Each main/focus session will be an opportunity for a productive exchange between all stakeholders on policy approaches, challenges, and practical options to address them. Each session may have a chair appointed by the host country or lead organizer and may choose to appoint one or two moderators depending upon the session topic to structure the discussion. The goal is to discuss practices or issues and their relevance to all stakeholders.
All of these main sessions/focus sessions will take place in the main meeting hall and will be related to the key sub-themes of the meeting. They will all have live transcription in English and interpretation in all six UN languages. The transcription will be streamed in real time on the Web and all main sessions/focus sessions will be webcasted.
In some instances these main sessions/focus sessions could be organized in a roundtable format or as an open forum/microphone platform for participants, ultimately the format for each session will be decided upon by the respective session organizers.
The timing of each of these sessions (90 minutes/2 hours/3 hours, etc.) has been decided by the MAG in its ongoing substantive and logistical planning over the past year.
Each focus session will seek to be more ‘output oriented’ than previous years and will integrate the various tracks of workshops in a constructive manner. Some focus sessions mat be preceded by a roundtable grouping related workshops to prepare the possible output of the main session. Each session may also seek to address a set of relevant policy questions, as per the recommendations of the CSTD working group on improvements to the IGF, divergent and convergent opinions on these questions would then be captured in outcome reporting.