UN Decade on Biodiversity platform: policy to product for 190 countries with WCAG compliance and RTL/LTR support.
Project Summary
The Decade on Biodiversity needed a single digital home for public audiences and government reporters. Accuracy, accessibility, and maintainability after hand-off were non-negotiable.
My Role
UI/UX designer and product lead with the program secretariat: policy-to-product translation, information architecture, design system, accessibility compliance, and implementation QA.
The Challenge
Translate policy-heavy global requirements into one system that works for ministries, NGOs, educators, and the public, across digital maturity levels and reading directions.
My Mandate
Build the official Decade platform: comparable country reporting, public awareness, and a structure non-technical staff could maintain after the contract ended.
Translate policy to screens
We sat with secretariat lawyers and program leads until every page type had a named owner and a data source. Campaign landings, country profiles, and resource libraries each got a template so content stayed accurate across 190 jurisdictions. The constraint was not creativity. It was clarity: public summaries beside expert detail without duplicating contradictory stats.
Build the global hub
We launched a modular landing system, interactive country map, standardized country dashboards, and a filterable resource library with multilingual metadata. Program staff got a page builder so they could launch campaigns without opening a developer ticket for every press cycle. Expert and public paths shared components but different depth: comparability for governments, plain language for educators.
Bake in accessibility and RTL
WCAG and institutional accessibility specs were release gates, not polish at the end. Components were tested in screen readers, with captions for media, and in both LTR and RTL layouts before they entered the library. Arabic, French, and English could run side by side without breaking navigation or table alignment.
Outcome
The platform is still online beyond the Decade. It became the reference for national biodiversity reporting, passed formal accessibility and compliance audit, and gave the secretariat autonomy to update content.
Closing Insight
The platform was still live when the Decade ended. That mattered more to the client than any award.