KEREADY

When the Covid-19 pandemic initially swept across South Africa in early 2020, young people were not the focus of vaccination campaigns as they were not viewed as high risk. However, the key to high vaccination coverage is young people – as a third of the entire population is aged 18–34.6 The #keready campaign emerged out of DGMT’s involvement in establishing a demand acceleration task team in collaboration with other donors and government departments in 2021.

Launched in February 2022, after intense engagement with youth in various parts of the country, #keready harnessed the power of digital communication to put young people in charge of campaign messaging promoting the uptake of Covid-19 vaccinations. At the time, only 5 million of the country’s 17.7 million people aged 18–34 had been fully vaccinated.7 #Keready means “I am ready” in Mzansi8 slang, so it is accessible to all young South Africans, not just township youth. The “I am” has a sense of agency, encouraging inclusion and involvement.

“The campaign is deliberately unbranded so that it is an uncontested space for the youth. It represents the views that young people repeatedly shared: they don’t want to hear from government or from politicians or even from paid influencers about vaccines.”

Lebo Motshegoa, head of communication, #keready

6 DGMT. 2022. #Keready – Young

want their lives back! https://dgmt.co.za/ keready-young-people-want-their-lives-back/

7 Kgomotso,

8 Informal name for South Africa from IsiXhosa, literally meaning “south”.

Dr Joe Phaahla, Minister of Health, endorsed the campaign as part of the Health Department’s demand generation efforts: “We were happy to support young people who decided to take the vaccination campaign as their own under the theme #keready, I am ready. The campaign is led by young health professionals and ours [sic] is simply to support and encourage, they are in charge of the campaign.”9

An independent evaluation report by Genesis Analytics found that vaccination uptake in 12 to 19-year-olds was significantly larger than would have been expected without the #keready campaign, with an estimated 251 000 more vaccinations administered as a result of the intervention.10

The campaign has since evolved into a movement that seeks to enhance healthcare-seeking behaviour among young people. #Keready aimed to put young people in control of the message, creating incentives for their participation in vaccination programmes and public health activities, as well as offering unfiltered health information.

10

people

M. 2022. Health department reworks campaign to encourage youth to vaccinate. Eye Witness News, 18 Feb. https://ewn.co.za/2022/02/18/healthdepartment-reworks-campaign-to-encourage-youth-to-vaccinate

9 Government of South Africa. 2022. South Africa: speaking notes by the Minister of Health Dr. Joe Phaahla during the Covid-19 vaccination update media briefing. Press release, 10 Mar. https://allafrica.com/stories/202203100604.html

Genesis Analytics. 2022. Evaluation of the Covid-19 Youth Vaccination Programme. April. "PowerPoint presentation"

Figure 1: Total Vaccination by Week and Age Group (12 - 19) – Expected and Actual

Figure 2: Total Vaccination by Week and Age Group (12 - 19) – Trend and Actual

THE #KEREADY APPROACH

REACH YOUR AUDIENCE WHERE THEY ARE, NOT WHERE YOU THINK THEY SHOULD BE 1

“I am on Twitter, I am on Facebook, I am on WhatsApp. If you are looking for me, that is where you are going to find me."

– This is the response that #keready researchers received from the young people they were hoping to target.

Young people are not always accessible through traditional mediums of communication such as newspapers, television or radio. But most can reliably be reached on their phones through social media.

SOCIAL MEDIA ANALYTICS

between February and March 2022 for #keready

Headline figures for social media

› 2.4 million estimated social media reach

› 612 inbound messages on Facebook

› 260 inbound messages on Instagram

› 339 inbound messages on Twitter

› Facebook page impressions: 367 000

› Instagram profile impressions: 49 000

› Twitter impressions: 68 000

Headline figures for the WhatsApp line

› 41 500 active users

› 10 000 total questions

Hot topics

› Boosters

› Side effects

› Getting vaccinated while pregnant

Motshegoa says:

“The hashtag was the first thing we got right. It meant we were available on all forms of social media.”

A key initiative of the campaign was the “#keready doctors”, a network of young health professionals who engaged daily with young people on various platforms including social media, answering their many questions. Another digital initiative was the WhatsApp hotline “Ask a Dr”, which has more than 54 000 users.

Source: Genesis Analytics. 2022. Evaluation of the Covid-19 Youth Vaccination Programme. April. "PowerPoint presentation".

After months of restrictions, young people were tired of being told what to do and demanded greater freedom. The campaign tapped into that by asking if they were ready to take advantage of opportunities to follow their own path. Motshegoa expands: “We wanted to say: ‘Make yourself opportunity ready. If you don’t and opportunities present themselves, you might miss out.’” To visually demonstrate this feeling of being opportunity ready, the #keready team included tick-box graphics on its social media content (see Figure 3).

Young people want their choices respected and to feel like they are involved in decisions that affect them. For the campaign to resonate with them, young people’s needs and aspirations had to be at the centre of the campaign, not the vaccine. This led to the co-creation of social media content in the form of a competition: the #keready2flex challenge.

Motshegoa explains that it was important to keep content fresh and flowing, so that people would keep following the hashtag. Gradually the campaign plugged into various parts of life –university, travel, worship and romance.

INVOLVE THE AUDIENCE 3

This initiative, using both social media and community engagement, invited young people to take control of the communication about Covid-19. It challenged youth to frame Covid-19 and vaccination-related messages in their own style using their creative talent. Working with a network of over 100 civil society organisations (CSOs) across South Africa, young people were encouraged to perform, paint, move, write and to share their creativity with #keready. When they did not have a phone, their video clips were sent to the #keready team from the offices of the CSO.

Emma O’Shaughnessy, digital communications specialist and lead of the AMC11 programme says: “No campaign should exist without participation and collaboration. And, it is important to make it clear to people what the effect of that collaboration will be so they are motivated to take part.”

Figure 4: Thousands of competition submissions ensured a strong presence on social media because of the requirement to submit entries on the #keready WhatsApp line and to tag #keready on different social media platforms

Figure 3: Unbranded communication with a strong youth identity, utilising tick-box graphics

"We want to feel that the content is ours. Nothing about us, without us.”

- Audience feedback to the #keready team.

Figure 1: utilising tick-box graphics

11 Amplify|Mobilise|Change is an online learning programme launched in 2019. AMC was developed as an opportunity for communicators in South African civil society to hone their knowledge and skills in technology and online content strategy, and to better integrate online communication into their arsenal of social change tools.

LESSONS FROM OTHER DGMT-FUNDED INITIATIVES USING THE POWER OF DIGITAL COMMUNICATION

KNOW YOUR TARGET AUDIENCE 1

Nal’ibali is a national reading-for-enjoyment campaign, targeting children aged 1–10. Athenkosi Matyalana, Nal’ibali’s digital specialist, says his approach is informed by target audience research and engagement with the Nal’ibali network, as well as social media users.

Matyalana explains: “Through audience research, I was able to gather information about the digital behaviour of Nal’ibali’s target audience, which informs the type of content that we create as well as the language and tone we use.”

Nal’ibali’s top tips for making the most of digital platforms:

› CONDUCT AUDIENCE RESEARCH: if you know your audience doesn’t respond to emails, you should rather use SMS. If you know they prefer visuals, don’t use SMS, use Instagram.

› INNOVATE: this can cost less than you think, e.g. serving content by WhatsApp is cost-effective and is a widely used communication tool.

› MONITOR AND EVALUATE (M&E): use Google Analytics to measure how your audiences respond to your website content. This tells you what is working and what isn’t – data doesn’t lie! Other tools recommended for M&E:

› TWEETDECK is useful for monitoring conversations about you and topics associated with your organisation on Twitter.

› FANPAGE KARMA can help to monitor behaviour and trends on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.

Digital channels and digital campaigns play an essential role in raising awareness about the systemic factors that deepen youth unemployment. Most recently, Youth Capital, a national campaign advocating for solutions to youth unemployment, developed a short documentary about the challenges of finding a job. The Youth Capital team knew that to create a buzz around the film, they had to draw on their network of young people to screen the documentary at various community-based events around the country. In essence, the film went on tour, run by Youth Capital’s own network.

› MAILCHIMP has built-in tools for monitoring uptake of your newsletters.

Figure 5: Documentary screenings use digital media to mobilise young people

Clotilde Angelucci, communications and network strategist for Youth Capital, explains that on Youth Day (16 June 2022), young people were encouraged to mobilise at least 10 other young people using the resources available to them, e.g. by hosting a documentary screening at home, which made the call for mobilising in their communities realistic and achievable. Events and social media livestreams12 also generated an increase in traffic to Youth Capital’s website (see Figure 6).

Livestreams are when streamed video is sent over the Internet in real time, without first being recorded and stored.

Once you have successfully grabbed your audience’s attention, the common challenge is to hold it over the long run. Angelucci acknowledges that retaining someone’s attention long after they attended a digital livestream or in-person event is a challenge. Overcoming this hurdle requires developing curated audience journeys aimed at soliciting higher levels of engagement over a sustained period.

3 CREATE SCROLL-STOPPING CONTENT

REPURPOSE TRADITIONAL MEDIA CONTENT FOR SOCIAL MEDIA 4

Audiovisuals13 are a good way of using content you already have, says Kendra Stewart, communications officer for the Zero Dropout Campaign. “Most of us in the advocacy space are doing radio interviews as part of our awareness-raising efforts. Now, we can merge traditional media content with new media by repurposing radio interviews into sound bites for Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and LinkedIn. It’s a win-win.”

Microvisual (reels) are also popular, particularly those with motivational themes. Stewart explains: “Reels garner a wider reach on Instagram, while visual clips from TV interviews tend to perform better on social media than static images.”

“There is so much content being pumped through these systems and it is important to develop scroll-stopping storytelling in every campaign that you run.”

Emma O’Shaughnessy, digital communications specialist, AMC

Storytelling can help a campaign to capture the hearts and minds of its target audience. O’Shaughnessy expands: “People don’t simply make decisions based on rational thought alone. Their feelings play a major role in their decision-making processes. Even a serious campaign that has legal implications should speak to the emotional reasons why someone should care about a campaign’s call to action.”

O’Shaughnessy says creative content and storytelling are critical; we must keep challenging ourselves to innovate with content, not just through calls to action, but also solution-based messaging.

13 In terms of social media, audiovisuals are audio files presented with the visual effect of sound waves as certain social media algorithms prefer video to static images.

Figure 6: Tracking of Youth Capital’s traffic to website in June 2022, related to live conversations and the documentary launch

Figure 5: This is an example of a reel that performed well on Zero Dropout’s Instagram account

CONSISTENCY IS KEY 5

“I see a lot of people trying to do once-off campaigns that don’t really land with their audiences. But the more consistently you campaign around a topic or a theme, the more trustworthy you become,” says O’Shaughnessy.

It is important to remember that building responsiveness to campaigns happens gradually. It is tricky to have a successful campaign with a once-off run of content, as relationships take time to build and nurture. Often the hard work in a campaign happens behind the scenes once somebody has responded to a call to action. Helping them participate in the campaign in valuable ways is often done one-on-one, which requires time and effort. O’Shaughnessy adds, “If you are going to be running a campaign, be prepared to engage and manage those conversations actively. It is a big part of any campaign’s journey.”

ALLOCATE A BUDGET 6

Don’t skimp on communications, but you don’t have to break the bank. “It is difficult to get the kind of reach and engagement on social media that you want if you don’t spend a bit of money,” says O’Shaughnessy.

“You don’t have to spend a lot of money, especially on places like Facebook and Instagram, since microbudgets go really far. For instance, you can reach tens of thousands with a few hundred rand,” she explains.

Managing spend and seeing the value in one’s spending becomes easier once you begin tracking calls to action, outcomes and connect them to real-life impact. If you are running an awareness campaign with no action, it is hard to see the value of the money invested, besides the fact that you have reached many people.

CHANGE IS IN THE AUDIENCE’S HANDS

Digital technology can be used to drive changes in human behaviour for the benefit of all South Africans. However, the success of any digital campaign depends on the relationship between the campaign and the target audience and the campaign’s ability to retain that audience. Civil society organisations must offer a compelling narrative and a reason to get involved in their campaigns. As O’Shaughnessy concludes: “If you tell people how and why their contribution will lead to tangible change, they are more likely to feel motivated, to engage and to stay.”

Learning brief developed by Daniella Horwitz, with contributions from #Keready, Nal’ibali, Youth Capital, Zero Dropout and AMC, edited by Rahima Essop.

HANDS-ON Experience Learning

LESSONS FROM ZERO-RATED WEBSITES

LESSONS FROM ZERO-RATED WEBSITES: PUTTING THE USER FIRST

Zero-rating means that a user can access a specific website for free. Civil society organisations (CSOs) know that having their digital content zero-rated is a major advantage because zero-rating democratises access to information and resources online.

But the zero-rating1 advantage can only be fully realised once CSOs meet the needs of their target audiences. This means that audiences must know where to find free resources and feel comfortable using them. This learning brief looks at the experience of three zero-rated websites (CareUp, OLICO and Zibuza) to discover how they became more accessible, more user-friendly and better known.

Prepaid data is unaffordable to most South Africans. Yet, if they had access to the information and services offered on mobile platforms, it would improve their quality of life and grow our economy. Since 2016, DGMT has proposed that the zerorating of mobile services and content, offered by registered public benefit organisations (PBOs) and government entities promoting socio-economic development, should be managed through a Social Innovation Register (SIR). The SIR would allow approved PBOs to provide Internet users with free mobile data access to their online services.

DID YOU KNOW?

Zero-rating of the digital content of public benefit organisations and government websites is now a condition of licence for network operators. However, the mechanism to facilitate this is not yet in place and DGMT is working with the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (ICASA) and the Department of Communications and Digital Technologies to make this happen urgently.

1 Typically, zero-rating is the process of providing subsidised digital content and/ or access to the Internet at no charge to the user. One of its key objectives is to increase access to online information and resources for users who cannot afford the cost of data. For more about zero-rating in South Africa, visit: https://dgmt. co.za/zero-rating-mobile-services/

In 2020, several educational sites were zero-rated since schools and early learning centres were closed because of lockdown regulations. These sites were made more accessible to ensure as many people as possible – particularly those in the poorest communities – were able to access content, free of charge, in order to support their continued education. DGMT championed the zero-rating of 66 PBO educational websites in July 2020, of which 39 were approved.

However, “making something free doesn’t necessarily mean that people will find your content and engage with it in the way you intended”, explains Emma O’Shaughnessy, digital communications specialist and lead of the Amplify|Mobilise|Change2 programme at DGMT. Understanding your audience’s needs, telling good stories, making information engaging and ensuring widespread distribution of content are critical for creating and retaining valuable interactions with audiences.

In August 2020, to further its zero-rating advocacy3 and help zero-rated PBOs capitalise on this advantage, DGMT invited them to apply for a grant. The intention was for the grant to address supply and demand issues with the zero-rated sites.

These included:

› AUDIENCE RESEARCH that informs a digital strategy.

[See learning brief on digital communications in DGMT's Hands-On Learning Publication (Issue 16) on page 3.]

› DIGITAL STRATEGY DEVELOPMENT so that PBOs could make better use of their digital resources.

› TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENT to make the zero-rated sites more user-friendly and to help PBOs transition from face-to-face support to digital support.

› CONTENT CREATION so that the content could be more service-oriented (as opposed to informative from a marketing perspective).

› STAFF DEVELOPMENT to ensure that there were internal competencies to manage the digital services.

› BUILDING OF MONITORING, EVALUATION, RESEARCH AND LEARNING SYSTEMS to ensure strong analytics for better measurement of success.

› KNOWLEDGE SHARING and opportunities for collaborative partnerships.

› MARKETING of the zero-rated sites.

› IMPROVED SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMISATION (SEO) on the zero-rated sites.

In total, 18 grants were approved and the plan was to administer them over a short period from August to December 2020.4 It is important to note that the timescale impacted on the type of site modifications PBOs were able to implement. As a quick win at the start of the project, Mignon Hardie, DGMT project grant manager, organised for 26 of the original 39 zero-rated sites (more than the number of grantees) to be added to relevant categories (Read Books, Parenting, Education) within the popular Moya Messenger app’s “Discover” section. This South African data-free app was launched five years ago and provides free access to a suite of websites and messenger services, aimed mainly at young people. Moya had the immediate impact of increasing traffic to these sites.

The following important learnings emerged from the grantmaking process:

THINK MOBILE FIRST: Always think about the end user who is on a mobile phone and who may have relatively low digital literacy. Site navigation needs to be clear.

THINK DATA-LIGHT: Even if a site is zero-rated, it won’t be easy to navigate if it is data-heavy, as this affects site speed, and users become discouraged on slow sites. It is vital to use low data images, for example.

PUT RESOURCES UPFRONT: Make sure that the resources you are promoting are easy to find, even for someone with low digital literacy.

HAVE A CLEAR DIGITAL STRATEGY: Specialists need to work with PBOs to develop more cohesive digital strategies and to move beyond the concept of ‘putting resources out there’. You need to think about your audience and how programmes/projects can harness technology to reach them better or meet their needs in more comprehensive ways.

What can civil society organisations learn from the experience of PBOs that have been zero-rated? This learning brief delves into three case studies: CareUp, OLICO (both DGMT grantees) and Zibuza.

2 Amplify|Mobilise|Change (AMC) is an online learning programme launched in 2019. AMC was developed as an opportunity for communicators in South African civil society to hone their knowledge and skills in technology and online content strategy, and to better integrate online communication into their arsenal of social change tools.

3 If these zero-rated sites proved successful, DGMT would be well-placed to argue for zero-rating of PBOs beyond the period designated as a national disaster.

4 One grantee’s funding period extended in to 2021.

CareUp (careup.mobi) is one of the Reach Trust’s flagship Early Childhood Development (ECD) services, aimed at parents and ECD practitioners. It provides daily content and activities for children aged 4–5 years. It was launched as a free offlinecompatible Android app5 in 2016. Later, a mobi-site6 version was created that modelled the Android experience.

Andrew Rudge, CEO of the Reach Trust, explains why they wanted to be zero-rated: “We aim to inspire and improve lives through the development of innovative and cost-effective mobile solutions. The main goal for all our products has always been to be accessible to those who need them most.”

The CareUp mobi-site had to be moved to a local server on a fixed Internet Protocol (IP) to accommodate zero-rating requirements. It also needed an improved landing page and easier login and tracking processes. The tech improvements were completed, but there was a hold-up as the site then needed to be re-submitted to the Internet Service Providers Association (ISPA) for zerorating using the new server details. This took some time7 and delayed their marketing campaigns.

LANDING PAGE IMPROVEMENTS

While users of the Android app can also find more information on the app prior to download in the Google Play Store (with screenshots demonstrating functionalities), this was not available to the mobi-site users. Additionally, while face-to-face workshops were previously used to provide more information on the app prior to onboarding, these have not been used since the start of the Covid-19 epidemic in early 2020. Therefore, having no additional information on the mobi-site landing page didn’t allow users to find out more about the platform and its purpose before signing in. This was seen as a potential barrier to users, which may have caused a higher bounce rate.8

Front-end web development changes were made to the landing pages of the mobi-site to improve the user experience of firsttime users, including the addition of:

› a brief introduction text describing the platform and its purpose;

› logos for the content provider and managing organisation;

› a link to the Reach Trust’s website in the footnote to improve the page’s authenticity and to provide users with a channel of communication to report any issues or bugs;

› basic Google Analytics tracking for the landing page; and

› a new sign-in method.

A NEW SIGN-IN METHOD

In order to lessen barriers to creating new accounts, a new signin method was introduced along with the zero-rating of the ECD mobi-site. This allowed users to register and sign in using their mobile number as their “username”. No password requirements were added to simplify the registration process and to limit the potential for duplicate accounts.9 Prior to this addition, users could only sign in using their Google account.

5 An Android app is a native software designed to run on an Android device.

6 A mobi-site (also known as a mobi website) can be accessed from any Internet browser (including on desktop computers), but is developed specifically for a fast and efficient user experience on mobile devices, like smartphones.

7 CareUp was zero-rated in the last quarter of 2020

8 The percentage of users who enter the site, don’t complete any actions on the page they landed on, and then leave rather than continuing to view other pages within the same site.

9 In an early pilot study (2016), it was found that users who forgot their passwords would often just create new accounts, increasing the number of new registrations without increasing the number of unique users.

Figure 1: The new CareUp landing page

This new method was released in December 2020. To determine its overall success, the percentage of new mobi registrations using each method from December 2020 is shown in Figure 2.

AUDIENCE SEGMENTATION

While competitions are a great way to attract attention and drive engagement, it is difficult to know if the right target group is being reached. So CareUp utilised a newsletter/email marketing campaign to attract new users and filter out disengaged audiences.

While the new sign-in method appears to be successful (around 75% of all new web registrations use this sign-in method), the quality of these registrations appears to be lower with fewer of these users completing their basic profile details.

MARKETING AND COMMUNICATIONS

An airtime competition was launched in January 2021 with the objectives of: increasing uptake on the mobi-site, encouraging quality engagement and bringing attention to the newly launched Facebook page. Over the course of six weeks, ten R100-airtime prizes were awarded per week.

During the competition, there were 165 new registrations on the CareUp mobi-site; of which 142 (86%) provided their mobile numbers. Of these, 103 (73%) with mobile numbers were also active (engaged with activity, resource and message pages) and were automatically entered into the draws over the six-week period.

LEARNINGS

› A large portion of the ECD apps’ users may not regularly use their email accounts (or may not do so from their mobile phones). Typically during workshop onboardings, many users required assistance with setting up their Google accounts or had forgotten their account details.

› POPIA (Protection of Personal Information Act) has to be taken into consideration when sending out any form of communication to users. Users should be able to opt-in and opt-out of any form of communication and/ or marketing.

PARTNERSHIP WITH MOYA MESSENGER

In January 2022, CareUp was featured in the “Discover Section” of the Moya Messenger app, where a range of data-free content and services are linked. This resulted in a unanimous surge in new daily visitors. See Figure 3

Figure 3: Sign-in on CareUp’s mobi-site

Figure 2: Sign-in on CareUp’s mobi-site

ENGAGEMENT

While growth on the mobi-site improved after zero-rating with the support of the development changes and marketing strategies undertaken, the long-term engagement is expected to be lower.

The majority of users are active for one day. CareUp aims to encourage regular engagement, which is more easily achieved on the Android app through frequent push notifications.

This can be seen in Table 1, which compares the average number of active days and the maximum number of active days of mobisite users and Android app users for the same time period.

WHATSAPP HELPLINE

In 2020, OLICO launched a WhatsApp hotline for learners struggling with maths in Grades 7, 8 and 9. The helpline also helps learners to log into the site by providing a username and password linked to their mobile number.s

THE TIMES-TABLES CHALLENGE

The times-tables challenge was delivered via an app that connects to the zero-rated server content, so it came with no data cost to learners. It consists of 15 quick drill questions that learners should aim to complete in under a minute. About 1 300 learners from 59 schools or NGO partners participated in the challenge, and 256 learners from 38 schools/NGOs participated in a live final that was run over the video communication platform, Zoom.

LEARNINGS

Table 1 shows that users on the Android app are more likely to remain active for longer. Ways to encourage longer-term engagement from mobi users should continue to be investigated.

CASE STUDY #1 OLICO MATHS EDUCATION

OLICO (learn.olico.org) uses digital technology to help township youth make sense of maths. OLICO’s digital platforms are tailored for learners in low-resource communities who are struggling with numeracy. Prior to the pandemic, OLICO worked in the afterschool space with their tutors providing fun and engaging maths activities in maths clubs at schools and community centres. Zerorating services allowed them to continue to engage with learners over a longer time frame.

Andrew Barrett, CEO and founder of OLICO, says: “For most of our learners, data is a highly prized and expensive commodity and to have zero-rated offerings that allow learners to connect with their maths content without having to spend limited resources on data and airtime is really useful and significant.”

OLICO has an Android app that learners can download from the Google Play Store. But less than half their learners use it – most prefer to go to the browser because it is free. There is a certain resistance to downloading apps, perhaps because entry-level devices do not have a lot of space.

OLICO identified the need to drive more traffic to its site and increase user engagement with the content. Thus, they launched a WhatsApp helpline and a times-tables challenge.

› The WhatsApp hotline led to learners returning in much higher numbers than they ever did on the pure e-learning platform. Barret explains: “We never thought we would go onto a WhatsApp hotline; we never thought it would work. If it wasn’t for Covid-19, we would never have done that. But we have seen reactions way beyond our expectations.” In 2022, over 10 000 children accessed the hotline. During the DGMTgrant period, the WhatsApp hotline increased usage from between 240 and 980 monthly users to between 1 800 and 3 400 monthly users.

› OLICO’s aim with the times-tables challenge was to push maths fluency across the broad base of their learners. Barrett thinks they were “half successful” with that because: “the more proficient children practised regularly and improved dramatically whereas the struggling learners tended to give up quicker. The challenge now is how do we keep the struggling learners motivated."

› A strong recommendation when setting up a zero-rated site is to use as few third-party plug-ins as possible. Barrett tested the site when it was zero-rated and it took 30–40 seconds to load. This was due to the presence of Google fonts (a common element on WordPress sites). Barret says: “It was loading terribly slowly, and it was essentially unusable. If this happens, you are actually not getting the benefit out of your zero-rating. Make sure your fonts sit directly on your server, that they are not looking for instructions from outside.”

› There is a limit as to how much technology can do on its own. Barrett thinks that in a learning environment children need the input of a caregiver, parent, tutor or teacher in conjunction with the e-learning tool.

Table 1: Active days stats for CareUp’s users

CASE STUDY #3 ZIBUZA

Zibuza (Zibuza.net) is an online professional learning community that launched in 2016 with the goal of improving the quality of teaching and learning outcomes, particularly in South African public schools, quintile 1–3.10 The aim was to connect teachers across the country with their peers, experts and organisations, and then facilitate interactions around academic and nonacademic support.

In 2020, Zibuza joined the campaign for zero-rating but discovered they could not apply because their platform was based in the United States and it had to be hosted in South Africa to be considered. However, a teacher from rural Mpumalanga reached out, asking if their monthly teacher award could be changed to thrice monthly, as he could only afford to log on for two weeks per month because of high data costs. “This was counter to our vision and mission for a more inclusive and equitable schooling environment,” explains Malcolm Mooi, Zibuza’s founder. “Getting our platform zero-rated became a key priority.”

In November 2020, Zibuza applied to be zero-rated via the Department of Basic Education (DBE). They were also able to migrate their infrastructure from the United States to South Africa, in terms of compliance. Zibuza was zero-rated in the first quarter of 2021.

Mooi says that zero-rating enabled the PBO to offer more services to teachers and learners. It launched a virtual learning environment that mimics in-person experiences:

› CLASSROOMS: teachers can build and publish courses/lessons for learners to access.

› LABS: there are 90 interactive maths and science simulations.

› LIBRARIES: teachers and learners can access more than 3 500 books across all grades, subject areas, and in all official languages.

LEARNINGS

› Zibuza did not see an increase in users using the site when it was zero-rated. They saw more engagement when the lockdown first happened, but by the time the platform was zero-rated, this demand had plateaued.

› Zibuza was informed by a partner organisation that the site was zero-rated, not by the relevant government department. Many PBOs are frustrated by the lack of communication from authorities. The process of zero-rating under the disaster regulations lacked transparency and PBOs were equally ill-informed about the reversal of their zero-rated status known as “unzero-rating” after the disaster regulations were lifted.

WHAT NEXT?

The National State of Disaster and provisional spectrum regulations forced mobile operators to zero-rate a wide range of websites. Although these obligations ended with the state of disaster in April 2022, they were replaced with social obligations under their new spectrum licences. ICASA requires telecommunications operators who won bids to zero-rate all mobile content provided by PBOs.

What remains is for ICASA to agree to a mechanism whereby this can be done. DGMT is working with ICASA and the Department of Communications and Digital Technology to facilitate this.

Key insights were learnt through the experience of zero-rating of health and educational websites in terms of the disaster regulations:

› Technically, it is possible to maintain a zero-rated basket of websites and applications (which the network operators achieved both for mandated sites and those they chose to include in their own subscriber benefit packages).

› However, management and monitoring systems must be robust to prevent attempts to misuse the system. These systems must be aimed at preventing both potential user fraud and misuse by PBOs.

10 South Africa divides all public schools into five quintile rankings. Quintile 1–3 schools are no-fee-paying schools and quintile 4–5 schools are fee-paying schools.

› Some of the crucial digital services provided by PBOs fall outside the specific ambit of government departments (e.g. training and support for young people not in education, employment or training [NEET], and youth- and leadership development). For this reason, applications from several PBOs in support of young people outside formal systems were rejected – despite their education and information content being vital for livelihoods during and beyond the Covid-19 disaster period.

› Many PBOs also provide digital support in several areas – from early childhood development to accelerated learning and remediation, to job mediation – and need digital content related to all of these components to be zero-rated. It would be difficult for them to submit the content through a single line department; yet multiple submissions to different departments will lead to delays and likely systems failure.

In DGMT’s view, the following key design elements for the system will be most effective:

› explicit communication of guidelines and conditions for the use of zero-rated services (both for end users and PBO applicants);

› one entry point for all PBO applications, to facilitate compliance and monitoring;

› one point of authorisation;

› maintenance of a registry;

› an interface with network operators;

› compliance monitoring;

› reporting; and

› regulatory enforcement.

› The mechanism for oversight will need to be funded. These can be achieved through a simplified system proposed in Figure 4.

Proposed registry for zero-rating of PBO digital content

ZERO-RATING REGISTRY OF PBOs

A single registry of zero-rated sites should be instituted. Its functions should include:

› maintenance of the register of zero-rated sites;

› records of the utilisation of zero-rated sites;

› continual review of the digital content of zero-rated sites to ensure they comply with the public benefit activities outlined in Schedule 9 of the Income Tax Act; and

› reporting back to network operators, oversight structures and the general public.

The process of PBO application management (via an online system) could be outsourced to a service provider, while government websites would automatically be included in the registry.

OPTION OF A SINGLE PORTAL VERIFICATION/INTERFACE

The zero-rating registry could have one interface with all network operators through a single portal containing the domains and other technical specifications of the zero-rated digital applications. Working with the network operators, this portal could help ensure a secure platform through which all datafree services could be accessed by the user. This portal could be hosted and managed by a contracted digital service provider.

Zero-rating represents a major breakthrough because it will enable all mobile phone users to access digital content for early learning, education, health and work preparation, among other services, in their own homes. Arguably, it is the most significant move towards bridging South Africa’s digital divide since the introduction of mobile technology.

Learning brief developed by Daniella Horwitz, with contributions from CareUp, OLICO and Zibuza, edited by Rahima Essop.

is the learning experience of:

DGMT is a South African public innovator through strategic investment. Our goal for South Africa is a flourishing people, economy and society. Towards this end DGMT currently distributes about R180-million per year and leverages and manages a similar amount of funding through joint ventures with other investors.

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