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Enter the Open Data Day 2021 photo and video competition

- February 19, 2021 in Open Data Day, Open Data Day 2021

Open Data Day 2020: images from round the world Every year, hundreds of Open Data Day events take place to celebrate open data in communities across the world and it is fantastic to see all the photos and videos shared. So this year, we are giving away prizes for the best Open Data Day 2021 photographs and videos as well as making sure that all the winners are published under an open license for anyone to use to promote Open Data Day in the future. Thanks to the generous support of our funding partners, we are able to offer:
  • 10 prizes of $50 USD each for the best Open Data Day 2021 photographs
  • 5 prizes of $100 USD each for the best Open Data Day 2021 videos (max length = 60 seconds)
Open Knowledge Foundation wants more openly licensed images and video of Open Data Day in order to better communicate and share more about all the activities which happen annually to celebrate open data.  All entries must be submitted by 12pm GMT on Saturday 13th March 2021 via this form and winners will be announced shortly afterwards. If you are organising an event, please do tell your participants about the prizes. Anyone attending any Open Data Day event or online session anywhere in the world can submit photographs and/or videos to this competition. 

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Meet the organisations receiving Open Data Day 2021 mini-grants

- February 12, 2021 in Open Data Day, Open Data Day 2021

Open Data Day 2020: images from round the world The Open Knowledge Foundation is happy to announce the list of organisations from all over the world who have been awarded mini-grants to help them celebrate Open Data Day on Saturday 6th March 2021. Thanks to the generous support of this year’s mini-grant funders –Microsoft, UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, Mapbox, Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery, Latin American Open Data Initiative, Open Contracting Partnership and Datopian – the Open Knowledge Foundation will be giving out a total of 61 mini-grants to help organisations run great online or in-person events on or around Open Data Day. We received hundreds of mini-grant applications this year and were greatly impressed by the quality of the events being organised all over the world. Learn more about Open Data Day, discover events taking place online or in your country and find out how to connect with the global open data community by checking out the information at the bottom of this blogpost. Here are the organisations who will receive mini-grants for each of this year’s four themes:

Environmental data

  • Code for Pakistan
    • A hack day to open and publish the block coordinates of the plantation conducted during the billion tree tsunami in Pakistan
  • DRM Africa (Democratic Republic of the Congo)
    • Preventing vulnerable communities from river floods through risk data collection, analysis and communication
  • Escuela de Fiscales (Argentina)
    • Our goal is to show the community and other civil society organizations the importance of open data in preserving and caring for the environment, and the urgency of taking action against climate change and pollution, and how open data can improve public politics with the participation of citizens
  • Government Degree College Bemina,J and K Higher Education (India)
    • Make the community aware about the availability and benefits of environmental data for addressing environmental concerns in Kashmir Valley
  • Future Lab (Mexico)
    • Engage with the local community and enable citizen participation through the use of open data for the proposal of cleaner and more sustainable public policies
  • IUCN (Switzerland)
    • We will talk about the PANORAMA initiative and web platform, which allows conservation practitioners to share and reflect on their experiences, increase recognition for successful work, and to learn with peers how similar challenges have been addressed around the globe
  • Mijas Multimedia (Democratic Republic of the Congo)
    • Strengthen the community resilience to the rapid rise of Lake Tanganyika through the use of open data
  • Niger Delta SnapShots (Nigeria)
    • Use open data to uncover hidden threats damaging Nigerian mangrove and demonstrate the necessity for urgent action to save Nigerian Mangrove
  • Open Knowledge Nepal
    • Organise a datathon that will bring open data enthusiasts to work on the real-time air quality data and Twitter bot enhancement, so that people can use the service and get informed with the recent situations of air quality in their surroundings
  • PermaPeople (Germany)
    • Present and discuss the importance and challenges of collecting and sharing open source data on plants and growing to assist in the growth of the regenerative movement
  • Zanzibar Volunteers for Environmental Conservation (Tanzania)
    • The main goal is to contribute to open data initiatives by helping the students understand more about open data and environmental issues

Tracking public money flows

  • Afonte Jornalismo de Dados
    • Brazilian are tired of corruption, and Open Data Day Porto Alegre 2021 will provide relevant and open-access information to show the path to investigate public expenses and how they are connected to politicians and even companies
  • Dataphyte
    • Train participants on how to track Covid-19 spending using open government data to unearth malpractices and corruption in the management of the pandemic
  • Datos Concepción (Argentina)
    • Show companies and organizations that received contracts related to COVID-19
  • Equity Watch Initiative (Nigeria)
    • Using data to ensure that various gender equality and women empowerment projects in Nsukka Local Government Area deliver on promises
  • HackBo / Grafoscopio
    • To intertwine mini wikis, chatbots and public oversight of public expenses, starting with a particular project in the neighborhood, to showcase how grassroots developed civic tech and open government could be bridged, as an empowering alternative to the opaque extractivist social media where such interaction is happening (Facebook) beyond the reach and real interest of civic communities
  • Ojoconmipisto (Guatemala)
    • Teaching local journalists data visualisation techniques
  • Open Knowledge Estonia
    • Estonian procurement registry doesn’t use OCDS, but the common European standard (TED). Our goal is to cross-match the datasets concerning donations and business registries, in order to automatically detect potential conflict of interests
  • Society for the Improvement of Rural People (SIRP)
    • An increase in the knowledge of participants about their rights to track the government’s budget through the Freedom of Information Act
  • Universidad Latinoamericana de Ciencia y Tecnología (ULACIT)
  • Water With Development Initiative (Nigeria)
    • Increase transparency and accountability discussing the use of existing WASH data

Open mapping

  • DIH Slovenia
    • Disseminating existing open mapping solutions, sharing best practices and discussion of possibilities for improving life in communities through open mapping
  • Federal University of Bahia (Brazil)
    • Strengthen a global network of community data collectors from communities, organisations, as well as academic institutions by 1) focusing on sharing experiences from specific cases where particular mapping tools were used as part of strategies of community empowerment and 2) using the insights to subsequently co-design a platform to empower data collectors globally
  • Geoladies PH (Philippines)
    • Since March is International Women’s Month and 31st March is International Transgender Day of Visibility, we would like to hold an event that empowers and engages women (cisgender and transgender) to map out features and amenities (women support desks, breastfeeding stations, gender-neutral comfort rooms, and LGBT safe spaces) and feature lightning talks to highlight women in mapping
  • GEOSM (Cameroon)
    • Host a “geo-evangelisation”, workshop in the use of JOSM (Java OpenStreetMap ) and GEOSM (the first 100% African open source geolocation platform)
  • HTW Dresden – University of Applied Sciences (Germany)
    • Explore how to leverage open geodata to create content for virtual worlds in conferencing and collaboration platforms
  • iLabs@Mak Project (Uganda)
    • To understand and value the need of Farmers’ Live Geo Map across food value chain in Africa to better food traceability and security
  • LABIKS – Latin American Bike Knowledge Sharing
    • To promote and stimulate the sharing of open data about the bike-sharing systems in Latin America and to promote and discuss our online open map, aiming to improve it
  • Les Libres Geographes (Senegal)
    • This event which combines outreach, sensitization, demonstration and presentation of results will take place within the Open Science, Citizen Sciences component of the Public Health Geography Cohesion project which studies malaria risk in Bouaké (Ivory Coast) using FOSS Open Data (OpenStreetMap) within an capacity building community approach and with the view of building an Open Geographical Observatory of the city
  • Monitor de Femicidios de UTOPIX (Venezuela)
    • Monitoring of femicide cases in Venezuela
  • Periféria Policy and Research Center
    • Learn about the relevance of open data in collective/critical mapping of gentrification in Hungary
  • PoliMappers (Italy)
    • Host an introductory mapping event on OpenStreetMap so that students and people interested in collaborating gain the basic skills needed to tackle more advanced tools later in the year
  • SmartCT (Philippines)
    • Launch the MapaTanda Initiative (a portmanteau of Mapa — which means a map — and Tanda — which can mean an older adult but can also mean remember); which is an initiative that seeks to improve the number and quality of data in OpenStreetMap that are important and relevant to older adults (senior citizens) and the ageing population (60+ years old) in the Philippines
  • Society of Young Social Innovators (Thailand)
    • Soft launch ‘Change Maker Community Platform’ to potential user (Changemaker in Thailand)
  • SUZA Youthmappers
    • Create awareness on open data data use, and how the students can use the data in developing innovative web and mobile applications to solve existing challenges in the society
  • TuTela Learning Network in collaboration with local activists and researchers
    • Start a debate on alternative, community-managed forms of housing in the city of Lisbon based on the model of grant of use and raising awareness on the importance of accessible data on available real estate resources owned by the city
  • Unificar Ações e Informações Geoespaciais – UAIGeo – Universidade Federal de São João del-Rei (UFSJ) 
    • Disseminate the use and importance of open data to support the solution of territorial tension points, the use of water and the preservation of cultural heritage, as well as providing participants with contacts with collaborative mapping applications

Data for equal development

  • 254 Youth Policy Cafe (Kenya)
    • Undertake a webinar via the Zoom Platform themed “Leveraging Open Data as an Asset for Inclusive & Sustainable Development in Kenya”
  • ACCESA (Costa Rica)
    • Explore, map, visualize and disseminate key data about the projects being implemented by the Territorial Councils of Rural Development, the main participatory bodies for fostering rural development in Costa Rica, and assess their progress, the money being spent on them, the results obtained, and their impact in narrowing the many social gaps that currently affect the different rural regions of the country
  • Afroimpacto
    • Discuss the importance to the black community of the open data discussion
  • CoST Honduras
    • Present how we can promote sustainable infrastructure by using data disclosed under the Open Contracting for Infrastructure Data Standard and engage citizens and civil society organisations to demand government accountability by using a tool called InfraS
  • Dados Abertos de Feira (Brazil)
    • Promote and discuss the open data knowledge to our local community (city of Feira de Santana, countryside of Brazil), bringing together the academy, government agents and the society itself
  • DataFest Tbilisi (Georgia)
    • Highlight and promote the use of data and data-driven products as an effective way to tackle pressing social issues and inequality
  • Demokrasya (Democratic Republic of the Congo)
    • Raise awareness of the Congolese community especially the women’s rights community on the use of open data in defending the women’s accessibility to employment
  • Fundación Eduna (Colombia)
    • Develop activities to address the issue of strengthening the capacity for creative thinking of children and young people in the central region of Colombia making use and taking advantage of open data
  • Gênero e Número (Brazil)
    • Explore open data to get a comprehensive landscape on the labour market for women in Brazil during the pandemic
  • Girls’ Tech-Changer Community (Cameroon)
    • Show the benefits of open data (such as an increase in efficiency, transparency, innovation, and economic growth) and to encourage the adoption of open data policies in various government bodies, businesses, and civil societies
  • Hawa Feminist Coalition (Somalia)
    • Advance the production, dissemination and openness of sex-disaggregated data in Somalia in support of evidence-based planning and policy-making as well as tracking of progress by the government and other stakeholders to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
  • Hope for Girls and Women Tanzania
    • Teaching community about the benefit of using data for development
  • Intellectual Property Hub Zambia
    • Promote innovation through instilling the value of creativity and protection of ideas in young creators, originators, writers and inventors in Zambia
  • International Youth Alliance for Family Planning- TOGO (IYAFP-TOGO)
    • Develop an open map of contraceptive methods and service availability in Agbalepedo area
  • IPANDETEC (Panama)
    • Train Panamanian women on their current position, role and future in the world of open data
  • iWatch Africa
    • Demonstrate how equal development within the digital ecosystem in Africa can be improved by leveraging data on online abuse and harassment of female journalists
  • Jokkolabs Banjul (Gambia)
    • Show the benefit of open data to the Gambia community and what we as an organisation have been doing with open data through our involvement in the International Open Data Charter
  • Kiyita Foundation
    • Encourage local women to get access to data about economic development
  • Madagascar Initiatives for Digital Innovation
    • Make participants understand the value of data for development
  • Nepal Open Source Klub
    • We will create a glossary of technical terms and words that are commonly used on websites/in software and translate those into Nepali
  • Nukta Africa (Tanzania)
    • Maximizing the use of open data to increase accountability through data journalism
  • Programming Historian (Chile)
    • Walk participants through the process of visualising qualitative and quantitative development open data for equal development in Latin America, using open access tools
  • Punch Up (Thailand)
    • Emphasise what would be lost if we don’t have open data in our country
  • Rausing Zimbabwe
    • Create a platform and outlet for information distribution, updates and discussion with communities on the issues surrounding peace and security in the age of the pandemic
  • Vilnius Legal Hackers (Lithuania)
    • Implement more transparency into funeral business of Lithuania

About Open Data Day

Open Data Day is the annual event where we gather to reach out to new people and build new solutions to issues in our communities using open data. The eleventh Open Data Day will take place on Saturday 6th March 2021. If you have started planning your Open Data Day event already, please add it to the global map on the Open Data Day website using this form. Our new events listing pages on opendataday.org will help you to discover online and in-person events by country, theme or region. You can also connect with others and spread the word about Open Data Day using the #OpenDataDay or #ODD2021 hashtags. Alternatively you can join the Google Group to ask for advice or share tips. To get inspired with ideas for events, you can read about some of the great events which took place on Open Data Day 2020 in our wrap-up blogpost. Need more information? If you have any questions, you can reach out to the Open Knowledge Foundation team by emailing opendataday@okfn.org or on Twitter via @OKFN.

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Launching the Open Data Day 2021 mini-grant scheme

- January 15, 2021 in Open Data Day, Open Data Day 2021

Open Data Day 2020: images from round the world We are thrilled to announce that once again the Open Knowledge Foundation is giving out mini-grants to support people hosting Open Data Day events across the world. Open Data Day is an annual celebration of open data taking place for the eleventh time on Saturday 6th March 2021. Everyone can take part as groups from around the globe create local events to show how they use open data in their communities. We are extremely grateful to our partners who have provided funding for this year’s mini-grant scheme. These include Microsoft, UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, Mapbox, Latin American Open Data Initiative (ILDA), Open Contracting Partnership and Datopian. Open Data Day 2021 funder logos How to apply?  The deadline to submit your mini-grant application is midday GMT on Friday 5th February 2021. Use this form to make your application. Who can apply?  Anyone can apply for a $300 USD mini-grant.  This year we are providing mini-grants to both:
  • Real world events in your location, and 
  • Online events to connect with community members and people around the world virtually
We understand that many people sadly will not be able to meet in person for this year’s Open Data Day due to local/national restrictions relating to the Covid-19 pandemic. But we want to help you and open data communities around the world by supporting online events and celebrations. As well as providing mini-grant funds to those running online events, we will be sharing tips and advice for running great virtual sessions. What are the criteria?  Your event or online session must fit into one of the four tracks laid out below to be in with a chance of receiving a mini-grant:
  • Environmental data: Use open data to illustrate the urgency of the climate emergency and spur people into action to take a stand or make changes in their lives to help the world become more environmentally sustainable.
  • Tracking public money flows: Expand budget transparency, dive into public procurement, examine tax data or raise issues around public finance management by submitting Freedom of Information requests.
  • Open mapping: Learn about the power of maps to develop better communities.
  • Data for equal development: How can open data be used by communities to highlight pressing issues on a local, national or global level? Can open data be used to track progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals or SDGs?
What is a mini-grant? You can only make one application for one event/online session in just one track.   A mini-grant is a small fund of $300 USD to help support groups organising Open Data Day events and online sessions. The mini-grants cannot be used to fund government events, whether national or local.  We can only support civil society activities.  We encourage governments to find local groups and engage with them if they want to organise events and apply for a mini-grant. The funds will only be delivered to the successful grantees after:
  • The event or online session has taken place, and 
  • We receive a written report on your event/online session which must be delivered within 30 days of your event  
In case the funds are needed before 6th March 2021, you can email opendataday@okfn.org and we will assess whether or not we can help on a case-by-case basis. Photography and video competition  This year, we will be giving away prizes for the best Open Data Day photographs and videos. These will be used to help promote Open Data Day in the future. Check back soon for more information about how to enter the competition. About Open Data Day Open Data Day is the annual event where we gather to reach out to new people and build new solutions to issues in our communities using open data.  The eleventh Open Data Day will take place on Saturday 6th March 2021. If you have started planning your Open Data Day event already, please add it to the global map on the Open Data Day website using this form. If you are running a free online session open to anyone in the world, we will publish a timetable to promote your online session.  Connect with others and spread the word about Open Data Day using the #OpenDataDay or #ODD2021 hashtags.  Alternatively you can join the Google Group to ask for advice or share tips. To get inspired with ideas for events or online sessions, read about some of the great events which took place on Open Data Day 2020 in our wrap-up blog post. Need more information? If you have any questions, you can reach out to the Open Knowledge Foundation team by emailing opendataday@okfn.org or on Twitter via @OKFN. There’s also the Open Data Day Google Group where you can connect with others interested in taking part, share ideas for your event or ask for help.

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Open Data Day 2021 will take place on Saturday 6th March

- September 22, 2020 in Featured, Open Data, Open Data Day, Open Data Day 2021

Open Data Day 2021 We are pleased to announce that Open Data Day 2021 will take place on Saturday 6th March. Open Data Day is the annual global celebration of open data facilitated by the Open Knowledge Foundation. The Open Data Day website is opendataday.org. Groups from around the world create local events on the day where they will use open data in their communities. It is an opportunity to show the benefits of open data and encourage the adoption of open data policies in government, business and civil society. In March 2020, more than 300 events took place across the world to mark the tenth Open Data Day despite some events having to shift online due to event restrictions relating to the COVID-19 pandemic. Thanks to the generous support of our funders – Datopian, the Foreign & Commonwealth Office, Hivos, the Latin American Open Data Initiative (ILDA), Mapbox, Open Contracting Partnership and Resource Watch – we were able to give out more than 60 mini-grants to support the running of great community events on Open Data Day 2020.  Learn all about those events and discover organisations celebrating open data near you by reading our round-up blogpost. If you or your organisation would like to give financial support for Open Data Day or would be interested in sponsoring our mini-grant scheme, please get in touch by emailing opendataday@okfn.org. We will announce more details about the 2021 mini-grant scheme in the coming months. For Open Data Day 2021, you can connect with others and spread the word using the #OpenDataDay or #ODD2021 hashtags. Alternatively you can join the Google Group to ask for advice or share tips. By March 2021, we hope that in-person events will be able to take place in many locations but we know that differing levels of COVID-19 restrictions will be in force in a number of countries so we are looking at how best we can support the organisation of more virtual events. Find out more about Open Data Day by visiting opendataday.org where you can also add your event to the global map, find recommended data resources and use a free logo generator to create a logo to help your city mark the event.

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Harnessing open data for agricultural business opportunities in the DRC: Open Data Day 2020 report

- June 15, 2020 in Democratic Republic of the Congo, Open Data Day, Open Data Day 2020

On Saturday 7th March 2020, the tenth Open Data Day took place with people around the world organising over 300 events to celebrate, promote and spread the use of open data. Thanks to generous support from key funders, the Open Knowledge Foundation was able to support the running of more than 60 of these events via our mini-grants scheme.  This blogpost is a report from Young Professionals for Agricultural Development (YPARD) in the Democratic Republic of the Congo who received funding from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office to help young and female agricultural entrepreneurs explore how they can use open data to create new businesses. This blogpost is published in French. Open Knowledge Foundation en tant qu’institution qui prône les données ouvertes a sélectionné une soixantaine d’organisations à travers le monde pour bénéficier du small grant en vue d’organiser la journée d’#OpenDataDay le 7 mars. Et, Young Professionals for Agricultural Development (YPARD/DRC) est parmi les 67 organisations bénéficiaire de ce fonds.  Opendata : une opportunité pour l’agrobusiness en RDC C’est sous ce thème que @ypard_rdc a organisé en date du 07 mars 2020, une séance d’information  et de sensibilisation auprès de 25 jeunes réunis au bureau @HabariRDC avec l’appui de #OpenKnowledgeFoundation. L’accès libre des données surtout agricoles est un sujet d’actualité à l’ère du numérique où des questions d’ordre mondial s’impose avec acuité. Le besoin en partage des nouvelles solutions est une nécessité d’autant plus il facilite un large éventail d’informations liées à la productivité agricole, à la maitrise des conditions météorologiques, au partage des innovations et offre une meilleure opportunité dans le domaine de l’entrepreneuriat agricole selon Eden Mvuenga, un des orateurs du jour. Pour Lisette Ntumba, une jeune entrepreneure et membre d’YPARD RDC : “Les données ouvertes restent importantes pour nous jeunes entrepreneurs agricoles qui investissent dans la transformation des fruits car, elles permettent de mieux s’outiller en termes d’informations sur les emballages, les qualités nutritionnelles et certaines données utiles sur la transformation des fruits.” Il sied de noter qu’il y a toujours un lien entre l’agrobusiness et accès libre aux données agricoles ouvertes; et plusieurs portails ainsi que plateformes en ligne offrent des possibilités d’accès aux données agricoles a renchérit Eden Mvuenga. Par ailleurs, l’internet reste incontournable comme moyen d’accès aux données ouvertes.  Pour aider les jeunes à mieux comprendre les concepts clés sur Open Data ainsi que la mission de Open Knowledge Foundation et de Global Open Data for Agriculture and Nutrition (GODAN), les participants ont dû échanger sur les critères fondamentaux qui caractérisent une donnée ouverte à savoir : l’accessibilité, la disponibilité ; la redistribution et la réutilisation.  Avec des exemples à l’appui, les jeunes ont partagé leurs expériences en matière d’accès aux données bien que butés à certaines difficultés telles que l’absence d’ouverture et/ou libéralisation des données agricoles au niveau des institutions étatiques via un portail gouvernemental des données ouvertes, le manque d’informations dans ce domaine d’Open Data.  Ainsi, comme l’a noté Marlene Kabemba, participante à la session d’OpenDataDay, l’accès aux données ouvertes est une bonne opportunité surtout qu’YPARD RDC s’y attèle depuis plusieurs années quoique les Open Data ont encore du chemin à faire  en  RDC, c’est ainsi qu’il s’avère impérieux d’en faire la promotion en vue de leur intégration dans les sphères étatiques et surtout celles en charge des jeunes pour que ces derniers s’offrent les chances de voir leurs projets réussir grâce à des informations ouvertes et à libre accès.   Avant de conclure la journée, plusieurs jeunes ont proposé à YPARD RDC de penser à créer OpenDataRDC (une structure qui s’occuperait uniquement de la promotion des données ouvertes, libres et accessibles en RDC).

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Teaching students to tell stories with budget data in Guatemala: Open Data Day 2020 report

- June 15, 2020 in Guatemala, Open Data Day, Open Data Day 2020

On Saturday 7th March 2020, the tenth Open Data Day took place with people around the world organising over 300 events to celebrate, promote and spread the use of open data. Thanks to generous support from key funders, the Open Knowledge Foundation was able to support the running of more than 60 of these events via our mini-grants scheme.  This blogpost is a report from Ojoconmipisto in Guatemala who received funding from Hivos to teach students and journalists how to investigate and tell stories from public budget and contracting data. This blogpost is published in Spanish. Ojoconmipisto participó el pasado 7 de marzo en la celebración mundial del Open Data Day. Organizó un taller dirigido a estudiantes de periodismo y periodistas en ejercicio, donde se habló de datos abiertos, compras públicas, fiscalización herramientas, acceso a la información y periodismo. Esta es la primera que el medio guatemalteco organiza la actividad, en las cuatro ediciones anteriores asistió como participante.  El 5 de marzo publicó la actividad en el mapa de eventos de Opendataday.org, que registró 305. Ojoconmipisto fue uno de los 19 participantes de la categoría “seguimiento de fondos públicos”. La convocatoria, en donde anunciaba que tenía espacio para 25 personas, la hizo en sus redes sociales (Facebook y Twitter). Al menos 168 personas consultaron el formulario en línea.  El encuentro se realizó en Hakuna Matata 2, un salón ubicado en la zona 13 de la ciudad de Guatemala. Asistieron 21 personas de un total de 27 que se registraron, entre ellos estudiantes de las Universidades del Istmo, Regional y Galileo, catedráticos universitarios y periodistas interesados en datos abiertos.  La actividad de 14:30 a 18:30 horas consistió de cuatro charlas, tres relacionadas con datos y una con la Ley de Acceso a la Información que para Ojoconmipisto es una herramienta de trabajo.  La primera a cargo de Daniel Ambeliz –autor de un estudio sobre los precios de antirretrovirales–, se centró en recursos digitales como Power BI, un programa que permite analizar bases de datos para crear visualizaciones y entender de manera sencilla. Junto a los participantes realizó un ejercicio práctico para identificar posibles enfoques y datos llamativos para una investigación.  En la segunda sesión la dirigió Silvio Gramajo, especialista en temas de transparencia, quien abordó sobre la importancia de la Ley de Acceso a Información, la rendición de cuentas y el uso de los datos abiertos para construir ciudadanía. Esta se transmitió a través de Facebook Live que registró 343 reproducciones y un alcance de 1,673 personas.  La tercera estuvo a cargo de Isaias Morales, reportero de Ojoconmipisto. El presentó una guía para fiscalizar la obra pública a partir del periodismo. Este documento es parte del proyecto “Obras bajo la lupa”, realizado con Open Contracting e Hivos, y monitorea 40 construcciones municipales. La guía explica procesos y cómo encontrar historias a partir el uso del portal de Guatecompras. Este es el sistema que registra todas las compras y contrataciones que se hacen con fondos públicos.  Para cerrar la jornada, Francelia Solano, reportera de Nómada, impartió la charla “un dato, una historia”. Compartió su experiencia de usar los datos para investigar a los alcaldes del país.  Al finalizar la actividad los estudiantes se acercaron a los dos reporteros de Ojoconmipisto para distintas consultas y solicitar orientación para realizar reportajes investigativos que requiere su universidad. Al menos cuatro de ellos quedaron en contacto con el equipo.  La actividad se tuiteó desde la cuenta de Ojoconmipisto con los hashtags #OpenDataDay y #ODD2020. Publicamos 26 tuits con la interacción de los asistentes.

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Celebrating open data initiatives in Paraguay: Open Data Day 2020 report

- June 15, 2020 in Open Data Day, Open Data Day 2020, Paraguay

On Saturday 7th March 2020, the tenth Open Data Day took place with people around the world organising over 300 events to celebrate, promote and spread the use of open data. Thanks to generous support from key funders, the Open Knowledge Foundation was able to support the running of more than 60 of these events via our mini-grants scheme.  This blogpost is a report from Girolabs in Paraguay who received funding from Mapbox to showcase local initiatives using and producing open data. This blogpost is published in Spanish. ¡Una vez más la comunidad datera en Paraguay ha acudido al llamado a la convocatoria anual y mundial sobre los datos abiertos, con esto sumamos ocho años desde su primera edición y estamos orgullosos y ansiosos de contarte lo que pasó! Nuestra cita con el pueblo ODD fue realizado el 07 de marzo en el Loffice Las Mercedes, un lugar de coworking situado en la capital de nuestro país y ya identificado como punto simbólico del tema ya que hemos recibido a 70 personas (nada mal para un jueves nocturno). La actividad fue organizada por la iniciativa social CIVILAB con la colaboración de Girolabs y la Fundación CIRD.  En esta edición hemos combinado el evento del ODD con la iniciativa social “Te Invito un Tere (TIUT)” como estrategia de organización y coordinación, pero …, ¿Qué es te Invito un Tere?  Es un espacio colectivo de intercambio y aprendizaje, donde se comparten experiencias sobre temáticas de participación ciudadana en diversas aplicaciones. Ya se llevaron adelante 9 ediciones desde el 2017, conociendo más sobre temáticas de educación, participación ciudadana, transparencia, medio ambiente, entre otros temas. Todas las ediciones son descontracturadas y cercanas, propiciando un ambiente de diálogo y colaboración. ¿Por qué decidimos juntar estas dos plataformas? Por la importancia social del tereré como un símbolo que nos une para hablar de lo que sea y porque el ODD y TIUT comparten los mismos principios de aprender, desaprender y volver a aprender colaborando y participando. ¿Cuál fue la modalidad de las exposiciones y cuáles fueron los temas destacados de este año? Como agregado especial esta vez optamos por las exposiciones “a toda hora”,  esto quiere decir que hubo exposiciones simultáneas en salas y en el tiempo del break que usualmente lo usamos para el coworking, siguiendo la temática datos y tereré hemos denominados a las tres salas destinadas para las exposiciones con nombres de remedios yuyos tradicionales como lo son el zarzaparrilla, capi´i catí y menta´í, esto sin lugar a duda le da una connotación bien paraguaya y de apropiación a los temas de datos abiertos. Presentamos Mapasocial. Marco Aponte, socio fundador de Civilab, presentó un proyecto, denominado Mapa Social, que consiste en una plataforma digital que permite hacer donaciones a las organizaciones civiles e incluso que las personas puedan sumarse como voluntarios de los programas.  Actualmente, la página registra 150 organizaciones no gubernamentales, pero la idea es sumar unas 300 organizaciones antes de finalizar el año.  La forma de unirse al directorio es simple. Las organizaciones simplemente deben solicitar el permiso en la página y completar sus datos. La idea es juntar a todos los actores en un solo canal, convirtiéndonos realmente en un mapa social”. Las organizaciones están georreferenciadas y la web cuenta con un visor de datos abiertos, así como la posibilidad de la descarga de la base de datos en CSV. En esta edición informamos gratamente que hemos recibido la postulación de temas desde los tres poderes del estado, la academia y el sector de organizaciones sociales, esto nos alegra mucho ya que cada vez más existe una mira integral sobre las aristas en que se mueven los datos abiertos, a continuación, te damos una breve reseña de los temas desarrollados: Zarzaparrilla Room
  • Ley de Protección de Datos en Paraguay (Martín Oxilia Aponte)
  • Datos Educativos en Paraguay: Perspectivas y Desafíos (Marcos Miranda – Juntos por la Educación)
  • Defensores, plataforma de sistematización de casos de tortura en Paraguay. Herramientas del programa de Frictionless Data del Open Knowledge Foundation.
Menta´i Room
  • Participación ciudadana, audiencias públicas, acceso a la información pública
  • La transparencia como condición de la ética pública (Academia – Viviana Romero)
  • “Los datos abiertos para soluciones globales” Experiencia de participación en Hackatón de la NASA. “Space Apps” (Giselle Ramírez Rojas)
Kapi’i katî Room
  • Nuevo Portal de Datos Abiertos del Ministerio de Tecnologías de la Información y Comunicación (MITIC) y del Ministerio de Agricultura (MAG).
  • Presupuesto Ciudadano (Centro de Estudios Ambientales y Sociales)
  • Cartografía Open Data (Katrina Lisnichuk, Diego Bernal y Tomás López – MapPyOSM
  • Datos Abiertos del Poder Judicial.

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Agricultural data for equal development in Nigeria: Open Data Day 2020 report

- June 8, 2020 in Nigeria, Open Data Day, Open Data Day 2020

On Saturday 7th March 2020, the tenth Open Data Day took place with people around the world organising over 300 events to celebrate, promote and spread the use of open data. Thanks to generous support from key funders, the Open Knowledge Foundation was able to support the running of more than 60 of these events via our mini-grants scheme.  This blogpost is a report by Dr Philip Ifejika from the National Institute for Freshwater Fisheries Research in Nigeria who received funding from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office to develop an event to sensitise agricultural stakeholders on the need and benefits of data for equal development.

Our Open Data Day 2020 event on “Sensitisation of Agricultural Stakeholders on the Need and Benefits of Data for Equal Development” got wide publicity in the social media like Facebook, LinkedIn, and WhatsApp groups which was hosted in National Institute for Freshwater Fisheries Research (NIFFR), New Bussa, Niger State Nigeria.

The event attracted interest and commendations from individuals and groups from different states of Nigeria namely; Niger, Anambra, Abuja, Benue, Enugu, and Rivers as well as African countries like Zambia, Uganda, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Sudan, Ghana, Mozambique and Tanzania mostly from members of Alumini Group-Farm Management Online Course including GODAN Discussion group.

The colourful event was declared open by Dr Mbagwu, I.G. Director of Research Operations, in the presence of NIFFR management staff and was well attended by 135 participants comprising of 56% men and 44% women.

Stakeholders were educated and sensitised on ASFA Database, Fisheries Database Project and the Need and Benefits of Data for Equal Development.

Promoting the ASFA Database, the Head of Library, Information and Documentation, Mrs V.A.K. Sado, shared NIFFR’s experience since 2003. Unfortunately ASFA has restrictions and is not available freely as open data.

Dr, Mbagwu, I.G. Director of Research Operations, then gave an update on the Fisheries Database project which was inconclusive due to poor funding and the inconsistence of government. According to him, the project was designed to cover the fisheries and inland water bodies’ data of the entire country.

For the main business of the day, Dr Philip Ifejika, the ODD programme implementer, provided more insights on Open Data Day, the Open Knowledge Foundation and the Data for Equal Development movement.

Dr Ifejika highlighted the benefits of open data to farmers, groups and organisations as well as its application at farm and organisation levels to develop business model and participate in data-driven agriculture. On data for equal development, he demonstrated link between equity and equality, need for gender empowerment and data aggregation.

Participants expressed delight with the new knowledge as well as expressing readiness to be open on data sharing, participate in database development and join more training to reap in the benefit of data economy, equity and equality in development.

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Mapping HIV facilities and LGBT-friendly spaces in the Philippines: Open Data Day 2020 report

- June 8, 2020 in Open Data Day, Open Data Day 2020, Open Knowledge, philippines

On Saturday 7th March 2020, the tenth Open Data Day took place with people around the world organising over 300 events to celebrate, promote and spread the use of open data. Thanks to generous support from key funders, the Open Knowledge Foundation was able to support the running of more than 60 of these events via our mini-grants scheme.  This blogpost is a report by Mikko Tamura from MapBeks in the Philippines who received funding from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office to organise a mapping party to highlight HIV facilities and LGBT-friendly spaces on OpenStreetMap. The first Open Data Day celebration of Pilipinas Chubs X Chasers (PCC) was done at the Fahrenheit Club on 7th March 2020. The event started at 9pm and 16 participants joined the datathon to improve on the largest open HIV database in the country. PCC, the largest online community of LGBTQIA+ chubs, chasers and bears in the Philippines has dedicated its celebration of Open Data Day to teach fellow community (bear, chubs, chasers, supporters) members the importance of emancipating the data and making it more accessible to everyone who needs it. Mr Papu Torres, chairperson of PCC, and Mr Mikko Tamura, lead advocate of MapBeks, spearheaded the event as they believe that as members of their growing community can make a bigger impact by encouraging people to contribute by simply researching and validating information. Currently, MapBeks with the full support of PCC, has been developing maps and databases highlighting and representing the LGBTQ community. You may contribute to their working HIV database and maps here:  HIV Facilities Email/Website working database https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1jdlDJw3eue0e6YK9mKgYfaTw5962e2H1g_tWZQscbcE/ edit?usp=sharing  HIV Facilities map http://tinyurl.com/mapbekshivmap  PCC’s objective of the ODD event was to collect/complete as much information on websites and email addresses of all HIV facilities in the country and contribute the information on OpenStreetMap for everyone to access.  Figure 1 Papu Torres, chairperson of Pilipinas Chubs X Chasers, teaching how to contribute and research on websites and emails for the open database of HIV Facilities. According to MapBeks, there are a total of 659 identified HIV facilities in the country, but the data varies from one organisation to another. It is part of the group’s advocacy to make such information more accessible, downloadable, and useable to the crowd specially for people living with HIV (PLHIV).
 The SlumBEAR Datathon was able to contribute 250 email addresses and 383 websites to the database. This constitutes more than 20% of the needed information that will be added on geotagged locations of clinics, hospitals, and health centres in the country. Lastly, Mr Leonard Kodie Macayan III, Mr. Fahrenheit 2020 and our country’s representative to the Mr Gay World competition, visited the crowd and showed support for our open data movement. Mr Fahrenheit is an annual male pageant, exclusive only for gay men and bisexuals. It is the first and the longest running of its kind, having been set up in 2003. Its mission is to support the advocacy towards mental health and tackling various issues like clinical depression, suicidal tendencies and the stigma of HIV/AIDS.  We would like to specially thank the Open Knowledge Foundation for the support and trust for our small community, and to Papu Torres, John Mojica, Ryan Sotto for making things possible. The Pilipinas Chubs X Chasers community will continue to support activities such as this in the future as it deems it necessary and empowering for smaller communities to be part of something bigger. See you next Open Data Day! For more information and partnerships, contact Mikko Tamura at mikko.tamura@gmail.com.

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Empowering R users to work with open spatial data in South Africa: Open Data Day 2020 report

- June 8, 2020 in Open Data Day, Open Data Day 2020, South Africa

On Saturday 7th March 2020, the tenth Open Data Day took place with people around the world organising over 300 events to celebrate, promote and spread the use of open data. Thanks to generous support from key funders, the Open Knowledge Foundation was able to support the running of more than 60 of these events via our mini-grants scheme.  This blogpost is a report from Exegetic Analytics in South Africa who received funding from Mapbox to expose the South African R community to a range of resources for working with open spatial data. satRday Joburg warmed up with an RLadies Joburg event hosted by Rain where our keynotes, Heather Turner and Colin Fay, spoke to us about publishing and promoting your R package as well as contributing to the R ecosystem. Coupled with pizza and great company this event was thoroughly enjoyed by all. satRday Joburg officially kicked off on 4 March 2020 with a 2-day “Introduction to R” workshop held by Bianca Peterson. The purpose of this workshop was to provide foundational knowledge to empower new R users with the right skills (and confidence) in order for them to efficiently tackle real-world problems. This workshop covered everything from connecting to Rstudio cloud to Data Visualisation. On 6 March, satRday workshop participants were spoilt for choice with a selection of three full-day workshops. Topics included “Building Successful Shiny Apps with {golem}” by Colin Fay, “R Package Development” by Heather Turner and “Web Scraping with R” by Megan Beckett & Andrew Collier. The satRday conference took place on 7 March 2020 at the Discovery building in the heart of Sandton. The programme (consisting of 21 presentations) was varied, catering for the diverse range of interests. Attendees seemed to really enjoy the diverse range of topics and variance in presentation lengths ranging from 5-minute lightning talks, 20-minute standard talks and finally to 45-minute keynote talks. Throughout the day the hashtag #satRdayJoburg was flying all over Twitter with the R community (both in attendance and elsewhere) sharing words of encouragement and admiration for talks and the atmosphere of the conference as a whole.  Here are some of our favourite excerpts: Organising a conference is a huge endeavour and it would not have been possible without the hard work of the organising committee or the generous financial assistance of our sponsors:

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