The Convergence Initiative is an open, transparent and virtual community working to build a global consensus around standards and guidelines for social protection information systems. 

The challenge at hand:

• Despite widespread recognition of the benefits that digital solutions can unleash, countries are struggling to fully realise them.
• Even though social protection programme follow a common set of processes, fragmented social protection information systems are unable to communicate with other systems. This lack of harmonisation and interoperability not only impacts on social protection outcomes, but also leads to wasted public expenditure.

What does the Initiative seek to achieve?

• Foster an ecosystem for innovation by technology solution providers to build products that are interoperable, based on globally agreed standards and guidelines.
• Reduce the time and cost of developing solutions at the country or programme level.
• Design systems that are prepared for future demands, beyond the current level of maturity of policy and information systems.
• Enable countries and programs to mix and match interoperable pieces from various vendors

The initiative is a joint effort by USP2030 members and non-members, governments, development partners and private sector towards creating a harmonized and interoperable digital ecosystem for social protection.