The Policy Innovation Centre (PIC) is the first national institutionalized behavioral initiative in Africa supporting government and stakeholders to make behaviorally informed decisions and generate evidence for impact driven interventions in critical thematic areas. The PIC is an initiative of the Nigeria Economic Summit Group (NESG), a leading think tank in Africa redefining evidence based policy advocacy. In 2017, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) provided funding to establish the ‘interim Policy Innovation Unit (PIU)” as a proof of concept to assess whether a behavioural insights (BI) unit could work in the Nigerian context to improve public sector outcomes. Based on the demonstrated success, the PIC was launched in October 2021 to deepen the impact of social interventions in Nigeria.

The complexity of issues faced by most countries is increasingly inter-related and dynamic. Policies and Interventions must be human centered, realistic and connect the often multi-faceted nature of the needs and challenges people face in their everyday lives. The PIC is positioned to support the delivery of better policies and innovative solutions for high impact interventions across Africa.