Page 104 - Demo

Harnessing Open Data to achieve development results in Latin America and the Caribbean
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Using experienced researchers in Jamaica, Trinidad & Tobago, Barbados, and The Dominican Republic, the research team has conducted detailed sector-scoping studies in several countries in the region that describe and evaluate the existing data ecosystem and the potential for open data opportunities and interventions in the following sectors: Agriculture, Fisheries/ Marine Protected Areas, Tourism, Education and National Statistics System.
New knowledge
Insights from these studies are now being used to formulate strategic interventions in key areas related to one or more of the following developmental issues: governance structures, capacity/community building, standards development, and inclusion/cognitive divide. These interventions will be geared towards developing the open data ecosystem and testing core “theories of change”. The researchers will conduct a critical evaluation of the outcomes of the interventions that allow for cross-sector / cross-country comparisons, and evaluation of the value potential of open data.
Thus far, tangible outputs of this research programme include: four (4) multi-country sector studies, several conference papers/ presentations, and a submitted book chapter. It is expected that the completed research programme, scheduled for September 2016, will contribute evidence to informing a “Caribbean Data Consensus” which will be critical to the region’s achievement of the “data revolution for sustainable development”, recognised as a key pillar in the post-2015 development agenda.
Potential Impact
Whether or not the philosophical driver for a particular open data initiative is increased government transparency, improved public service delivery, enhanced government-citizen collaboration, or a stimulus for innovation/entrepreneurship, opening up data provides a catalyst for problem solving that is relevant across many different sectors, social contexts and data communities.
This problem-centric approach is an imperative for the Caribbean, where the lingering effects of the economic recession, tight fiscal space, and limited economic policy discretion demand tangible returns on the investment of scarce resources in the emerging Open Data agenda. In this setting, problem-solving has become the dominant discourse:
• In Agriculture, how does Open Data help to combat the vexing problem of praedial larceny?
• In Tourism, can Open Data initiatives increase visibility and economic opportunities for small community tourism interests that struggle to survive in a sector dominated by large properties and operators?
• In Fisheries & Marine Protected Areas, can Open Data enhance the governance linkages between national, regional, and global stakeholders in order to improve policy, legislative, and managerial decisions in a domain that is critical to Caribbean environmental sustainability?
New partnerships
Open data has demonstrated, by its nature, great convening power in bringing together government agencies that have both access to data, and an understanding of key policy problems, with stakeholders, domain experts and technology innovators from outside government, across different countries and sectors, around shared problem spaces and practical problem solving. For the sector-specific initiatives currently being mobilised, value-adding regional and international partners include:
• Mona School of Business & Management, UWI
• Centre for Resource Management and Environmental Studies (CERMES), UWI
• The Caribbean ICT Research Programme (CIRP), UWI
• Rural Agricultural Development Authority (RADA) in the Ministry of Agriculture, GOJ
• Slashroots Foundation, technology innovators
• Open Knowledge Foundation / International School of Data
Open data has been cast as an important enabler for harnessing the data revolution to improve policy-making, empower citizens, and foster innovation and entrepreneurship, in order to contribute to achieving the new sustainable development goals. No less a luminary than Sir Tim Berners-Lee, credited with the invention of the World-Wide-Web, has said: “To achieve the goals of sustainable development, critical data must be open and available for reuse by anyone, anywhere, anytime.”
Although Caribbean Governments have been relatively late to the global open data discourse, countries such as Jamaica, St. Lucia, Trinidad & Tobago, the Dominican Republic and Antigua, bolstered by the joint funding support from the World Bank and UK-DFID, have recently completed Open Data Readiness Assessments (ODRAs) and are now actively engaged in the development of government open data portals and policy frameworks. This research programme is timely and well-positioned to contribute evidence-based insights and guidance to support the formulation of regional, appropriately targeted open data initiatives with the potential to yield positive development impact.
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Recognising Outstanding Researchers 2016