Realising the Data Revolution for Sustainable Development: Towards Capacity Development 4.0

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Report by Niels Keijzer and Stephan Klingebiel for Paris21: “An ever-deepening data revolution is shaping everyday lives in many parts of the world. As just one of many mindboggling statistics on Big Data, it has been estimated that by the year 2020, about 1.7 megabytes of new information will be created every second for every human being on the planet. The benefits of the data revolution extend to different groups of people, social movements, institutions and businesses. Yet many people and countries do not have access to these positive benefits and in richer countries potentially positive changes raise suspicion amongst citizens as well as concerns related to privacy and confidentiality. The availability of potential advantages is, to a large extent, guided by levels of development and income. Despite the rapid spread of mobile phone technology that allows regions otherwise disconnected from the grid to ‘leapfrog’ in terms of using and producing data and statistics, poor people are still less likely to benefit from the dramatic changes in the field of data.

Against the background of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the main challenge for statistics is to manage the data revolution in support of sustainable development. The main priorities are the broadening and deepening of production, dissemination and use of data and statistics, and achieving them requires identifying those population groups which are most vulnerable and making governments more accountable to their citizens. In parallel, the risks accompanying the data revolution need to be mitigated and reduced, including the use of data for purposes of repression or otherwise infringing on the privacy of citizens. In addition to representing a universal agenda that breaks away from the dichotomy of developed and developing countries, the new agenda calls for tailor-made approaches in each country or region concerned, supported by global actions. The 2030 Agenda further states the international community’s realisation of the need to move away from ‘business as usual’ in international support for data and statistics.

The most important driving forces shaping the data revolution are domestic (legal) frameworks and public policies across the globe. This applies not only to wealthier countries but also developing countries2 , and external support cannot compensate for absent domestic leadership and investment. Technical, legal and political factors all affect whether countries are willing and able to succeed in benefiting from the data revolution. However, in both low income countries and lower-middle income countries, and to some extent in upper-middle income countries, we can observe two constraining factors in this regard, capacities and funding. These factors are, to some degree, interrelated: if funding is not sufficiently available it might be difficult to increase the capacities required, and if capacities are insufficient funding issues might be more challenging….(More)”

Confused by data visualisation? Here’s how to cope in a world of many features

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

 in The Conversation: “The late data visionary Hans Rosling mesmerised the world with his work, contributing to a more informed society. Rosling used global health data to paint a stunning picture of how our world is a better place now than it was in the past, bringing hope through data.

Now more than ever, data are collected from every aspect of our lives. From social media and advertising to artificial intelligence and automated systems, understanding and parsing information have become highly valuable skills. But we often overlook the importance of knowing how to communicate data to peers and to the public in an effective, meaningful way.

The first tools that come to mind in considering how to best communicate data – especially statistics – are graphs and scatter plots. These simple visuals help us understand elementary causes and consequences, trends and so on. They are invaluable and have an important role in disseminating knowledge.

Data visualisation can take many other forms, just as data itself can be interpreted in many different ways. It can be used to highlight important achievements, as Bill and Melinda Gates have shown with their annual letters in which their main results and aspirations are creatively displayed.

Everyone has the potential to better explore data sets and provide more thorough, yet simple, representations of facts. But how can do we do this when faced with daunting levels of complex data?

A world of too many features

We can start by breaking the data down. Any data set consists of two main elements: samples and features. The former correspond to individual elements in a group; the latter are the characteristics they share….

Venturing into network analysis is easier than undertaking dimensionality reduction, since usually a high level of programming skills is not required. Widely available user-friendly software and tutorials allow people new to data visualisation to explore several aspects of network science.

The world of data visualisation is vast and it goes way beyond what has been introduced here, but those who actually reap its benefits, garnering new insights and becoming agents of positive and efficient change, are few. In an age of overwhelming information, knowing how to communicate data can make a difference – and it can help keep data’s relevance in check…(More)”

Trust and Public Policy – How Better Governance Can Help Rebuild Public Trust

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

New Report by the OECD: “Trust plays a very tangible role in the effectiveness of government. Few perceptions are more palpable than that of trust or its absence. Governments ignore this at their peril. Yet, public trust has been eroding just when policy makers need it most, given persistent unemployment, rising inequality and a variety of global pressures. This report examines the influence of trust on policy making and explores some of the steps governments can take to strengthen public trust…(More)”

The Routledge Handbook of Global Public Policy and Administration

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Book edited by Thomas R. Klassen, Denita Cepiku, T. J. Lah: “…a comprehensive leading-edge guide for students, scholars and practitioners of public policy and administration. Public policy and administration are key aspects of modern societies that affect the daily lives of all citizens. This handbook examines current trends and reforms in public policy and administration, such as financial regulation, risk management, public health, e-government and many others at the local, national and international levels. The two themes of the book are that public policy and administration have acquired an important global aspect, and that a critical role for government is the regulation of capital.

The handbook is organized into three thematic sections – Contemporary Challenges, Policy and Administration Responses and Forging a Resilient Public Administration – to allow readers to quickly access knowledge and improve their understanding of topics. The opening chapter, introductions to sections and extensive glossary aid readers to most effectively learn from the book. Each chapter provides a balanced overview of current knowledge, identifying issues and discussing relevant debates. The book is written by authors from Europe, Asia, North and South America, Africa and Australia….(More)’

Fighting famine with mobile data

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Steve Schwartz at Tableau: “For most people, asking about the price of a bag of rice is inconsequential. For Moustapha Toure, it is a question of life and death for thousands.

A Vulnerability Analysis and Mapping (VAM) Officer with the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) in Maiduguri, Nigeria, Moustapha and his team are currently collecting price data and assessing food security in a corner of the country wracked by the effects of the Boko Haram insurgency.

When the conflict broke out in 2009, the threat of violence made it difficult for humanitarian workers like Moustapha to access the communities they serve.

“The security situation made it impossible for the team to go to local markets, talk to vendors, or even chat with people in their homes—all the things they usually do to gather data on local food prices,” said the WFP Nigeria Country Director, Ronald Sibanda.

To overcome this challenge, WFP, in collaboration with the Nigerian National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA), turned to an innovative new approach for collecting data via mobile phones, known as mobile Vulnerability Analysis and Mapping (mVAM). Using mVAM, WFP and its partners can remotely collect food security and price data. Not only does this approach provide a way to hear from people in inaccessible areas, but it also makes near real-time reporting to local decision-makers possible. That means WFP staff like Moustapha are able to make reliable, data-informed decisions that may impact the lives of more than one million people across the affected Nigerian states.

A Vital Lifeline for a Looming Famine

The mVAM team could be in demand now more than ever. Along with Yemen, Somalia, and South Sudan, Nigeria is one of the four countries at risk of famine. Stephen O’Brien, the United Nation’s Emergency Relief Coordinator, recently described this global food security emergency as the most serious humanitarian crisis since the Second World War.

For seven years, the Boko Haram conflict has affected communities in north-eastern Nigeria, leaving some 5.1 million people food insecure in Borno, Yobe and Adamawa states and forcing an estimated 1.9 million people to leave behind their homes, land, and livelihoods.

Without this remotely-collected information, little would be known about these areas and how the conflict is affecting food security. However, this data—collected on a regular basis—actually presents a unique opportunity. In the new system, WFP’s VAM team can take a leap forward from traditional PDF reports which take at least a few weeks, to produce a near real-time look at the situation on the ground…(More)”.

Big Data and the Well-Being of Women and Girls: Applications on the Social Scientific Frontier

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Report by Bapu Vaitla et al for Data2X: “Conventional forms of data—household surveys, national economic accounts, institutional records, and so on—struggle to capture detailed information on the lives of women and girls. The many forms of big data, from geospatial information to digital transaction logs to records of internet activity, can help close the global gender data gap. This report profiles several big data projects that quantify the economic, social, and health status of women and girls…

This report illustrates the potential of big data in filling the global gender data gap. The rise of big data, however, does not mean that traditional sources of data will become less important. On the contrary, the successful implementation of big data approaches requires investment in proven methods of social scientific research, especially for validation and bias correction of big datasets. More broadly, the invisibility of women and girls in national and international data systems is a political, not solely a technical, problem. In the best case, the current “data revolution” will be reimagined as a step towards better “data governance”: a process through which novel types of information catalyze the creation of new partnerships to advocate for scientific, policy, and political reforms that include women and girls in all spheres of social and economic life….(More)”.

Civic Tech & GovTech: An Overlooked Lucrative Opportunity for Technology Startups

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Elena Mesropyan at LTP: “Civic technology, or Civic Tech, is defined as a technology that enables greater participation in government or otherwise assists government in delivering citizen services and strengthening ties with the public. In other words, Civic Tech is where the public lends its talents, usually voluntarily, to help government do a better job. Moreover, Omidyar Network(which invested over $90 million across 35 civic tech organizations over the past decade) emphasizes that like a movement, civic tech is mission-driven, focused on making a change that benefits the public, and in most cases enables better public input into decision making.

As an emerging sector, Civic Tech is defined as incorporating any technology that is used to empower citizens or help make government more accessible, efficient, and effective. Civic tech isn’t just talk, Omidyar notes, it is a community of people coming together to create tangible projects and take action. The civic tech and open data movements have grown with the ubiquity of personal technology.

Civic tech can be defined as a convergence of various fields. An example of such convergence has been given by Knight Foundation, a national foundation with a goal to foster informed and engaged communities to power a healthy democracy:

Civic Tech & GovTech: An Overlooked Lucrative Opportunity for Technology Startups

Source: The Emergence of Civic Tech: Investments in a Growing Field

In the report called Engines of Change: What Civic Tech Can Learn From Social Movements, Civic Tech is divided into three categories:

  • Citizen to Citizen (C2C): Technology that improves citizen mobilization or improves connections between citizens
  • Citizen to Government (C2G): Technology that improves the frequency or quality of interaction between citizens and government
  • Government Technology (Govtech): Innovative technology solutions that make government more efficient and effective at service delivery

In 2015, Forbes reported that Civic Tech makes up almost a quarter of local and state government spendings on technology….

Civic tech initiatives address a diverse range of industries – from energy and payments to agriculture and telecommunications. Mattermark outlines the following top ten industries associated with government and civic tech:

…There are certainly much more examples of GovTech/civic tech companies, and just tech startups offering solutions across the board that can significantly improve the way governments are run, and services are delivered to citizens and businesses. More importantly, GovTech should no longer be considered a charity and solely non-profit type of venture. Recently reviewed global P2G payments flows only, for example, are estimated to be at $7.7 trillion and represent a significant feature of the global payments landscape. For the low- and lower-middle-income countries alone, the number hits $375 billion (~50% of annual government expenditure)….(More)”

From disaster planning to conservation: mobile phones as a new tracking tool

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

, , and  in The Conversation: “We can learn a lot about things by studying how they move through the world and interact with the environment.

In the past, for example, it was possible to study the mobility of people within the United States by monitoring things such as the movement of banknotes. Today we can use something that is much more global and widely available than US cash.

Mobile phones have almost totally infiltrated human society, with the number estimated at more than 7 billion in 2014. Ownership of mobile phones continues to grow, even in some of the poorest countries.

Many of those phones are geolocated, continuously providing the geographic location of the user, so effectively acting as tracking devices for human populations.

As biologists, our understanding of animals has been transformed over the past four decades by our ability to track their movements and behaviour.

We were interested to see what we can learn from the use of mobile phones tracking, as we show in a study published this month in Trends in Ecology and Evolution.

It’s now possible to use the mobile phone data to gain a better insight into human movement under certain conditions.

For example, mobile phone data was used to study the movement of people during the 2010 earthquake and subsequent cholera outbreak in Haiti, and Hurricane Sandy in the United States in 2012.

It was interesting to note that the human reaction to escape from certain events we found was close to that of some animal groups, such as birds and fish, when fleeing from attack.

Such studies can help predict how people will respond in the future to any emergencies, and help to improve the delivery of any aid or disaster relief.

Conservation with mobile phones

The detail, immediacy and sheer volume of data from mobile phones also offers innovative ways to monitor and possibly solve some of the most pressing conservation problems that animal populations now face.

For example, geolocated phones are changing the way we tackle the crisis of illegal wildlife trade.

Not only is it a major driver of species extinctions, but the human cost is high with more than 1,000 wildlife rangers killed in the line of duty over a ten-year period.

In India, rangers on the front line use a smartphone app to monitor movements and record sightings of targeted species, such as tigers, and to report suspicious activity.

In Africa, mobile phones help rangers collate social and environmental information about reserves and encounter rates with animals killed by poachers….(More)”

The Crowd & the Cloud

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

The Crowd & the Cloud (TV series): “Are you interested in birds, fish, the oceans or streams in your community? Are you concerned about fracking, air quality, extreme weather, asthma, Alzheimer’s disease, Zika or other epidemics? Now you can do more than read about these issues. You can be part of the solution.

Smartphones, computers and mobile technology are enabling regular citizens to become part of a 21st century way of doing science. By observing their environments, monitoring neighborhoods, collecting information about the world and the things they care about, so-called “citizen scientists” are helping professional scientists to advance knowledge while speeding up new discoveries and innovations.

The results are improving health and welfare, assisting in wildlife conservation, and giving communities the power to create needed change and help themselves.

Citizen science has amazing promise, but also raises questions about data quality and privacy. Its potential and challenges are explored in THE CROWD & THE CLOUD, a 4-part public television series premiering in April 2017. Hosted by former NASA Chief Scientist Waleed Abdalati, each episode takes viewers on a global tour of the projects and people on the front lines of this disruptive transformation in how science is done, and shows how anyone, anywhere can participate….(More)”