By Winnie Kamau
Nairobi, Kenya: Tanzania outshined Kenya in a recent Global Open Data Index ranking. Tanzania ranked position 71 globally with 56 points while Kenya was ranked 121 out of 187 countries globally with a score of 43 points in the newly launched 2020/21 Open Data Inventory (ODIN) index report compiled by Open Data Watch.
Rwanda ranked 1st in the 16 Eastern African Countries with 65 points followed by Tanzania 3rd, Uganda ranked 4th with 49 points and Kenya came in 7th in the report.
ODIN is an evaluation of the coverage and openness of data provided on the websites maintained by national statistical offices (NSOs) and any official government website that is accessible from the NSO site.
Overall ODIN score is an indicator of how completely open and accessible the NSO website is in any country.
For example when we look at the Openness elements where Kenya’s NSO the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS) scored poorly.
On Machine Readability Element where data can easily be accessed in common formats like XLS, CSV, and JSON files, Tanzania scored 36 points while Kenya scored Zero points.
Another important element in open data is the non-proprietary file-formats, these elements are important because they allow users to access data without requiring the use of costly, proprietary software that may prevent some users from accessing the data.
Common non-proprietary formats include PDF, HTML, XLSX, DOCX, CSV, and JSON files. Both Kenya and Tanzania scored 93 points in this area.
On Metadata Availability where we look at additional information given by the publishers of data like the definition of indicator, date when data was uploaded and the source of data, Kenya scored 48 and Tanzania 54.
The Download Option elements including bulk download, API, and customized downloads Tanzania scored 46 points while Kenya scored 18 points.
The Terms of Use or Data License element measures and whether data are made available under an open license was another indicator in this ranking. The open licenses must allow the use, reuse, and sharing or adaption of data for commercial and non-commercial use without any obligation other than attribution, per the Open Definition on this Tanzania scored 90 while Kenya scored Zero.
The most improved countries in Africa were Benin 31points, Angola with 22 points, and Tanzania 23 points. Tanzania increased its score by 23 points because its improvements were driven by efforts to increase the openness of data previously published.
What improved the score in Tanzania was some new datasets were published as well, specifically those that included subnational data. Openness efforts focused on the publication of an open data license and making more data available through the Tanzania Social-Economic Database, which makes it easier to publish data in machine-readable formats.
For Kenya, it is a wait and see situation whether the recommendations suggested by the Open Data Index will be adhered to with the coming in of a new Director-General of KNBS, Macdonald George Obudho who took over from Zachary Chege Mwangi having served as Director-General for the last 8 years.
