OPEN DATA IN GOVERNMENT

Steps forward and back

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THE TREND TOWARDS ‘OPEN’

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OPEN DATA

What is open data

Technically open

Legally open

Free for commercial reuse

Example datasets

National statistics

Government budget

Election results

National map

Company register

Transport timetables

Government spending

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WHY OPEN DATA

Transparency

Accountability

Inclusion

Engagement

Service delivery

Economic growth and jobs

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GOVERNMENT ADOPTION OF OPEN DATA

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>50 countries > 250 governments

DIFFERING LEVELS OF PROGRESS

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EXAMPLES OF OPEN DATA PROGRAMS

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STORIES FROM THE FIELD

Nigeria – BudgiT simplifies government budgets for ordinary citizens and provides tools to visualize and share data

India – IndiaSpend is a data journalism initiative that uses open data and more to foster better governance, transparency, and accountability in the Indian government

Jamaica – CrimeBot alerts citizens to crimes in their neighborhood and provides different kinds of analysis of crime data

UK – FixMyStreet lets citizens report local problems directly to relevant government agencies

Macedonia – a UNDP initiative combined SMS, open data, and other data sources to create a service that helped farmers reduce pesticide use by 30%

Malawi – Malwivote helps voters find their registration centers

Kenya – an NTV journalist produced a series of stories linking grades with sanitation facilities

Philippines – CheckMySchool provides information on services and facilities in schools

USA – BuildingEye provides ‘mashed-up’ information to government agencies and citizens about building permits, planning applications, business licenses, public events, etc.

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STORIES FROM THE BOARD ROOM

USA – Climate Corporation sells highly localized crop insurance products (the company was recently sold for almost a billion dollars)

Mexico – Medii.co helps consumers compare drug prices in different pharmacies in Mexico

India – MandiTrades provides commodity price information to farmers/agribusiness

Indonesia – UrbanIndo connects property buyers and sellers

Chile – Junar is a cloud based open data publishing platform

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USE AND REUSE

It is not about the data, it is about the use of data

The government has a critical role to play in the open data ‘ecosystem’ Supplier

Leader

Catalyst

User

The government however can’t do it alone. Essential partners include - Private sector

Civil society organizations

Media

Academia

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CHALLENGES

Data Most open data programs are superficial; too much data – especially local, granular, current – is still unavailable

Policy Significant policy gaps discourage both the publication and use (especially commercial) of data

Capacity/Literacy Few government policy makers are trained to understand the potential of data in governance

Limited understanding of open data within critical communities like entrepreneurs, investors, journalists, CSOs, and development practitioners

Innovation Limited support/infrastructure for innovation and incubation of new data driven ideas and companies

Financing Many government open data programs face significant financing challenges

Access to capital, especially post-seed stage capital, is a significant challenge for open data driven companies

Result measurement The current focus is on supply, rather than demand

Measurements are focused on inputs, rather than outputs

Data puritanism Open data purists are unable to see the larger data landscape

Most open data initiatives focus only on data, ignoring ‘ecosystem’ challenges associated with policy, engagement, capacity, use, financing, and the like

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TOOLKITS/RESOURCES

The World Bank provides an open government data toolkit that may be helpful for government officials considering open data programs

The Open Foundation has created a handy guide to the technical, legal, and social aspects of open data

The European Journalism Center has produced a useful data journalism guide

The US government published its open data policy recently

The G8 recently announced an open data charter

The UK government recently published a white paper describing the potential of open data

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FINALLY

Governments need to make significant investment in building a data literate society Technical skills are important but there’s a greater need for people that can ask data smart questions – what are we trying to solve, what can we instrument, what can we ask from the data, what can we share, what is it telling us

The modern policy maker MUST be data savvy

The media is a natural producer, disseminator, aggregator, combiner, and consumer of data Will it (or will the ‘new media’ do it instead)

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THANK YOU

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REFERENCES

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http://barometer.opendataresearch.org/assets/downloads/Open%20Data%20Barometer%20-%20Global%20Report%20-%202nd%20Edition%20-%20PRINT.pdf

http://index.okfn.org/place/

THE TREND TOWARDS ‘OPEN’ –THE FLAVORS

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