WISIONS Innovations Labs

In the last years, the importance of putting people at the centre of efforts to provide universal energy has been increasingly recognised, as a key principle in order to achieve the just and green energy transformation. Communities should become co-creators, not just beneficiaries, in order to develop holistic, creative and contextual innovations to unlock the social and economic development potential. This is exactly where WISIONS has gained extensive experience and in-depth knowledge over the past 15 years.

The next WISONS phase focuses on turning that wealth of knowledge into action and shift from individual projects and activities to an approach that can trigger systemic change. WISIONS Innovation Labs comprises two work streams: First, mobilising WISIONS knowledge to support other organisations and secondly, establish one Innovation Lab.
The work stream of mobilising knowledge comprises two main types of activities:

• disseminating the knowledge about holistic and people-centred approaches to energy access to individuals and organizations active in the SDG7 field
• building collaborative activities (like events and knowledge exchanges) that strengthen the capacities of relevant practitioners and organisations for the design and implementation of impactful energy access interventions

The Innovation Lab will test and scale-up interventions approaches that effectively strengthen the livelihoods of rural and peri-urban population in Nepal. Innovation Labs are multi-stakeholder processes organised along four main phases:

• define a shared vision of fulfilling and sustainable life styles and define the changes needed to move towards that horizon
• strengthen capacities in energy and nature-based solutions and co-create transformative interventions that can help advancing the needed changes
• implement, test, monitor and improve the transformative interventions
• extract lessons learned and develop strategies for further up-scaling.