Germany’s Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) entered a new phase in its development co-operation with its Digital by Default concept. This approach is grounded in a simple principle: digital solutions must be the default position for projects to meet their objectives within German development co-operation. To ensure broad implementation of this strategy, projects must identify and justify their reasons for not employing digital components. As a result, opportunities for digital technologies are consistently being considered by our implementation partners in the review process of any new or follow-up projects and then employed if they bring valuable advantages.
The Digital by Default approach ensures both the technical and methodological quality of the proposed solutions. It also aims to enable societies to make digitalisation sustainable. The focus is always on the practical benefits: which specific digital solutions can help make a project more effective, more efficient, or more innovative. Furthermore, successful projects under this strategy are scaled up in partner countries.