Sub-Saharan Africa

State of Open Corporate Data: Wins and Challenges Ahead

Curated on February 8, 2017October 10, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

Sunlight Foundation: “For many people working to open data and reduce corruption, the past year could be summed up in two words: “Panama Papers.” The transcontinental investigation by a team from International Center of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) blew open the murky world of offshore company registration. It put corporate transparency high on the agenda of countries all around the world and helped lead to some notable advances in access to official company register data….

While most companies are created and operated for legitimate economic activity, there is a small percentage that aren’t. Entities involved in corruption, money laundering, fraud and tax evasion frequently use such companies as vehicles for their criminal activity. “The Idiot’s Guide to Money Laundering from Global Witness” shows how easy it is to use layer after layer of shell companies to hide the identity of the person who controls and benefits from the activities of the network. The World Bank’s “Puppet Masters” report found that over 70% of grand corruption cases, in fact, involved the use of offshore vehicles.

For years, OpenCorporates has advocated for company information to be in the public domain as open data, so it is usable and comparable. It was the public reaction to Panama Papers, however, that made it clear that due diligence requires global data sets and beneficial registries are key for integrity and progress.

The call for accountability and action was clear from the aftermath of the leak. ICIJ, the journalists involved and advocates have called for tougher action on prosecutions and more transparency measures: open corporate registers and beneficial ownership registers. A series of workshops organized by the B20 showed that business also needed public beneficial ownership registers….

Last year the UK became the first country in the world to collect and publish who controls and benefits from companies in a structured format, and as open data. Just a few days later, we were able to add the information in OpenCorporates. The UK data, therefore, is one of a kind, and has been highly anticipated by transparency skeptics and advocates advocates alike. So fa,r things are looking good. 15 other countries have committed to having a public beneficial ownership register including Nigeria, Afghanistan, Germany, Indonesia, New Zealand and Norway. Denmark has announced its first public beneficial ownership data will be published in June 2017. It’s likely to be open data.

This progress isn’t limited to beneficial ownership. It is also being seen in the opening up of corporate registers . These are what OpenCorporates calls “core company data”. In 2016, more countries started releasing company register as open data, including Japan, with over 4.4 million companies, Israel, Virginia, Slovenia, Texas, Singapore and Bulgaria. We’ve also had a great start to 2017 , with France publishing their central company database as open data on January 5th.

As more states have embracing open data, the USA jumped from average score of 19/100 to 30/100. Singapore rose from 0 to 20. The Slovak Republic from 20 to 40. Bulgaria wet from 35 to 90. Japan rose from 0 to 70 — the biggest increase of the year….(More)”

Making the Case for Open Contracting in Healthcare Procurement

Curated on February 6, 2017August 3, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

Transparency International “…new report “Making the Case for Open Contracting in Healthcare Procurement” examines the utility of open contracting in healthcare procurement. The process relies on governments to disclose procurement information to businesses and civil society improves stakeholders’ understanding of procurement processes increasing the integrity, fairness and efficiency of public contracting.

In several countries, including Honduras, Ukraine and Nigeria, corruption was significantly reduced throughout the healthcare procurement process following the implementation of open contracting, according to the report. Click here to download the report”

The tiny digital camera on every smartphone has had real impact on African lives

Curated on February 3, 2017August 20, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

Calestous Juma at Quartz: “…The first major impact of the technology on African users was to expand global connectivity by making it possible for the youth to access information that was collected using the technology via the Internet.

African engineers have been able use such information to design their own technologies suited to local condition. In 2016 Arthur Zhang, a young Cameroonian medical engineering was awarded the $37,000 Africa Prize for Engineering Innovation by the UK Royal Academy of Engineering. Zhang invented the Cardiopad, a tablet computer takes heart readings and sends them to a heart specialist using the Internet.

Zhang was trained in electronic engineering but gained much of the relevant medical knowledge by watching video online, many which had been posted using digital camera. Many more young Africans are following in Zhang footprints in using such material to acquire knowledge that is available through their regular university courses….

In agriculture, farmers can how take diseased images of the leaves of their crops and share them with scientists around the world for identification and advice. Such digital imaging research is an important addition to other agricultural used of mobile phones that constitute low-cost agricultural extension approaches.

Young African engineers are making extensive use of mobile phones for disease diagnosis. Ugandan researchers developed a jacket that diagnoses pneumonia faster than the standard methods used by doctors. Imaging technologies offer additional ways to expand the range of diagnosis for a wide range of diseases.

In low-cost eye are, for example, EyeNetra uses smartphones as a platform to capture the refractive power of the lenses in eyeglasses. EyeNetra is planning to deploy its technology in Nigeria. It has distributed units to be piloted in Gabon, Gambia, Kenya, Morocco, Rwanda, South Africa and Zimbabwe.

There have been concerns that the emerging era of personalized medicine will create a “health divide” between the industrialized and emerging worlds. This is mainly because of human genetic diversity influences the choice of treatment options. Smartphones are becoming as a low-cost way to pre-empt the emergence such a divide.

Climate change is going to force African scientists to study afresh alternations in the microscopic world. With as little as $15 Micro Phone Lens it will soon be possible to turn a regular smartphone into a microscope that capture images and videos at a magnification range of 15-60 times using the phone’s digital zoom feature. The add-on will inspire a new generation of explorers and scientists….(More)”

Open Data Inventory 2016

Curated on January 15, 2017August 3, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

“Open Data Watch is pleased to announce the release of the 2016 Open Data Inventory (ODIN). The new ODIN results provide a comprehensive review of the coverage and openness of official statistics in 173 countries around the world, including most OECD countries. Featuring a methodology updated to reflect the latest international open data standards, ODIN 2016 results are fully available online at odin.opendatawatch.com, including interactive functions to compare year-to-year results from 122 countries.

ODIN assesses the coverage and openness of data provided on the websites maintained by national statistical offices (NSOs). The overall ODIN score is an indicator of how complete and open an NSO’s data offerings are. In addition to ratings of coverage and openness in twenty statistical categories, ODIN assessments provide the online location of key indicators in each data category, permitting quick access to hundreds of indicators.

ODIN 2016 Top Scores Reveal Gaps Between Openness and Coverage

In the 2016 round, the top scores went to high-income and OECD countries. Sweden was ranked first overall with a score of 81. Sweden was also the most open site, with an openness score of 91. Among non-OECD countries, the highest rank was Lithuania with an overall score of 77. Among non-high-income countries, Mexico again earned the highest ranking with a score of 67, followed by the lower-middle-income economies of Mongolia (61), and Moldova (59). Among low-income countries, Rwanda received the highest score of 55. ODIN overall scores are scaled from 0 to 100 and provide equal weighting for social, economic, and environmental statistics….

The new ODIN website allows users to compare and download scores for 2015 and 2016….(More)”

Data capitalism is cashing in on our privacy . . . for now

Curated on January 10, 2017August 3, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

John Thornhill in the Financial Times: “The buzz at last week’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas was all about connectivity and machine learning. …The primary effect of these consumer tech products seems limited — but we will need to pay increasing attention to the secondary consequences of these connected devices. They are just the most visible manifestation of a fundamental transformation that is likely to shape our societies far more than Brexit, Donald Trump or squabbles over the South China Sea. It concerns who collects, owns and uses data. The subject of data is so antiseptic that it seldom generates excitement. To make it sound sexy, some have described data as the “new oil”, fuelling our digital economies. In reality, it is likely to prove far more significant than that. Data are increasingly determining economic value, reshaping the practice of power and intruding into the innermost areas of our lives. Some commentators have suggested that this transformation is so profound that we are moving from an era of financial capitalism into one of data capitalism. The Israeli historian Yuval Noah Harari even argues that Dataism, as he calls it, can be compared with the birth of a religion, given the claims of its most fervent disciples to provide universal solutions. …

Sir Nigel Shadbolt, co-founder of the Open Data Institute, argues in a recent FT TechTonic podcast that it is too early to give up on privacy…The next impending revolution, he argues, will be about giving consumers control over their data. Considering the increasing processing power and memory capacity of smartphones, he believes new models of data collection and more localised use may soon gain traction. One example is the Blue Button service used by US veterans, which allows individuals to maintain and update their medical records. “That has turned out to be a really revolutionary step,” he says. “I think we are going to see a lot more of that kind of re-empowering.” According to this view, we can use data to create a far smarter world without sacrificing precious rights. If we truly believe in such a benign future, we had better hurry up and invent it….(More)”

Rethinking how we collect, share, and use development results data

Curated on December 16, 2016August 3, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

Development Gateway: “The international development community spends a great deal of time, effort, and money gathering data on thousands of indicators embedded in various levels of Results Frameworks. These data comprise outputs (school enrollment, immunization figures), program outcomes (educational attainment, disease prevalence), and, in some cases, impacts (changes in key outcomes over time).

Ostensibly, we use results data to allocate resources to the places, partners, and programs most likely to achieve lasting success. But is this data good enough – and is it used well enough – to genuinely increase development impact in priority areas?

Experience suggests that decision-makers at all levels may often face inadequate, incorrect, late, or incomplete results data. At the same time, a figurative “Tower of Babel” of both project-level M&E and program-level outcome data can make it difficult for agencies and organizations to share and use data effectively. Further, potential users may not have the skills, resources, or enabling environment to meaningfully analyze and apply results data to decisions. With these challenges in mind, the development community needs to re-think its investments in results data, making sure that the right users are able to collect, share, and use this information to maximum effect.

Our Initiative

To this end, Development Gateway (DG), with the support of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, aims to “diagnose” the results data ecosystem in three countries, identifying ways to improve data quality, sharing, and use in the health and agriculture sectors. Some of our important questions include:

Quality: Who collects data and how? Is data quality adequate? Does the data meet actual needs? How much time does data collection demand? How can data collection, quality, and reporting be improved?
Sharing: How can we compare results data from different donors, governments, and implementers? Is there demand for comparability? Should data be shared more freely? If so, how?
Use: How is results data analyzed and used to inform actual policies and plans? Does (or can) access to results data improve decision-making? Do the right people have the right data? How else can (or should) we promote data use?…(More)”

Introducing the Agricultural Open Data Package: BETA Version

Curated on December 14, 2016August 3, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

PressRelease: “GODAN, Open Data for Development (OD4D) Network, Open Data Charter, and the Open Data Institute are pleased to announce the release of the Agricultural Open Data Package: BETA version. …The Agriculture Open Data Package (http://AgPack.info) has been designed to help governments get to impact with open data in the agriculture sector. This practical resource provides key policy areas, key data categories, examples datasets, relevant interoperability initiatives, and use cases that policymakers and other stakeholders in the agriculture sector or open data should focus on, in order to address food security challenges.

The Package is meant as a source of inspiration and an invitation to start a national open data for agriculture initiative.

In the Package we identify fourteen key categories of data and discuss the effort it will take for a government to make this data available in a meaningful way. …

The Package also highlights more than ten use cases (the number is growing) demonstrating how open data is being harnessed to address sustainable agriculture and food security around the world. Examples include:

mapping water points to optimise scarce resource allocation in Burkina Faso
surfacing daily price information on multiple food commodities across India
benchmarking agricultural productivity in the Netherlands

Where relevant we also highlight applicable interoperability initiatives, such as open contracting, international aid transparency initiative (IATI), and global product classification (GPC) standards.

We recognise that the agriculture sector is diverse, with many contextual differences affecting scope of activities, priorities and capacities. In the full version of the Agricultural Open Data Package we discuss important implementation considerations such as inter-agency coordination and resourcing to develop an appropriate data infrastructure and a healthy data ‘ecosystem’ for agriculture….(More)”

Four steps to precision public health

Curated on December 13, 2016August 3, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

Scott F. Dowell, David Blazes & Susan Desmond-Hellmann at Nature: “When domestic transmission of Zika virus was confirmed in the United States in July 2016, the entire country was not declared at risk — nor even the entire state of Florida. Instead, precise surveillance defined two at-risk areas of Miami-Dade County, neighbourhoods measuring just 2.6 and 3.9 square kilometres. Travel advisories and mosquito control focused on those regions. Six weeks later, ongoing surveillance convinced officials to lift restrictions in one area and expand the other.

By contrast, a campaign against yellow fever launched this year in sub-Saharan Africa defines risk at the level of entire nations, often hundreds of thousands of square kilometres. More granular assessments have been deemed too complex.

The use of data to guide interventions that benefit populations more efficiently is a strategy we call precision public health. It requires robust primary surveillance data, rapid application of sophisticated analytics to track the geographical distribution of disease, and the capacity to act on such information¹.

The availability and use of precise data is becoming the norm in wealthy countries. But large swathes of the developing world are not reaping its advantages. In Guinea, it took months to assemble enough data to clearly identify the start of the largest Ebola outbreak in history. This should take days. Sub-Saharan Africa has the highest rates of childhood mortality in the world; it is also where we know the least about causes of death…..

The value of precise disease tracking was baked into epidemiology from the start. In 1854, John Snow famously located cholera cases in London. His mapping of the spread of infection through contaminated water dealt a blow to the idea that the disease was caused by bad air. These days, people and pathogens move across the globe swiftly and in great numbers. In 2009, the H1N1 ‘swine flu’ influenza virus took just 35 days to spread from Mexico and the United States to China, South Korea and 12 other countries…

The public-health community is sharing more data faster; expectations are higher than ever that data will be available from clinical trials and from disease surveillance. In the past two years, the US National Institutes of Health, the Wellcome Trust in London and the Gates Foundation have all instituted open data policies for their grant recipients, and leading journals have declared that sharing data during disease emergencies will not impede later publication.

Meanwhile, improved analysis, data visualization and machine learning have expanded our ability to use disparate data sources to decide what to do. A study published last year⁴ used precise geospatial modelling to infer that insecticide-treated bed nets were the single most influential intervention in the rapid decline of malaria.

However, in many parts of the developing world, there are still hurdles to the collection, analysis and use of more precise public-health data. Work towards malaria elimination in South Africa, for example, has depended largely on paper reporting forms, which are collected and entered manually each week by dozens of subdistricts, and eventually analysed at the province level. This process would be much faster if field workers filed reports from mobile phones.

Sources: Ref. 8/Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

…Frontline workers should not find themselves frustrated by global programmes that fail to take into account data on local circumstances. Wherever they live — in a village, city or country, in the global south or north — people have the right to public-health decisions that are based on the best data and science possible, that minimize risk and cost, and maximize health in their communities…(More)”

Solving some of the world’s toughest problems with the Global Open Policy Report

Curated on December 12, 2016August 3, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

Kelsey Wiens at Creative Commons: “Open Policy is when governments, institutions, and non-profits enact policies and legislation that makes content, knowledge, or data they produce or fund available under a permissive license to allow reuse, revision, remix, retention, and redistribution. This promotes innovation, access, and equity in areas of education, data, software, heritage, cultural content, science, and academia.

For several years, Creative Commons has been tracking the spread of open policies around the world. And now, with the new Global Open Policy Report (PDF) by the Open Policy Network, we’re able to provide a systematic overview of open policy development.

The first-of-its-kind report gives an overview of open policies in 38 countries, across four sectors: education, science, data and heritage. The report includes an Open Policy Index and regional impact and local case studies from Africa, the Middle East, Asia, Australia, Latin America, Europe, and North America. The index measures open policy strength on two scales: policy strength and scope, and level of policy implementation. The index was developed by researchers from CommonSphere, a partner organization of CC Japan.

The Open Policy Index scores were used to classify countries as either Leading, Mid-Way, or Delayed in open policy development. The ten countries with the highest scores are Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, France, Kyrgyzstan, New Zealand, Poland, South Korea, Tanzania, and Uruguay…(More)

Open Government: The Global Context and the Way Forward

Curated on December 8, 2016August 3, 2018 by Stefaan Verhulst

Report by the OECD: “…provides an in-depth, evidence-based analysis of open government initiatives and the challenges countries face in implementing and co-ordinating them. It also explores new trends in OECD member countries as well as a selection of countries from Latin America, MENA and South East Asia regions. Based on the 2015 Survey on Open Government and Citizen Participation in the Policy Cycle, the report identifies future areas of work, including the effort to mobilise and engage all branches and all levels of government in order to move from open governments to open states; how open government principles and practices can help achieve the UN Sustainable Development Goals; the role of the Media to create an enabling environment for open government initiatives to thrive; and the growing importance of subnational institutions to implement successful open government reforms….(More)”