The first edition of the global data barometer have just been released yesterday, a zoom webinar took place yesterday to introduce results of this first edition and talk about this amazing new experience. I was honored to work in this edition as researcher with two regional hubs : The Center for Continuing Education (CCE) at Birzeit University for the golf countries, and LDRI Kenya for North African countries. 109 countries have been surveyed in this edition to get the state of data for public good around the world !
The results in my opinion was very fair and reflect the reality of the data economy in the world. To be honest the research was much harder than previous barometers, as I worked previously in the ODB with the web foundation. In the GDB there are much more work and research, more details and more detailed modules !
There are always recommendations to improve the barometer, and I think most complains that I heard was about the political integrity module. Overall, the barometer for those who don’t know it is organized around four pillars or core areas of assessment: governance, capability, availability, and use and impact. The barometer include two core modules which correspond to data governance and capability, in addition to five thematic modules that examine data for the public good related to money, property, and power. The other two pillars of the Barometer, availability and use and impact, are assessed through the thematic modules.
So before diving in the MENA region, I want to point to few key findings in the barometer by module :
Capabilities :
Capabilities is one of the four pillars, or areas of assessment, of the Global Data Barometer and will be examined as a core module given its foundational importance across all aspects of data activity. The module include 4 sub-modules : civil service training, open data initiative, Government support for reuse, and sub-national, which mean to what extent do city, regional, and local governments have the capability to effectively manage data.
Best score in capabilities goes to Estonia, with 92 out of 100. Followed by South Korea 88, then Span 82. Most probably sub-module that most countries are missing is civil service training, where Estonia scored 90.
Climate action
The climate action module investigates national and sub-national climate action data as a critical tool for increasing the number and diversity of climate actors and supporting the expansion and ambition of mitigation and adaptation efforts. In this module we have three pillars : Emission, biodiversity and vulnerability.
Best score in climate action goes to USA with a score of 94 out of 100. Followed by New Zealand 87 and Finland 81. What I find interesting in this indicator is that both USA and New Zealand got both top score (100) in the Emission indicator, while Finland got top score (100) in Biodiversity.
Data about climate vulnerability should integrate or otherwise address the two major strands of vulnerability approaches: the risks and hazards approach, which focuses on responding to natural hazards and extreme weather events; and the entitlements and livelihoods approach, which focuses on preventing undesirable outcomes by identifying where people have too few resources to withstand or recover from disaster—for example, in conjunction with poverty, gender, and marginalization.
Company Information
The company information module has been developed in partnership with Open Ownership, explores data on companies as a key connecting element of a modern public data infrastructure, supporting trade, trusted business environments, and investigation and enforcement related to anti-corruption and anti-money laundering activities.
Best score in company information goes to Denmark with a score of 91 out of 100. Followed by UK and Ireland 83, and Latvia 81. Here it’s very interesting to notice the presence of a small country like Latvia among the top 3 in company information module ! Latvia’s economic freedom score is 74.8, making its economy the 18th freest in the 2022 Index of Economic Freedom.
Governance
This section includes a number of country-level data governance indicators on the presence of regulatory regimes for data protection, right to information, and right to data, as well as identifying emerging frameworks for data sharing. In addition to ecosystem-specific governance indicators located within the different thematic modules covered in the Barometer. These indicators will explore the extent to which the collection, sharing, and secure management of specific datasets are safeguarded and optimized through laws, regulations, policies, infrastructure, and guidance.
Best score in Governance goes to South Korea with a score of 79 out of 100. Followed by New Zealand 78, and Spain 77. Scores are very close in this module, but what is most notable here is that the 3 first places share having a top score in one of the sub-modules of the Governance, which are Data management framework for South Korea (100/100), Data Sharing Framework for New Zealand (100/100) and Data protection law in Spain (100/100).
Health and Covid19
The health & COVID-19 thematic module is designed to cover research, public health work, and provision of primary healthcare, all of which draw substantially upon data. The COVID-19 pandemic has underscored the importance of reliable, accessible, and trusted health data to enable coordinated action. The governance and reusability of data in the health sector must combine respect for individual privacy rights with a focus on population and patient health. Data can be used to support access to healthcare across the many different healthcare systems of the world.
Best score in Health and Covid19 thematic module goes to United States with a score of 85 out of 100. Followed by Germany 83, and Slovakia 82. What we found interesting in this module is that most countries, or at least the top 50 countries, have all top score in Covid19 testing with 100/100 with few exceptions. Generally if the score is not 100 in Covid19 testing, it’s a zero. So it’s a feature either you have it all, or you don’t at all. However in vaccination score is very variable as there is not much details about vaccination published, if any.
Land
The land thematic module has been co-developed with the Land Portal research team to understand the state of data on land around the world and to contribute to overall Global Data Barometer assessments of data for the public good.
There are a wide range of sub-themes and datasets that might be covered by the topic of land data, and land issues are often highly interconnected, with consequences for many different fields including socioeconomic development, environmental protection, and anti-corruption efforts. The barometer focus specifically on land tenure and on land use, as well on uses of land data to support work on gender and inclusion.
Best score in Land thematic module goes to New Zealand with a score of 96 out of 100. Followed by Denmark 79, then United States 74. New Zealand marked top score in the Land tenure sub-module , which is not very frequent. Companies having top score in land tenure include also Estonia, Albania, and Germany. A very important indicator, which mean in these countries you can identify who holds rights over land. A lack of transparency is noticed overall in this module among all countries.
Political Integrity
The political integrity module has been co-developed with the Open Government Partnership research team and Transparency International. To capture a breadth of information and data relevant to political integrity and to address key gaps in current data, it addresses five specific sub-themes: Data on political party finance; Data on political interest declarations; Lobbying registers; Data on public consultation in rule-making; and Data on right-to-information regime performance.
This is the largest thematic module in the Global Data Barometer 2021 edition and is being used to pilot an extended thematic module approach.
Best score in Political integrity thematic module goes to United States with a score of 82 out of 100. Followed by UK and Ireland 60, then Canada 58. Which is very notable in this module is that score is very low even less than average for most countries (92%).
Public Finance
The public finance module has been co-developed with the Global Initiative for Fiscal Transparency to improve comparative understanding of the development of open data approaches to providing granular public finance information, and to contribute to overall Global Data Barometer assessments of data for the public good.
Best score in Public Finance thematic module goes to France with a score of 94 out of 100. Followed by Mexico and South Africa (93 both). Interesting to find in the top countries, names like Mexico, South Africa, but also Armenia 88, Republic of Korea 85, Indonesia 81, and Bulgaria 80; among names like Germany 87, Canada 84 and United States 83.
Public procurement
The public procurement module has been developed in collaboration with the Open Contracting Partnership, built on the Open Data Barometer indicator on public contracts data and seeks to examine the connections between public procurement data and other key elements of public data infrastructure, including company information and public finance data.
Best score in Public procurement thematic module goes to Ukraine with 96 out of 100. Followed by Paraguay 91, then Kazakhstan 87. Ukraine is like Estonia have a top score in Public procurement (100/100), however Ukraine have the advantage of having extra score on procurement analytics which is the highest among other countries in this sub-module. Russia is ranked 8th in this module with a score of 82. Most interesting in this module that top countries are not necessarily top countries in the global ranking, or economies, but having the best data infrastructure for procurement.
Conclusion
In this first part I tried to cover all modules of the barometer one by one and mention some interesting insights from the results, to better understand score and recommendations. I’ll try to talk in the next part about the MENA region and key findings and insights in the region.
More details about the results of the 1st edition of the Global Data Barometer could be found at : https://globaldatabarometer.org/results/