Workshop on Open Data Readiness Assessment
Hello,
I attended the Ministry of Technology, Communication and
Innovation/World Bank workshop on Open Data readiness assessment as a
representative of the Mauritius Internet Users. The workshop was
held to validate the findings of the World Bank on Open Data.
Anat Lewin, ICT Policy Special, World Bank gave a presentation about
the assessment process and the role of the World Bank. She commented
that there were Open Data initiatives in 46 countries and provided
some information about how Open Data helps for:
- Economic value
- Transparency/accountability
- Data exchange across government
- Data-informed policy making
The World Bank uses a five star ranking for Open Data formats:
1. Make the data available on the web
2. Make it available as structured data (e.g. Excel)
3. make it available in a non-proprietary format (e.g. CSV)
4. Use URLs to identify datasets
5. Links to other people's data to provide context and enrich the datasets
Ms Lewin explained that the ODRA is a diagnostics and planning
tool. The aim is to have action-oriented recommendations based on
best practices. The findings of the World Bank study was that
Mauritius is well-placed to implement Open Data. She commented that there was:
- Strong commitment at the top-level to transparency and innovation
- Strong demand for Open Data from developers, the private sector
and researchers
- Government could move quickly as it already publishes statistical data but
it needs to conform to the requirements of Open Data (terms of
use and format)
It was mentioned that Open Data requires visible strong and sustained
leadership across government and that the Ministry of Technology,
Communication and Innovation and Statistics Mauritius are well-placed
to lead change at operational level. It was found that Open Data
would require a cultural change and that it could be done with the
support of the Ministry of Civil Service. The World Bank recommended
that government needs to proactively engage with Civil Society and developers.
Roza Vasileva, Open Data Consultant, World Bank explained the Open
Data Readiness findings. The ODRA uses a three color ranking, Red,
Yellow and Green.
The rank for Senior leadership was yellow. It was recommended that
government adopts an Open Data "declaration" to link initiatives to
commitments.
The rank for the policy framework was yellow. This was because of a
lack of clear policies on copyright and licensing of government
information. It was also attributed to the absence of Freedom of
Information legislation and the privacy provisions in the Statistics
Act. The World Bank recommended the development of an all of
government Open Data policy including criteria for release, licensing
and charging (for data), data protection and anonymization.
Institutional structures and capabilities ranked green. It was found
that the Ministry of Technology, Communication and Innovation was
well-placed to lead the Open Data with the support of Statistics
Mauritius and the Ministry of Civil Service. The World Bank
recommended that the Ministry of Technology, Communication and
Innovation should establish a central team for Open Data and ensure a
common understanding of Open Data.
Data Management policies and procedures ranked yellow. There was no
formal comprehensive inventory of government data holdings.
Demand for Open Data ranled from yellow to green. There was a
strongly expressed data demand by software developers, the private
sector, Civil Society and academics. It was stated that it is
difficult to obtain the data directly from ministries and agencies
and that there is no evidence of engagement by individual
ministries. The World Bank recommended that the Ministry of
Technology, Communication and Innovation could work with existing
groups of entrepreneurs and software developers; and that the
ministry themselves engage with data users in their appropriate sectors.
Civil engagement and capabilities ranked yellow. This is because
there is no data journalism and no social media engagement. It was
also found that the apps economy is at an early stage. It was
recommended that the Ministry of Technology, Communication and
Innovation and the Government Information Service. The World Bank
recommenced that the Ministry of Technology, Communication and
Innovation should introduce a data journalism capacity building program.
Finding for an Open Data program ranked yellow to green. It was
found that the Nation ICT strategy plan includes Open Dat as a key
component. However, funding is not yet in place. Funding could also
be found within the planned high-priority Smart Mauritius
strategy. It was recommended that the government should consider
moving to Open Source Software.
National Technology and Skills infrastructure ranked yellow. It was
found that there is a relatively strong technology infrastructure and
high mobile penetration. There were high broadband tariffs,
especially in the business sector. It was also found that ICT skills
are not met by market demand.
Alla Morisson, Program Officer, World Bank, gave a presentation about
the Recommendations for Action for the implementation of Open Data in
Mauritius. Ms Morisson recommended an implementation structure which
creates a central team with each ministry having an implementation cell.
The next step within the government needs to take place by building
an Open Data portal and develop a policy of "open by default". There
should also be a strategy for audience growth and user
engagement. It was recommended that there should be the release of
"quick win" datasets onto the Open Data portal and hackathons should
be organised soon after the data is released.
The Open Data policy needs to cover:
- basic principle of open by default
- exceptions regarding privacy, security, etc.
- terms and conditions of use
- no charging policy
- standards
In terms of licenses, it was recommended to follow the international
best practices of Creative Commons Attributions 4.0.
Open Data is not just about new data. It also includes data
previously published as a lot of data is already published but it is
not quite "open". It was recommended that data publishing use
standards such as CSV, JSON and XML. The World Bank recommended that
the government develop an audience growth and that it identifies
engagement channels. The government should also solicit feedback of
outcomes and success stories.
The advice to the isers were as follows: proactively communicate your
needs, consider whether your data gaps are being addressed and
whether Open Data helps you to solve a problem.
I commented that the report looks balanced and I asked Mr Rajnish
Hawabhay, Chief Technical Officer, Ministry of Technology,
Communication and Innovation about whether the report could be
circulated. Mr Hawabhay explained that the report will have to be
sent to the Cabinet and that it would be published after that. If I
recall correctly, he mentioned that it is a matter of weeks. There
is a list of datasets in the report. That may be of interest to
people who have requested access to datasets.
There was a question from a person from academia about using High
Performance Computing for data crunching (of Open Data). Ish asked
about whether Linux Users could be given access to the High
Performance Computing. In his reply, Mr Hawabhay stated that the
Mauritius Research Council just had a first workshop and that there
are no facilities at the HPC here. He added that the Ministry of
Technology, Communication and Innovation is thinking about how to go ahead.
Mr Hawabhay, in reply to a question about the Open Data portal,
answered that the MS Sharepoint platform is going to be used to
design the Open Data portal.
Regards,
S. Moonesamy
Received on Wed Oct 28 2015 - 16:31:24 PST
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