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Documentation of Wiki In Africa's work process, story, and impact

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Below you will find the documentation of Wiki In Africa's programs as part of our final report for Year 3 of the Wikimedia Community Fund/Wiki in Africa Multi-Year General Support 2023-25.

The activities report below is divided into two sections - General Operations and Programmatic Activities.

General Operations

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In our Year 3 plan, we cited the following new additions expected for our organisational development:

  • Consultation, analysis, strategy review, and development of 5-year plan until 2030 (possible staff and advisors retreat to map a 5-year plan for the organisation in 2025)
  • Additional board members added by Sept 2025
  • Finalise updated policy documents
  • Evolution of the constitution and charter

Read on to learn about what else we have been doing in more detail.

1. Strategy 2026-2030 Process

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From April to August 2025, the Wiki In Africa team reviewed its past work and analysed what was considered essential to carry forward. This process was conducted through thought-provoking workshops, asynchronous reviews, and community research – asking the Wikimedia community what they wanted and conducting multiple in-person interviews with key Wikimedians. The team participated in an Impact Strategy workshop with external consultants (Skating Panda).
The Impact Strategy 2030 now provides a framework guiding the future development and expansion of our work and programs.

Essential elements of the Impact Strategy included:

  • Validating and recalibrating our initial aims and intentions
  • Reinforcing our organisational values
  • Reaffirming our position and role within the Wikimedia community
  • Isolating the key expectations of our community
  • Assessing internal and external threats
  • Considering stakeholders’ needs and expectations
  • Consolidating our work around four strategic pillars
  • Defining a new Impact Statement

Strategic Pillars (from 2026 onwards)

  • Activation - Creating entry points and return touchpoints that build interest, momentum, and integration into the Wikimedia movement.
  • Leadership & Capacity Building - Making explicit our investment in people, creating longer-term sustainability.
  • Enablement - The explicit and implicit support our staff and programs provide, ensuring communities thrive.
  • Partnering - Building relationships that strengthen and sustain the wider open-knowledge movement.
More detail here
Guided by these documents until 2030, and specifically for this plan between 2026 and 2028, Wiki In Africa will continue to support and expand its current range of projects in alignment with these recalibrated strategic pillars and the guidelines of the Impact Strategy.
Our overall strategy is to:
  • Develop projects to their full sustainable potential
  • Facilitate content development by supporting the growth of Wikimedia and aligned communities
  • Activate new programs to close identified gaps in content and community development
The overarching aims of our projects are to:
  • Bring communities together and help them grow
  • Promote open knowledge as something built and led by communities
  • Facilitate change in how knowledge is created and shared
  • Ensure African ways of knowing are valued and respected equally
Our flagship programs have evolved since 2014, informed by:
  • Wikimedia 2030 Movement Strategy Recommendations
  • UN Sustainable Development Goals
  • Wikimedia Foundation Knowledge Gaps Index

Based on these, programs are loosely grouped into:

  1. Representation and Knowledge Gaps
  2. Youth Activation and Open Education
  3. Tools and Technology (including Offline)
  4. Community Cohesion and Care

Program Applications

From 2026 onwards, programs retain their core structures but are guided by the strategic pillars.

Activation

  • Close representation gaps
  • Make women visible and encourage gender equity
  • Activate youth and the next generation of Wikimedians
  • Foreground climate knowledge
  • Highlight Wikimedia entry points beyond Wiki In Africa

Enablement (Support & Service)

  • Facilitate access via offline and other tools
  • Promote community cohesion and care

Leadership & Capacity Building

  • Embed training within programs
  • Provide ongoing leadership support
  • Build capacity across the movement for Wikimedians at different stages

Partnerships

  • Support Wikimedia communities, user groups, and chapters
  • Build partnerships with cultural, heritage, media, climate, and knowledge institutions

2. Governance & Policies

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In 2025, Wiki In Africa made significant progress in strengthening its governance, strategic foundations, and organisational systems to support long term sustainability and accountability.

Strategic Framework and Organisational direction:

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An Impact Strategy 2026-2030 process was run and its outcome published. This included
  • an update of the mission/impact statement
  • clarified organisational values
  • Update of internal and external threats
  • Stakeholders analysis
  • PESTLE analysis
  • Refinement of our strategic pillars
  • Definition of programmatic strategic focus areas
  • Ultimately, our impact strategy and annual plan 2026

Governance and Policy development

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Published / Approved Documents:
  • WIA Board Membership Acceptance document
  • WIA Board Roles and Responsibilities document
  • BoardConfidentiality Agreement
  • General code of conduct
  • Non disclosure agreements
  • Conflict of Interest Policy and Questionnaire (Staff)
  • Conflict of Interest Questionnaire and Pledge of Personal Commitment (Staff and Board)
Policies and Documents currently under review  or in progress:
  • Staff expense report
  • Staff Leave Policy
  • Financial processes documentation
  • Annual Report 2024 (public version)
  • Board new charter/Board roles and relations

Board & Additional Updates

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  • WIA board expanded to 1 new member: Yop Rwang Pam
  • Updates sent to the board by email during the year:  total of five (February, April, June, August, December)
  • 2025 General Assembly took place on the 21th of Oct 2025 during which
    • Approval of 2024 Annual Report
    • Approval of Finances year end 2025 (February 2025)
    • Endorsement of Reports by current board members
    • Presentation and approval of updated Constitution before submission to the Department of Social Development and SARS for PBO application
    • Endorsement of the New Strategy
    • Presentation and approval of new board member
    • Approval for bank account access to Nonny

Other elements

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  • WIA obtained approval for the opening of a bank account in dollars and one in euros
  • WIA is submitting an updated constitution to the Department of Social Development

3. Fiscal Sponsorship

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In 2025, Wiki In Africa continued to provide fiscal sponsorship services to community-led Wikimedia initiatives across Africa and the Global South, enabling groups without legal or financial infrastructure to access, manage, and distribute grant funding responsibly. This support function plays a critical role in ensuring financial inclusion, accountability, and programme delivery across the movement.

Through fiscal sponsorship, Wiki In Africa acted as the legal and financial intermediary for grants, supporting both lead grantees and distributed teams across multiple countries and regions.

  • Total fiscal sponsorship projects supported: 6
  • Total individuals paid: 13+
  • Countries supported: Gabon, Zimbabwe, Sudan, Angola, multi-country WikiWomen network
  • Total funds disbursed: USD 13, 291.94

Fiscal sponsorship was provided to the following initiatives:

Distribution models
Two fiscal sponsorship payment and distribution models were used:

  1. Lead Disbursement Model - where the lead grantee received funds and distributed locally
  2. Direct Distribution Model (Wiki In Africa-led) - where Wiki In Africa paid multiple team members directly across regions due to cross-border, access, or compliance constraints

In 2025:

  • 3 projects operated under the lead disbursement
  • 3 projects required Wiki In Africa to distribute funds directly to 10+ individuals across multiple countries

This second model was particularly important for initiatives such as the WikiWomen Advisory Council and Wiki Loves Africa Zimbabwe, where contributors were geographically dispersed and banking access varied significantly.

In response to operational complexity and lessons learned from prior years, Wiki In Africa introduced a new structured fiscal sponsorship workflow in 2025, designed to:

  • Reduce payment delays
  • Minimise back-and-forth communication
  • Improve compliance and documentation consistency
  • Strengthen financial traceability and audit readiness

Key improvements included:

  • Introduction of a Grant Lead Information Form to clarify whether funds would be distributed centrally by the lead or directly by Wiki In Africa
  • Standardised Individual Payment Information Collection Forms
  • Mandatory submission of:
    • Invoices
    • Valid ID documentation
    • Proof of receipt confirmations

This structured approach significantly improved payment accuracy, reduced processing bottlenecks, and strengthened internal financial controls.

4. Partnership Projects

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VizWP

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Wiki in Africa is a partner in the research programme Visual Analytics for Sustainability and Climate Change.

Visualizing Sustainability and Climate Change is a project aimed at identifying and visualizing knowledge gaps related to sustainability and climate change on Wikipedia. The project helps visualize these knowledge gaps, supports communities in improving content on this important topic, facilitates collaboration among multilingual communities and partners, and strengthens the capacity of Wikipedia contributors to document and share information on climate change (as well as sustainability and SDGs).
In practice, in collaboration with Wikimedia projects focused on sustainability and climate change, the initiative will produce a visual tool that allows users to evaluate and monitor the quality and quantity of articles related to sustainability and climate change on Wikipedia across different languages.
In the long run, the tool is expected to serve beyond the specific «  Climate change » topic.

The project launched in May 2025 and will last 4 years.

Content Partnership Hub

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The Content Partnerships Hub is a proposed Wikimedia Hub.  It aims to enhance the Wikimedia movement’s collaboration with content partners, including GLAM institutions, research organisations, and UN agencies, by introducing new services, updating the GLAM infrastructure, and facilitating coordination efforts.

In 2025, Wiki In Africa joined 11 affiliates as a co-signatory on a hub pilot application that outlines the plan to establish the Content Partnership Hub (CPH). The application and resulting Governance Strategy are the result of a 3-day workshop in Berlin that was attended by Wiki In Africa. Wiki In Africa's Isla Haddow-Flood is on the initial Nominations Committee for the CPH.

Goals

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Wiki In Africa’s role in the Content Partnerships Hub is to:

  • Facilitate capacity building among African affiliates towards activating content from GLAM and other institutions and communities
  • Facilitate the activation of partnerships between GLAM, knowledge, media and other institutions across Africa

Stakeholders

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  • Wikimedia: GLAM-facing Wikimedians and potential Wikimedians in Residence
  • External: GLAM, knowledge, media and other institutions across Africa

Partners

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  1. AvoinGLAM
  2. Open Knowledge Initiatives - IIIT Hyderabad (formerly known as A2K)
  3. Wiki In Africa
  4. Wikimedia Brasil
  5. Wikimedia Indonesia
  6. Wikimedia Serbia
  7. Wikimedia Sverige
  8. Wikimedia UK
  9. Wikimedians of Singapore User Group

5. New Funding Pathway

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Key links
Context and short description

The New Funding Pathway is an approach piloted by Wiki In Africa — supported by the Wikimedia Foundation — to change how grant funding is managed and disbursed in the Wikimedia movement. This funding initiative started in 2024 as a test model upon the suggestion of the Wikimedia Foundation, but has grown to become a working system of collaboration between the Wikimedia Foundation and Wiki in Africa.

Instead of all funding decisions being made centrally by the Wikimedia Foundation, the New Funding Pathway aims to:

  • Give more decision-making power to local and community partners, such as Wiki In Africa, for community campaigns such as Wiki Loves Africa and SheSaid.
  • Allow these partners to review and decide on grant funds themselves; and
  • Drive funding decisions that are contextually informed and responsive to local priorities.
Impact since 2024

The New Funding Pathway initiative was launched in 2024 at the invitation of the Wikimedia Foundation. It was explored in 2024 and 2025. A partial implementation took place for the rapid grants of SheSaid 2025. But fully effective implementation only started in October 2025, for the rapid grant campaign of Wiki Loves Africa 2026.

2025 Goals
  • Define and test the implementation processes with WMF Grant Officer
  • Hire WIA staff in charge of the process
  • First implementation of the process for WLA 2026
2025 Activities for the WLA 2026
  • The first Office Hour was held on the 25th of September 2025, and had 31 participants register on the events page
  • An Office Hour held on the 18th of October 2025. 26 participants registered for the event on Meta.
  • An info session was held on the 30th of October 2025. 21 participants registered for the event on Meta. Recordings can be found here.
  • A training session for jury members was held on the 25th of November 2025. All ten (10) jury members and three staff members of Wiki in Africa were in attendance.
  • Training videos on the rapid grants application process were created and uploaded on Commons. The links were shared on the mailing lists and Telegram channels
  • Jury review activities took place in the last two months of the year
2024-5 Impact (WLA 2025 round only)
  • A total of 32 applications were submitted from 15 countries for the WLA campaign. This was a marked improvement of the 22 applications submitted the previous year. This can be attributed to the three training sessions held within the application cycle, as well as the recorded videos and constant reminders to the mailing lists and Telegram channels.
  • The review committee approved 18 applications for either partial or full funding
  • Final funding count was 13 applications from 9 countries
  • A total of 31,405.07 USD was (or will be disbursed to the approved grantees)
Story

In this diff article published by the Community Resources Team on the 2nd of September 2025, WMF reported about its efforts towards Greater Subsidiarity. 

"Over the past year, we’ve made meaningful progress in advancing the principle of subsidiarity in resource distribution by working closely with movement partners who are well-placed to make funding decisions in their local or thematic contexts.
Through strong collaboration with organizers of core campaigns such as Wiki Loves Earth, Wiki Loves Africa, and SheSaid, we successfully implemented funding initiatives that placed these partners in direct decision-making roles. Wiki in Africa reviewed and made decisions on approximately 30 funding applications totalling $80,000, and is now in the process of reviewing campaign reporting and outcomes. Similarly, the Wiki Loves Earth team led decision-making on 12 applications in Rapid Fund cycles, amounting to $43,133. These efforts signal a growing capacity and trust in community-led funding processes that are both contextually informed and aligned with organizer priorities. "

Programmes

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The success of Wiki In Africa’s programmes can be seen as being built on four main pillars: activation, leadership and capacity building, enablement, and partnering.

First, activation was evident in consistent growth across all main programs. This evidence is collected through consistent connection to and support of the organisers and participants, active feedback loops and consultation, and up-to-date research and feasibility studies, such as the offline WikiFundi project (final report due 2026), with regular activity, and Results and Best Practice reports that track progress. link

One way to monitor the success of the activation pillar is to track community engagement, which flourished through consistent programming, which, in turn, led to increased participation among local Wikimedia organisers—especially in initiatives such as Wiki Loves Africa, SheSaid, and WikiChallenge. Regular community consultations and feedback loops were implemented for all programs and activities, ensuring that organisers’ voices shaped ongoing efforts. Community partnerships and involvement were fostered at all levels, including through ambassador roles, with best practices documented and shared widely. You can find all of the 2025 Results & best practices pages here: https://w.wiki/Hgws

Enablement, the second pillar, was strengthened by significant progress in balancing language divisions, with content translations, ambassador engagement, and training sessions provided in English, French, and Arabic.

The third pillar, leadership and capacity building, placed training and skills transfer at the core of every program, with explicit training schedules for focal initiatives such as Wiki Loves Africa, Wiki Loves Women’s Focus Group, SheSaid, and WikiOTO.

Finally, partnerships were expanded through collaborations on the VizWp Research Project, the development and activation of the Content Partnership Hub, the New Grant Pathway approach to grantee partnerships, and increased collaborations on the WikiChallenge Ecoles d’Afrique programme.

Wiki Loves Africa 2025

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Link to Wiki Loves Africa 2025: Results and best practices page

Context

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WLA poster - Wikimania 2025

Wiki Loves Africa is an annual public contest organised by Wiki In Africa in collaboration with the Wikimedia movement across Africa. The contest encourages people across Africa to contribute media (photographs, video and audio) about their environment to Wikimedia Commons for use on Wikipedia and other project websites of the Wikimedia Foundation. Wiki Loves Africa particularly encourages participants to contribute to media that illustrates a specific theme for that year. Each year the theme changes and could include any universal, visually rich and culturally specific topic (for example, markets, rites of passage, festivals, public art, cuisine, natural history, urbanity, daily life, notable persons, etc). The project is run across the whole continent. However, some specific actions (training, communication, etc.) are held in some countries with national organizers.

In 2025, the 11 edition of Wiki Loves Africa was held from 1st March until 30th April 2025 with the theme Farm to Plate. The year's contest also marks the 11th anniversary of the international photo contest and an opportunity for the international team to reflect on the journey so far; highlighting impact stories, learnings, and most importantly appreciating notable participants and local organizers from over the years.

2025 Goals

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The contest takes place in the first quarter of 2025.

  • The contest takes place in the first quarter of 2025
  • A minimum of 25 African Wikimedia volunteer groups organise local focused WLA activities.
  • At least 15k images are submitted to the 2025 competition.
  • At least 700 unique participants
  • Reuse on Wikimedia projects of at least 10% (12 months after contest).
  • The international photographic jury has at least 5 international members and conducts a transparent process towards the final selection.
  • The international video jury has at least 3 professional filmmakers and conducts a transparent process towards the final selection.
  • A survey is released from feedback from at least 20 contest participants with at least 70% positive engagement in the contest. Constructive improvements to further develop and enhance the programme for 2027.
  • At least 10 interviews are conducted among local team organizers, showing high levels of satisfaction with the contest. Constructive improvements to further develop and enhance the programme for 2027.
  • Documentation of best practices is completed and a final report published for the general public.

Activities

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  • Creation of homepage on meta, with key facts and timeline information: Wiki Loves Africa 2025
  • Creation of contest page on Commons: Wiki Loves Africa 2025
  • Grants Office Hours: Provided guidance and clarification to organizers and community members on the Wiki Loves Africa grants process, eligibility, and effective project implementation.
  • Support of 26 Rapid Grant submission requests. 20 were accepted
  • Official Launch Party (watch it here): It marked the formal commencement of Wiki Loves Africa 2025, creating awareness around the Farm to Plate theme and encouraging participation across African Wikimedia communities.
  • Several training webinars were organized, in 3 different languages
  • Developed and implemented a communication campaign on Insta, Facebook and Twitter. Wiki Loves Africa Farm to Plate" theme videos on Wikimedia Commons
  • The jury process:
    • 30,356 images, 23 Audios and 229 videos were reviewed through the Wiki Loves Africa Jury process.
    • The first round of photographic images was done by 55 Commonists and Wikimedians.
    • The first round of the video review was done for the first time in 2025 and was done by a group 7 Commonist and videographers
    • The Wilson Oluoha prize winners were selected by from the local community winners
    • The subsequent rounds were reviewed by experienced jurors based on predefined quality and relevance criteria. The full jury report is available on the Result and Best practices page
    • The photography jury comprised a mix of professional photographers, experience Commonists, an international contest organisers, and past Wiki Loves Africa winners), from Africa and internationally.
    • The video jury comprised a mix of professional filmmakers, from Africa and internationally.
    • The Wilson Oluoha prize jury comprised of professional photographers and Commonist from outside Africa.
  • Concluded the campaign by announcing and celebrating outstanding contributions, highlighting impactful stories from across Africa. The international winners of Wiki Loves Africa 2025 were announced during the closing ceremony of Wikimania 2025 in Kenya; while the winners of the Inaugural Wilson Oluoha prize were announced during a live broadcast on our YouTube and social media in December 2025.
  • The winners of Wiki Loves Africa 2025 were celebrated during Episode 49 of WikiAfrica Hour where they shared the stories behind their photos, videos and audio.

2025 Impact

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In 2025, per Category:Images from Wiki Loves Africa 2025,Category:Videos from Wiki Loves Africa 2025, Category:Audios from Wiki Loves Africa 2025; the contest resulted in

  • 30,356 photos submitted
  • 229 videos submitted
  • 23 audios submitted
  • 886 competitors in 45 countries.
  • 52 participating Communities
  • 17 In-person events (on record) several others were not communicated and documented by local organizers.
  • Online trainings and webinars were organized during the contest
  • Different Office Hours were hosted before the contest.

Key moments

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  • Introduction of regional prize category named after Wilson Oluoha, past Wiki Loves Africa community facilitator.
  • Introduction of the overview table with list of pages to be translated and the local languages translation needed.
  • We had training and webinar sessions in French and Arabic this time, not only English.
  • in 2025, we had an Audio producing session for the first time.
  • For the first time in the history of Wiki Loves, we had a collaboration between communities who came together and applied for one rapid grants to carry out Wiki Loves Africa campaign collaboratively.
  • Wiki Loves Africa grants was reviewed under WIA grants pathway, giving room to quality review.
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Image links: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Wiki_Loves_Africa_2025_events

Community Engagement

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The Wiki Loves Africa community was actively engaged during the 2025 campaign, with structured feedback gathered through two main channels. First, a general community survey was conducted using Quatrics, allowing participants to respond anonymously to guided questions, share their experiences, and provide open feedback on the campaign. In addition, qualitative insights were collected through organizers’ interviews, where four organizers from different regions across Africa were interviewed to reflect on their experiences. These interviews highlighted what worked well, the challenges encountered, and key lessons from the Wiki Loves Africa 2025 campaign. Together, these feedback mechanisms provided valuable community-driven insights to inform future editions of the campaign.

Communications

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In September, the Wiki Loves Africa theme for 2025 was announced as Farm to Plate.

Read more

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(DIFF, WikiAfrica Hour, News articles)

Wiki Loves Women 2025

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Link to results and best practices page

Context

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Wiki Loves Women Poster - Wikimania 2025

Wiki Loves Women is a global initiative of Wiki In Africa that works to reduce the gender gap across Wikimedia projects by improving the visibility and representation of women, with a strong focus on Africa. The project combines content creation, community engagement, and leadership development to address the structural absence of women’s stories, voices, and achievements in open knowledge spaces. Through campaigns, training programmes, and partnerships, Wiki Loves Women supports contributors and organisers from different regions and languages, while building a collaborative ecosystem where women are empowered to participate and lead knowledge locally and globally. In 2025 we worked along 5 directions:

  1. ISA Challenge – Tell Us About Her: Women in Literature (March – April 2025): This campaign used the ISA tool to enhance image descriptions on WikiCommons, helping to portray women more accurately and comprehensively. Through this drive, participants added valuable context to visual content featuring women in litterature.
  2. Wiki Loves Women Focus Group (January – December 2025): The Focus Coaching Programme continued to mentor and support community leaders through a structured, practical online learning space. Epowering participants with the skills and confidence to design and implement gender-equity initiatives within Wikimedia and the wider Open movement.
  3. SheSaid Campaign 2025 (October – December 2025): The SheSaid drive once again celebrated and amplified women’s voices by increasing their visibility on Wikiquote. This year’s campaign encouraged contributions in multiple languages and regional collaborations, expanding its global reach.
  4. Wiki Oto (Launched 2025): Newly introduced in 2025, it is a new campaign started by members of the Wiki Loves Women Focus Group in 2025. It is part of the group’s new learning-by-practicing approach, developed after three years of the leadership program. The campaign works to reduce the lack of information about African women on Wikimedia platforms. It encourages people around the world to create, improve, and add content that shows the achievements of African women. The campaign focuses on adding and improving structured data about African women and their contributions on Wikidata, with the possibility of expanding to other Wikimedia projects in the future.
  5. Inspiring Openː In 2025, two elements moved the Wiki Loves Africa Inspiring Open project forward. WikiAfrica Hour continued to include Inspiring Open interviews with leading Wikimedia and Open Community figures in its In Focus segment. These In-Focus segments for Inspiring Open were organized by Wiki In Africa’s Donia Domiaty, who also served as the lead interviewer.
  • WLW SheSaid logo
    WLW SheSaid logo
  • Wiki Loves Women Focus Group logo
    Wiki Loves Women Focus Group logo
  • Inspiring Open Podcast logo
    Inspiring Open Podcast logo
  • Wiki Loves Women Tell Us About Her logo
    Wiki Loves Women Tell Us About Her logo
  • Wiki Loves Women Wiki OTO logo
    Wiki Loves Women Wiki OTO logo

2025 Goals

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Focus Groupː

  • A minimum of 5 additional African-based individuals join the Wiki Loves Women Focus Group.
  • Focus Group members run at least 12 WLW events with Wiki in Africa in 2025
  • A minimum of 4 gender-gap-related webinars are presented and published to consistently transfer knowledge and inspire further action.
  • Feedback is collected and collated from the Focus Group members about the program, and includes constructive improvements to further develop and enhance the programme for 2026.

SheSaidː

  • Onboard a minimum of 2 new language communities
  • A minimum of 7 communities are inspired to participate
  • Support the application of 12 communities or individuals for rapid grant support
  • Host 5 office hours and training sessions throughout the project
  • SheSaid central portal updated for 2025
  • SheSaid redlists and queries reconfigured for 2025
  • Global social media campaign sees 10% increase in engagement across Wiki Loves Women social platforms
  • 5 blog posts 2 DIFF articles created
  • Encourage documentation of events hosted by organisers Experience
  • Feedback Survey conducted with organizers and participants
  • All metrics collated and analyzed
  • 15 Wikiquote language projects impacted
  • 10 national, regional or theme-focused teams (usergroups or volunteer groups) participate
  • 5,000 entries created or improved
  • One iteration of the train-the-trainer course is successfully hosted by the WLW team during the course of 2025 (funding-dependent).

Tell Us About Herː

  • One online image description improvement drive run on ISA Tool during 2025
  • A minimum of 30 participants
  • A minimum of 35,000 contributions

Wiki OTOː

  • 5 internal trainings condacted
  • 5 external trainings condacted
  • 5 editions run
  • 5 Skills developed or improved
  • 5 blog posts shared
  • 1,200 Wikidata items per edition

Inspiring Openː

  • A minimum of 10 Inspiring Open podcasts are recorded, released, and distributed to inspire further action.

Activities

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2025 Impact

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Isla and Sichelesile at Wikimania 2025

ISA Tell Us About Her: Women in Art:

  • 19,209 contributions
  • 10 Contributors
  • 60,682 Images worked on

Wiki Loves Women Focus Group:

  • 4 new members
  • 35 total members from 14 countries
  • 13 working sessions
  • A new Wikidata campaign Wiki OTO launched in 2025 by the WLW FG members

SheSaid 2025:

Afek at WikiConvention francophone 2025
  • 21 participating languages (Arabic, Catalan, Central Bikol, Tagalog, English, Fante, French, Gungbe, Hausa, Indonesian, Igbo, Italian, Central Kanuri, Malay, Serbian, Setswana, Spanish, Swahili, Ukrainian, Uzbek, Malayalam).
  • 18 participating communities
  • 5 new languages joined
  • 28 grant applications submitted
  • 5 diff posts shared
  • 15,510 new or improved articles (detailed results per language are here)
  • Top 3 languages are:
    1. Hausa with 4,976 new or improved articles
    2. Indonesian with 2,810 new or improved articles
    3. Igbo with 2,173 new or improved articles
  • She said 2025 in Igala community
    She said 2025 in Igala community
  • Shesaid 2025 in Anambra, Nigeria
    Shesaid 2025 in Anambra, Nigeria
  • Shesaid 2025 in Anambra, Nigeria
    Shesaid 2025 in Anambra, Nigeria
  • SheSaid 2025 Women Leaders and Entrepreneurs
    SheSaid 2025 Women Leaders and Entrepreneurs
  • SheSaid 2025 in Bénin
    SheSaid 2025 in Bénin

Wiki OTO:

Florence at WikiConvention francophone 2025
  • 674 Items created or improved
  • 9 working sessions run
  • 3 editions run

Inspiring Open

  • 4 Inspiring Open interviews were conducted in 4 episodes. Donia Domiaty interviewed:
  1. Nichole Saad in January 2025 (Episode 42: Offline Wikis)
  2. Sandra Soster in February (Episode 43: Decolonising knowledge on Wikipedia)
  3. Victoria Doronina in March (Episode 44: Women's Visibility)
  4. Tochi Precious in November (Episode 52: Preserving local languages)

Impact since 2023

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  • 32,094 new articles created or edited through SheSaid on Wikiquote
  • 28 different language communities participate in the SheSaid campaign
  • 44 working sessions were hosted by the Focus Group members
  • 95,870 contributions through the ISA Tell Us about her campaigns
  • 70,916 Images described during the ISA challenges
  • 35 members joined the Focus Group from 14 countries

Key moments

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Wiki Loves Women Poster - Wikimania 2025
  • Wiki Loves Women contributed to major international spaces, including Art+Feminism, WikiWomen Summit at Wikimania 2025 in Nairobi WikiConvention Francophone 2025 in Benin, and the UN Open Science Conference 2025 in Tokyo, bringing gender equity conversations into global open knowledge forums.
  • Through the #SheSaid campaign, Wiki Loves Women collaborated closely with other gender-gap initiatives and Wikimedia groups, including Noircir Wikipédia, WikiDonne, and Les sans pagEs. These partnerships strengthened the campaign’s reach and impact, while allowing each initiative to contribute according to its own vision and expertise.
  • The #SheSaid campaign continued to grow globally, with 20 Wikiquote language projects impacted, 18 teams participating, and 5 new languages joining in 2025. +15K women’s quotes were created or improved, amplifying women’s voices worldwide.
  • In March 2025, the Wiki Loves Women initiative was featured in Episode 44 of WikiAfrica Hour, a special edition held in celebration of International Women’s History Month.
  • The use of campaign illustrations was featured in The Portrait Lady comic, highlighting how visual storytelling supported the #SheSaid campaign and strengthened its creative impact.
  • The #SheSaid campaign was featured in the French Regards sur l’actualité du mouvement Wikimédia (RAW) after helping the community reach the milestone of 10,000 Wikiquote pages, marking a significant moment of recognition within the broader Wikimedia movement.
  • Inspiring Open Podcast conducted R&D on a new community-focused program (2 pilot podcasts to launch in March 2026) and released 4 Inspiring Open interviews, conducted as part of theWikiAfrica Hour episodes. 6 episodes created in 2025.

Community Engagement & Feedback

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Surveys

Inspiring Quotes from Organisers

  • "Beyond the activities and numbers, #SheSaid 2025 was a powerful reminder of the impact of language inclusion and community ownership. Working with volunteers showed how committed people become when they see their language and culture valued in global spaces like Wikimedia. The campaign strengthened collaboration, built confidence among new editors, and reaffirmed that documenting women’s voices especially in underrepresented languages is both necessary and urgent. Most importantly, it reinforced my belief that sustained mentorship and local partnerships are key to growing meaningful participation and ensuring long-term impact."
  • "Change happens when people are given both the space to be heard and the support to contribute. Organising #SheSaid showed me that collaboration, intention, and shared purpose can turn learning into lasting impact."
  • "Organiser SheSaid dans mon pays, la RDC, c’était transformer un engagement individuel en une force collective. J’ai ressenti de la fierté, de la responsabilité et beaucoup d’espoir en voyant des personnes collaborer pour rendre visibles les voix des femmes sur Wikiquote. Cette expérience m’a rappelé que lorsque nous écrivons ensemble, nous ne documentons pas seulement des faits, nous construisons une mémoire plus juste et plus inclusive."

Inspiring Quotes from the Focus Group members

  • "I really enjoyed connecting with new people and learning through hands-on activities. I hope the new Cohort Training continues to empower contributors, build skills, and foster collaboration."
  • "Since the first round I joined the community I felt welcomed I was glad I had the opportunity to be able to express my though suggest ideas and even share my personal feeling around my capacity my dreams in a community where I felt safe and supported . I am great full for the whole journey  that made me a stronger leader in my our life and community of Wikimedian."

Meetings, Events & Presentations
As part of the global gender gap community, the Wiki Loves Women initiative not only leads its own impactful projects but also actively contributes to international events that align with its mission to close the gender gap across Wikimedia and beyond. In 2025, WLW took part in several key global and regional gatherings that celebrated inclusion, open knowledge, and women’s representation within the movement:

  • Art+Feminism Programme – 8 March 2025 Wiki Loves Women participated in the Art+Feminism programme with a hands-on session on the #SheSaid campaign, introducing participants to editing Wikiquote and amplifying the voices of women and gender-diverse people. (Recording)
  • WikiAfrica Hour – Episode #44 Wiki Loves Women was featured in a special WikiAfrica Hour episode on women’s visibility, exploring how the Wikimedia Movement supports gender equity and the role of community initiatives in closing the gender gap.(Recording)
  • WikiWomen Summit – Wikimania 2025 (Participation) Wiki Loves Women took part in the WikiWomen Summit at Wikimania 2025, engaging in discussions on collaboration, empowerment, and the visibility of gender-focused initiatives across the movement.
  • WikiConvention Francophone 2025 Wiki Loves Women joined the WikiConvention Francophone to connect with French-speaking Wikimedia communities and share experiences and strategies for addressing the gender gap.
  • UN Open Science Conference 2025 Wiki Loves Women was featured at the United Nations Open Science Conference in Japan, contributing to global discussions on gender equity, open knowledge, and community-led approaches to inclusive open science.(Recording)

Read more

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Diff posts:

Blog posts:

Media Coverage:

Wiki Africa Hour:

Mentions:

WikiAfrica Hour 2025

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Link to: results and best practices page
WikiAfrica Hour is a monthly community-driven vodcast that spotlights the activities, impact, and stories of Wikimedians across Africa and beyond. It is produced by Wiki In Africa and serves as a platform that connects, informs, and amplifies the work of African contributors within the global Wikimedia movement.

Programme Objectives

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The programme aims to:

  • Share key updates and highlight notable contributions from African Wikimedians.
  • Host meaningful conversations with guests and engage live with community questions.
  • Strengthen collaboration across the Wikimedia ecosystem by exploring challenges, opportunities, and innovative projects.
  • Showcase African contributors and leaders to the regional and global Wikimedia community.

Impact since 2023

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  • guests= 156
  • episodes = 37
  • Wikimedia news items shared= 261
  • Total YouTube views (WAHour)= 9,052
  • YouTube Subscribers added= 1,180
  • Channel views= 29,422
  • Channel views % increase (on the previous 3-year period)= 12
  • Total Meta views (WAHour)= 15,464

2025 Goals

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  • Host a minimum of 10 WikiAfrica Hour episodes in 2025
  • Have a minimum of 30 guests discussing their experiences
  • Increase the viewership on YouTube to 40% of 2024 levels
  • Engage with and increase WikiAfrica audience by 30%
  • Engage more communities and individuals in the News and In Focus sections.
  • Expand the reach and views of WikiAfrica Hour episodes.

2025 Activities

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Episodes aired in 2025

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You can find them all in this page.

2025 Impact

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Qualitative improvement

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WikiAfrica Hour Advisory Panel
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As we always work to improve WikiAfrica Hour more and more, we decided to establish the Editorial Advisory Panel which is expected to play a key role in brainstorming and recommending relevant and timely topics that will enrich the WikiAfrica Hour, making it more engaging and beneficial for the Wikimedia community. The panel is composed of members with expertise in areas such as journalism, podcasting, communication, and Wikimedia projects. The panel convened one time, in which we collected some valuable feedback concerning the format and the production. They also suggested some valuable topics to be hosted in next episodes of WAH.

Here is the list of people who joined the panel:
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  • Jan Ainali : Co-founder of Wikimedians for Sustainable Development. From Sweden. He runs a podcast on his website.
  • Sandister : one of the founding members of the Wikimedia Ghana User Group. Wikimedian of the Year in October 2020. multimedia journalist and digital media trainer. WMF staff member
  • Donatien : Chairman Wikimedia Community User Group of Côte d'Ivoire. elected, in 2013, as General Secretary of the Bloggers Association of Côte d’Ivoire (ABCI). Professor in management
  • Mervat Salman: co-founder of the Wikimedians of the Levant user group. a member of the Conference Grants Review Committee (volunteer) since 2016, and a member of the Elections Committee. Established the Wiki for She user group in 2024 and recently has hosted a vodcast in Arabic related to women.
  • Anthony : Nigerian Program Director of the Africa Chatbot & Conversational AI Summit. Host of Africa Tech Radio.
  • Romeo Ronald Lomora: Team Leader, Wikimedia Community User Group South Sudan.
  • Delphine Menard: a postgraduate degree in international communication and marketing. French lives in Germany. Former Manager, Staff Experience, Wikimedia Foundation
Their main recommendations were
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  • Limit the number of guests to a maximum of two per episode to ensure deeper and more focused conversations.
  • Improve episode titles and In Focus framing to increase visibility and reach beyond the Wikimedia community.
  • Enhance production quality by collecting locally recorded videos from guests and editing them centrally before publishing.
  • Shorten the episode preparation timeline, as long lead times increase the risk of guest cancellations.
  • Keep the total episode duration within one hour, with clear time allocation across segments.
  • Invite more non-Wikimedians to broaden external engagement and showcase Wikimedia work beyond the movement.
Suggested Topic Directions
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Key suggested topics included AI and legal issues on Commons, technical skill-building, reuse of tools and templates, mapping and open data, digital safety, extended user rights, misinformation and disinformation, Wikimania-related insights, and local language Wikimedia projects.

Quantitative improvement

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2025 Objective 2025 impact Comment
Host a minimum of 10 WikiAfrica Hour episodes in 2025 11 episodes hosted 1 episode each month, just one of them paused. Additional episodes: 4 Wikimania 2025 Morning Briefings + 3 Offline Demo episodes
Have a minimum of 24 guests discussing their experiences 38 guests hosted + 13 Wikimania Guest + 3 Offline Demonstration guests Plus 13 different hosts (as host differs according to each episode's topic)

In Focus section

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In Focus section in WikiAfrica Hour have developed and been more varied, between inspiring open interviews, echoes from conferences, highlighting some projects such as Wiki Loves Africa and Wiki Challenge, and explaining/demo for tools such as Fluxx. You can find them all in this page, and on this playlist on YouTube.

News

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We kept the news segment which is the favorite for many people. It is a prerecorded section highlighting the most important news, especially the ones that are valuable to the African community. By the end of 2025, we collected and presented 110 news items during 2025. Find them all here.

2025 Key moments

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Many of WikiAfrica Hour spisode had great impact not just in audience, but also in guests and guest hosts themselves, here are some examples of WAH impact which extend beyond the live show:

  • Episode 42 discussed the offline field especially in education. The episode encourage Isla (Wiki In Africa co-lead) to host special episodes of WAH "Offline demo series" exploring tools that are used in the offline eso-system. You can find them in Youtube here.
  • Episode 43 discussed decolonisation of knowledge in wikimedia and out side it as well. The episode inspired one of the guest speakers Lutherking who reflected on his experience in the episode and in GLAM projects in this article. Moreover, the same episode inspired the guests to collaborate and organise a panel discussion on Wikimania 2025 about the same topic in which all panelist shared their thoughts and ideas and exchange.

Community Engagement & Feedback

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  • 2 Prep meetings for each guest host for onboarding
  • Poster at Wikimania 2025
    WikiAfrica Hour Wikimania 2025 Poster.
  • End of the year feedback survey from the guests and guest hosts of 2025 episodes
  • Event page on meta for each episode (example of ep#50)

Communications

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We have 2 communication campaigns for each episode; before & after

The communication campaign BEFORE the episode:

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  • Sharing the episode details (the topic, description, guest host, and guests) on our social media platforms:
  • WikiAfrica Facebook page
  • Wiki In Africa in LinkedIn
  • WikiAfrica on X
  • Announce the episode on Wikimedia mailing lists: African Wikimedians, Wikimedia L, and variant mailing lists according to the topic of each episode.
  • Announce the episode on relevant Telegram channels, for example: Wikimedia General Chat, Wikimedia announcement channel, African Wikimedians, WikiFranca, and other variant telegram groups according to the topic of each episode.
  • Write a blog post on Wiki In Africa website about the upcoming episode
  • Create an event page on meta and share the link with community members (example of ep#50)

The communication campaign AFTER the episode:

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  • We post post-episode diff post (example of ep#50)
  • Re-write the blog post on Wiki Ain Africa website
  • Share some quotes of episode’s guests on our social media pages (listed above).

Readmore

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ISA Tool 2025

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Link to ISA Tool/Results and best practices 2025

The ISA Tool was created to enhance the placement of images contributed each year to Wiki Loves Africa (and other photographic contests and GLAM collections) by improving labelling and descriptions. The ISA Tool links structured data from WikiData to Wikimedia Commons images through targeted online drives. At the WikiDataCon 2019 awards, the ISA Tool was recognised as the coolest data tool. In 2024, the ISA Tool received the Eggbeater Award at the Coolest Tools during Wikimania Katowice. Initially developed in collaboration with the Wikimedia Foundation's Structured Data on Commons project, the ISA Tool has also received support from the Wikimedia community. In 2022, Wikimedia Sweden supported the tool's development. In early 2024, the WikiMentor group hosted a Hack-a-thon for the ISA Tool. In 2025, Egbe Eugene (the main maintainer of the tool, and one of its primary developers) won the tech Wikimedian of the year in Wikimania Nairobi and he mentioned that the ISA Tool is the project/tool he was most interested in and spent much of his time on. At the Wikimania Nairobi Hackathon, Eugene gathered Wikimedians who were interested in the tool which they followed up with a WMA Tool Series - ISA Spotlight Session (an online hackathon after Wikimania to involve more people in this community to help improve ISA more and more).

ISA Impact

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Metrics by Queries

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The long term impact of the ISA Tool
Metric 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025
Number of contributions 0 51,640 85,563 182,421 156,426 159,335 98,428 136,428
Number of contributors 0 – – 267 180 130 314 380
Number of captions edited 0 – – 4,060 9,251 2,350 6,875 13,291
Number of depicts edited 0 – – 178,361 147,175 156,985 91,553 123,137

2025 Goals

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  • at least 50.000 edits through ISA
  • at least 50 campaigns
  • at least 40.000 contributions
  • at least 150 participants
  • Organize at least 5 discovery sessions during the year in other organizations events (eg, Let’s connect, a WikiFranca meeting, an online webinar in Ghana, an offline WikiConference etc.)

2025 Activities

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Campaigns organised by Wiki In Africa

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  • Tell Us About Her campaigns: Women in Literature – March 2025 (Contributors: 26 ; Images worked on: 60,682; Total Contributions: 19,207)
  • Wiki Loves Africa campaigns > ISA Challenge – Farm To Plate (October & November 2025) (Contributors: 50, Images worked on: 31203, Total Contributions: 8559)
  • Wiki Loves Africa campaigns > ISA Challenge – Climate & Weather (February 2025) (Contributors: 25,Images worked on: 13,721, Total Contributions: 27,709)

Campaigns organised by various wikimedia community members

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  • WLA 2025-Sudan (Contributors: 15 ; Images worked on: 552; Total Contributions: 6410)
  • Let’s have our images speak Arabic (Contributors: 10 ; Images worked on: 25738; Total Contributions: 4059)

ISA Tool Training to community

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Ukrainian community (Europe)

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Screenshot of ISA workshop with the Ukrainian community

As part of a technical course organised by Wikimedia Ukraine, the course coordinators contacted the Wiki In Africa team to deliver a training session on the ISA Tool. An ISA facilitator accepted the invitation and conducted a session on 17 June, explaining how to use ISA to improve the visibility and structured data of Wikimedia Commons content.

Iraq and Kuwait community (MENA)

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The Wikimedia communities in Iraq and Kuwait planned an ISA campaign focused on adding Arabic descriptions to images related to their countries. They contacted the ISA facilitator, who prepared and delivered a hands-on presentation on 18 December, introducing the tool and guiding participants through practical use cases aligned with the workshop’s goals.

ISA @ Wikimania 2025

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Wiki In Africa Team presented ISA tool as a poster at Wikimania 2025 in Nairobi.

ISA Tool Wikimania 2025 Poster.

Learnings over the years

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  • Campaigns with clear topics and visuals perform better.
  • Incentives and social media visibility boost participation.
  • Cross-promotion with Wiki Loves Africa or Wiki Loves Women increases impact.
  • Active presence and visibility in international events like Wikimania Hackathons can organically attract new contributors, build cross-regional collaborations, and sustain technical maintenance of open tools like ISA.
  • Tensions still exist with some Wikimedia Commons editors over the quality of the work done by ISA tool users. To limit the risk of poor quality work led by financial incentives, we decided to stop offering money gifts during the campaigns specifically run by Wiki in Africa (in the past, we offered 20 to 50 USD to the biggest participant)


Technical highlights

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Recognition

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  • Eugene, main developer, recognized as Tech Wikimedian of the Year. When he was asked about the most tool he interested in wikimedia projects, he mentioned ISA.
  • Loka, an admin on Arabic wikipedia, is recently interested in ISA tool and offer instant help to fix some bugs or offer some stats from time to time.

Wikimania 2025 Hackathon: A Catalyst for New Contributors

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During Wikimania 2025 in Nairobi, the Hackathon pre-conference became a major space where new contributors discovered the ISA Tool. One participant, in a post published on Diff, shared how they first learned about ISA during the MediaWiki environment setup session, when Eugene233, the main developer and maintainer of ISA, introduced the project. Inspired by its purpose and community-driven impact, the contributor chose ISA as their Hackathon project, collaborating with a mentor to set up the tool locally and work on an issue.

The experience showcased ISA’s role as a gateway project for developers entering Wikimedia’s technical ecosystem – especially those passionate about structured data, visual knowledge, and tools that empower underrepresented communities. As they noted: “It was hugely popular, especially among African communities. Something clicked. I knew right there this was going to be my Hackathon project.” The story emphasizes how inclusive, well-documented, and community-supported tools like ISA can help attract new technical contributors from all over the world — extending the tool’s impact beyond its African origins and into the broader Wikimedia developer ecosystem.

Following Wikimania, interested contributors organised the WMA Tool Series – ISA Spotlight Session to sustain momentum from the Hackathon and further explore ISA’s features and use cases.


Communications

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Social media engagement

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  • We use social media pages of Wiki In Africa and other allies to advertise ISA updates:
  • We created social media campaign on WIA Facebook page, twitter, and telegram channels (African Wikimedians, Wikimedia announcements) to announce the tutorial video.
  • We created social media campaigns on pages related to the campaign such as Wiki Loves Women for Tell Us About Her campaign and Wiki Loves Africa for their campaigns.

Email outreach

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  • We use mailing lists to announce ISA updates and to advertise campaigns
  • We usually use the general ones such as: Wikimedia-l & africanWikimedians, but also we use other mailing lists according to the topic of the campaign announced.

Read more

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WikiFundi 2025

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WikiFundi was developed to facilitate outreach and education goals in places where access and data can be challenging.

Key Project Links

  • WikiFundi Website: www.wikifundi.org
  • Wiki In Africa project page
  • WikiFundi on Meta
  • WikiAfrica Offline OEResources

2025 Activities

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  • Continue feasibility study research into the Offline landscape across Africa
  • Analyse recommendations in preparation for 5-year plan until 2030
  • Explore alternative technologies to host WikiFundi

2025 Impact

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  • In support of OEWeek 2025, and following from a successful WikiAfrica Hour episode on Offline Platforms, 3 special editions that provided Demos of these Offline Platforms. Isla Haddow-Flood hosted the sessions. Included in the OEWeek25 Special Editions were:
  • (Still in process) Feasibility study to assess the current environment and demand for offline solutions to properly assess WikiFundi’s future role, opportunities, and actions. This was launched in October 2025 and is expected to be completed by March 2026. Maxwell Beganim has been contracted to complete project. The aims are to:
    • To assess the degree of complexity of access to the current tool and installation by a potential user.
    • To assess the current and future relevance and value of WikiFundi
    • To investigate the demand for and use of offline educational tools across Africa, with a focus on, but not limited to, the education sector and the Wikimedia ecosystem
    • To recommend  future applications of and distribution for WikiFundi, including alternative paths,  based on community needs, partnerships and technology trends
    • To review and suggest changes and updates to WikiFundi website http://www.wikifundi.org + representations on www.wikiinafrica.org and meta.wikimedia.org

WikiChallenge Ecoles d'Afrique 2025

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Poster presented at Wikimania 2025

Lead: User:Anthere

Key project links
Context

WC is a writing competition organized by Wiki in Africa and Fondation Orange, every year, since 2017. It is a competition dedicated to pupils aged 8-13 and which takes place in several French and English speaking African countries such as Botswana, Burkina-Faso, Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, Guinée Conakry, Liberia, Madagascar, Mali, Morocco, Niger, RCA, RDC, Sénégal, Sierra Leone and Tunisie.

Impact since 2023
  • 7 Editions of WikiChallenge (2017-2025)
  • 14 participating countries (Botswana, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, DRC, Ivory Coast, Guinea Conakry, Liberia, Madagascar, Mali, Niger, Senegal, Tunisia, Morocco, and Sierra Leone)
  • 1216 participating establishments
  • 792 texts proposed by children and published on Vikidia for posterity
  • 4098 photos, drawings and videos published
  • 112 winning schools, for the direct benefit of the hundreds of students and staff of the schools
  • Skills acquired by all participating students
  • New partnerships between Orange and Wikimedia UserGroups
2025 Goals

The 2025 Goal was to effectively run the competition. And we did it. That being said, most of this programme is funded by Fondation Orange, and thus not required for this report.

The elements funded or co-funded through Wikimedia Foundation grant were

  • the document provided by the Jury selecting the winning schools
  • communication done on the WikiChallenge Facebook page, Diff, Wiki in Africa website, poster at Wikimania
2025 Activities

The activities are summarized on

2025 Impact

The 2025 edition saw a substantial increase in engagement across the continent:

  • 13 countries participated (including Botswana, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, DR Congo, Guinea, Liberia, Madagascar, Mali, Morocco, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Tunisia)
  • Involvement of at least 7 wikimedia UserGroups
  • 422 schools registered
  • 174 student articles were published on Vikidia
  • 696 Photos et 40 vidéos were produced and uploaded
  • 38 schools received awards at international, national or special prize level

This confirms WikiChallenge Écoles d’Afrique as one of the largest structured youth contribution programmes in the Wikimedia ecosystem in Africa.

Key moments

This 2024–2025 edition marked a significant year of expansion, good participation, and international recognition, as the project was honored with the Open Pedagogy Award 2024 by OE Global.

Community Engagement & Feedback

Not covered by the WMF grant

Communications

The year 2025 was marked by the success of our social media initiatives for the “WikiChallenges African Schools” contest. The planned campaigns proved their effectiveness by strengthening the visibility and engagement of our community. However, this positive assessment does not prevent us from recognizing areas for improvement. To maximize our impact, it is essential to give space to authentic testimonials, which are a powerful source of emotional connection. At the same time, strengthening our collaboration with partners on social media should be at the heart of our next steps, in order to broaden our reach and consolidate our digital presence.

Read more

Communications

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Social Media Report 2023–2025

[edit]

Introduction

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As Wiki In Africa’s programmes have expanded, so too have the organisation’s communications needs. In the early years, communications could be managed by a communications facilitator working alongside community facilitators. However, as the scope and volume of programme activity increased, it became clear that a more specialised approach to communications was required in order to achieve appropriate reach and meet the distinct goals of each programme.

In July 2022, Rachel Zadok moved into the role of Communications Oversight Manager (COM) (20 hours per week). In this role, she identified the need to streamline content creation and scheduling processes, and to develop more effective ways of engaging audiences both within and beyond the Wikimedia ecosystem. It also became clear that community facilitators needed to prioritise programme delivery and direct community engagement on established channels, and that social media and broader communications work required a different skill set and dedicated time.

During the final year of the grant, an external communications specialist, Caley Wildman, was contracted for 10 hours per week to support the COM. Initially focused on content scheduling and engagement, her role expanded when Rachel took leave for a family emergency in early 2025. During this period, Caley demonstrated the capacity to contribute across a broader range of communications tasks. Following Rachel’s return, she began training Caley across all aspects of Wiki In Africa communications, including content development (copy, visual, video editing) and the use of external apps such as newsletter platforms.

This experience highlighted the potential to formalise skills transfer within the organisation. As a result, Wiki In Africa developed a proposal for a series of three communications internships (four months each), designed to offer African Wikimedians structured, specialist communications training. These internships aim to build practical skills that support both the interns’ professional development and the communications capacity of the local user groups with which they are involved.

Reporting Methodology

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The analyses looks at social media performance across the three main platforms used by each project over the three-year grant period (January 2023–December 2025). Data was collected and reviewed on a quarterly basis in order to track longer-term trends and avoid over-emphasising short-term fluctuations.

For each project and platform, the following data was recorded per quarter:

  • Number of followers at the start and end of the quarter, and the net change in followers
  • Number of posts published during the quarter
  • Total reach or impressions during the quarter
  • Total engagements during the quarter

A link to the top-performing post in each quarter was also captured for reference.

All data was sourced from reports generated using Hootsuite.

The compiled data was then analysed for overall trends in follower growth and platform performance based solely on the metrics provided. It was not used to interpret campaign outcomes or attribute causes to changes in performance.

Summaries for each project (Wiki Loves Women, Wiki Loves Africa, and Wiki In Africa, with posts separately analysed for WikiAfrica Hour) provide a high-level overview of observed patterns. These summaries are intended to support, rather than replace, internal analysis, and are read alongside contextual knowledge of project activities and timelines.

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Data set spreadsheet (includes links to top performing posts for each quarter)

Over the three-year grant period, Wiki Loves Women’s social media performance shows divergent follower growth trajectories across platforms, with sustained growth on Instagram and comparatively flat growth on Facebook and X.

Instagram

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Instagram demonstrates consistent and cumulative audience growth across the full grant period. The account grew from a low base at the start of 2023 and recorded net positive follower growth in every quarter, resulting in a substantial overall increase by the end of 2025. Growth is not concentrated in a single spike but distributed across multiple quarters, indicating steady audience acquisition rather than one-off campaign effects. Instagram also shows relatively strong engagement levels in relation to reach, suggesting that exposure on this platform more frequently translates into follow behaviour.

Facebook

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Facebook follower numbers remain largely stable over the same period. While several quarters show modest gains, these are offset by periods of follower loss, resulting in minimal net growth across three years. The overall flat trend is influenced by one pronounced decline in 2024, after which follower numbers recover partially but do not accelerate. This pattern indicates that Facebook activity during the grant period largely maintained an existing audience rather than expanding it.

X (formerly Twitter)

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X shows low but positive net follower growth across the grant period, with incremental increases in most quarters. Growth remains modest relative to Instagram and does not display sustained acceleration. Engagement and reach figures suggest ongoing activity and visibility, but follower acquisition remains limited, indicating that exposure on this platform converts to new followers at a lower rate than on Instagram.

Cross-platform summary

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Taken together, the data indicates that: Audience growth is platform-specific, rather than uniform across channels.

  • Instagram functions as the primary driver of new follower acquisition.
  • Facebook and X primarily serve audience retention and visibility roles, with limited net expansion over time.
  • Differences in growth patterns persist across the full grant period, rather than emerging only in campaign-heavy quarters.

These trends suggest that platform performance is shaped less by overall activity volume and more by how effectively each platform converts reach and engagement into sustained followership.

[edit]

Data set spreadsheet (includes links to top performing posts for each quarter)

Instagram

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Instagram shows strong and sustained follower growth across the three-year period. Growth is consistently positive across most quarters, with several periods of accelerated gains aligned with high-activity phases of the campaign. Unlike short-term spikes, the overall trend reflects cumulative audience expansion over time rather than temporary increases that drop off in subsequent quarters.

Instagram also records relatively high engagement levels in relation to reach, indicating that visibility on this platform more often translates into active interaction and follow behaviour. Over the full grant period, Instagram emerges as the primary channel for audience growth for Wiki Loves Africa.

Facebook

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Facebook follower growth remains largely stable across the grant period. While individual quarters show modest increases, these are balanced by periods of limited growth or minor decline, resulting in low net growth overall.

Despite this, Facebook continues to generate substantial reach and engagement, suggesting that the platform plays an important role in maintaining visibility among an existing audience, rather than driving significant new follower acquisition. The data indicates consistency rather than expansion.

X (formerly Twitter)

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X shows incremental but modest follower growth over the three years. Growth is generally positive but remains low in magnitude when compared to Instagram. Engagement and impressions fluctuate across quarters, often corresponding to campaign-related activity, but these fluctuations do not translate into sustained increases in follower numbers.

This suggests that X functions primarily as a broadcast and amplification channel, supporting campaign visibility and conversation rather than acting as a major driver of long-term audience growth.

Cross-platform summary

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Across the three-year grant period, Wiki Loves Africa’s social media performance shows a clear pattern:

  1. Instagram is the main driver of follower growth, with sustained gains across multiple years.
  2. Facebook maintains audience reach and engagement, but shows limited net growth in followers.
  3. X delivers ongoing visibility and engagement, with modest, incremental follower increases.

These patterns are consistent across the full reporting period and are not confined to single campaigns or isolated quarters, indicating platform-specific performance characteristics rather than short-term anomalies.

Reaching Professional Photographers

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A concerted effort was made in 2023 and 2024 to grow the project’s reach to professional photographers and filmmakers in Africa by reaching out to them directly via their DMs as well as engaging with their work on social media platforms, particularly on Instagram. The process was started in 2023 when we approached 88 professional photographers, filmmakers and theme-focused organisations, and the same accounts were contacted again in 2024, with an additional 10+ accounts added.

While responses from photography magazines, blogs and groups were not forthcoming, individual photographers tended to respond positively to the messages and comments, and expressed an interest in entering the contest. Although it is not possible to directly track these accounts from social media onto Commons (usernames tend to differ, and tracking would be complicated if it was even possible), all the winning images in recent years have been the works of professional photographers.

In 2025, we shifted our social media engagement back to local Wikimedia user groups and communities, sharing images of their events and participation. We also announced a regional focus for the Wilson Oluoha Prize in order to award more amateur photographers, who tend to be Wikimedians, for their support and enthusiastic participation.

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Data set spreadsheet (includes links to top performing posts for each quarter)

Over the three-year grant period, Wiki In Africa’s social media performance shows divergent growth patterns across platforms, with stronger follower growth on LinkedIn and more moderate, incremental growth on Facebook and X. WikiAfrica Hour activity forms part of Wiki In Africa’s broader communications output and is reflected within the aggregated WIA social media data. Periods of increased engagement align with WikiAfrica Hour activity, particularly post episode clips and recaps linked directly to guests, which contributes to sustained visibility across platforms.

LinkedIn

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LinkedIn demonstrates the strongest and most sustained follower growth over the reporting period. Starting from a low base in early 2023, the account records net positive follower growth across multiple quarters, with more pronounced increases in the final year of the grant. Growth is distributed over time rather than concentrated in isolated spikes, indicating cumulative audience expansion rather than short-term gains.

Stronger LinkedIn growth in the final year of the grant reflects a deliberate decision to prioritise the platform, informed by observations that it has become an increasingly relevant space for engaging target audiences.

X (formerly Twitter)

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X shows consistent but modest follower growth across the three-year period. Net follower increases are recorded in most quarters, resulting in steady overall growth, though at a lower scale than on LinkedIn. Engagement and impressions fluctuate across quarters, supporting ongoing visibility, but follower acquisition remains incremental rather than accelerated.

Facebook

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Facebook follower numbers remain largely stable over the grant period. While some quarters show modest gains, these are offset by periods of limited growth or minor decline, resulting in low net growth overall. This pattern suggests that Facebook activity primarily supports the maintenance of an existing audience rather than significant audience expansion.

Cross-platform summary

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Taken together, the data indicates that:

  • LinkedIn functions as the primary driver of follower growth for Wiki In Africa over the grant period.
  • Facebook and X support ongoing visibility and audience retention, with comparatively limited net expansion.
  • Differences in growth patterns persist across the full reporting period, rather than emerging only in campaign-heavy quarters.

These trends suggest that platform performance reflects platform-specific audience growth dynamics, rather than overall activity volume alone.

Credits

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