The data revolution has picked up pace in February and March, driven by discussions about the post-2015 development agenda. Lists of post-2015 indictors were proposed and reports about funding the post-2015 goals were published, and many blogs and conferences focuses on moving the data revolution from theory to reality. We provide links to reports, articles, and blog posts below. If we have missed something, please contact.
2 April 2015
Savita Bailur writes a post on the World Wide Web Foundation blog titled Data for Africa, by Africa: Rebooting Open Data and the High Level Conference on the Data Revolution. The post summarizes the activities during the Data Revolution in Africa conference in Addis Ababa. One major outcome was the African Data Consensus which, the blog notes, includes a statement that official statistics should be open by default.…(more)
1 April 2015
Amanda Glassman and Lauren Post write a post on the Center for Global Development blog titled Fueling the Data Revolution: An African Data Consensus. They discuss the recently published African Data Consensus praising it for its focus on national statistical offices but note that it did not account for misaligned incentives for data collection. They also note that it does not fully grapple with the role of donors in African statistics.…(more)
1 April 2015
Bitange Ndemo writes an article for Ghana Business Daily titled Are we ready for a data revolution? The article lauds the potential of big data to improve lives but argues that Africa’s movement towards big data is hampered by fear of non-official statistics. Africa needs to embrace the data revolution.…(more)
31 March 2015
Rural21 publishes a blog post titled Sustainable development Goals: Monitoring progress on agriculture and rural development. The post gives several principles for creating successful SDG indicators and calls for a data revolution in agricultural statistics. The data revolution should provide better information about trends in poverty, land use, food systems, and so forth.…(more)
31 March 2015
Joshua Muskin blogs on the Brookings’ Education Plus Development blog. A World That Counts succeeds, he says, in many ways but notes that many revolutions have derailed and worsened the plight of those meant to benefit. To have more data interpreted better by policy makers is much easier than producing data that are useful to teachers, parents, and students.
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March 2015
Saferworld publishes a briefing titled Measuring Peace from 2015: An Indicator Framework at Work. The briefing focuses on SDG Goal 16, discussing potential indicators and methods of monitoring and evaluation.…(more)
30 March 2015
Chris Underwood blogs about the Africa Data Revolution conference. He says that he was particularly impressed by the focus on real constraints, rather than utopian technological fixes. He then adds an update saying that the final statement has too much focus on the state as opposed to other actors.…(more)
29 March 2015
Open Data Watch publishes an article titled Modernizing NSDS to Open Data. The article discusses a new research program geared to understanding what National Strategies for the Development of Statistics include with respect to the data revolution and openness. The program will highlight practical ways to mainstream openness and data revolutionary principles in these documents.…(more)
27 March 2015
The East African publishes an article titled Tanzania passes new draconian data law. The article discusses a bill passed by the Parliament of Tanzania that seems to provide stiff penalties–including jail time–for publishing anything other than official statistics.…(more)
27 March 2015
New Business Ethiopia publishes an article titled A meeting about African data opens in Addis Ababa. The article highlights efforts in several domains, particularly those related to finance and rights.…(more)
26 March 2015
Elizabeth Dodds (Open Aid Partnership) and Josh Powell (Development Gateway) publish a blog post on the AidData website titled Financing the Future 2015: Some hits and misses on the future of development finance. The post provides feedback on the Zero Draft of the Financing for Development document. One of the misses they identify is a lack of strong support for the data revolution, citing the costing research of SDSN, they suggest that much more attention should be paid to this issue…(more)
26 March 2015
The Open Data Institute publishes a post by Anna Scott and William Gerry titled Talkin’ ’bout a (data) revolution: Day 1 in Addis. The post discusses the data revolution in Africa meeting and argues that without open data, the data revolution will fail.…(more)
March 2015
PARIS21 updates its guidelines for National Strategies for the Development of Statistics (NSDSs) to include a section on post-2015 data and the data revolution.…(more)
26 March 2015
Markets for Good publishes a post by Bill Anderson titled Adventures in the Data Revolution: What Revolution? The post tries to assess whether the rhetoric about the data revolution is more about publicity than substance. Anderson argues that after learning that district-level data don’t really exist for maternal mortality in Uganda, a revolution is needed. To make people count, they must be counted, so a data revolution must take place.…(more)
23 March 2015
Bloomberg Philanthropies launches a $100 million Data for Health initiative in a partnership with the CDC Foundation, Johns Hopkins University, the World Health Organization, Union North America and the University of Melbourne. The money is designed to improve the quality of data on health around the world.…(more)
19 March 2015
Development Initiatives publishes a blog post titled Counting People to Make People Count. The post highlights a preliminary draft of a paper written with PARIS21, the Web Foundation, and Statistics South Africa in preparation for the African Data Revolution meeting.…(more)
19 March 2015
Development Gateway publishes a blog post by Benjamin Arancibia titled A Data Revolution from the Inside Out. The post argues that in order to be prepared for the data revolution, there needs to be a much deeper level of knowledge about data science.
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19 March 2015
Saferworld publishes a blog post by Thomas Wheeler and Craig Fagan titled Measuring Development: The importance of statistics on the post-2015 road to a better world. The post discusses key dimensions to consider with regards to Goal 16: “peaceful and inclusive societies, justice for all, and open and accountable government institutions”. The authors note that there is an important role for actors outside the government to play in the development of indicators for this goals.…(more)
16 March 2015
The UN publishes the zero draft of the 3rd Financing for Development conference titled A global framework for financing sustainable development. The document makes no direct reference to the data revolution, it call for substantial improvements in the transparency of development finance and says: “Greater transparency can be achieved by publishing timely, comprehensive and forward-looking information on development activities in an independent, standardized, open, electronic format. We will learn from and strengthen existing initiatives and open data standards. A focus on data and statistical systems at the country level will be especially important in order to strengthen domestic capacity and accountability. Targeted support will be needed for this effort.”.…(more)
16 March 2015
SciDevNet publishes a post by Andrea Rinaldi titled Data gaps make malnutrition too easy to ignore. The article suggests that in several states, malnutrition data is inadequate and needs to be revolutionized.…(more)
16 March 2015
Transparency International publishes a post by Craign Fagan titled Measuring development: Why statistics matter. He makes the case for a bigger role in the civil society sector.…(more)
13 March 2015
Emily Courey Pryor publishes a post on the UN Foundation blog titled Gender Data is Key to Building the World We Want. She discusses the work of Data2x, specifically highlighting the need for better CRVS systems among other data gaps.…(more)
12 March 2015
Roberto Bissio publishes a blog post on the Social Watch blog titled Statistics for the SDGs: The Devil Is in the Indicators. The post examines some of the proposed SDG targets, highlighting the challenges in developing practical indicators.…(more)
10 March 2015
The UN Development Group Silo Fighters blog publishes a post by Cathal Elder titled Malawi: Making best use of real-time data. The post draws on insights from the UN office in Malawi’s experience developing a real-time program monitoring framework.…(more)
10 March 2015
Development Gateway publishes comments from Nancy McGuire Choi titled A Call to Do More with Data. The post develops 4 key points: 1) Collecting data sounds easy, but in practice, has many dimensions. 2) In the fervor to create, liberate, and improve the supply of data, let’s never forget: Open data for whom? Open data for what? 3) The US government is doubling down on investments to advance the open data agenda. 4) We are in the midst of a major culture change.…(more)
10 March 2015
Markets for Good publishes an article by Bernard Sabiti and Bill Anderson titled Adventures in the Data Revolution: When the Data Tells No Story. The article describes finding unexpected correlations in exam scores in education that only made sense within a broader context, not taken on their face value…(more)
9 March 2015
Development Initiatives publishes a blog post by Bibhusan Bista titled Making open data work for the community. The post highlights ways for open data to be more useful in Nepal…(more)
9 March 2015
Bill Orme writes a blog post for Pass Blue titled Will Statisticians Get the Last Word on the UN’s New Development Goals? The post argues that there are too many SDG goals and targets but too little political will to reduce the number of indicators so the real negotiations center on the statisticians deciding the indcators for the SDGs…(more)
6 March 2015
The Journal of Development Studies publishes the online version of a special issue titled Statistical Tragedy in Africa? Evaluating the Data Base for African Economic Development. The journal has articles engaging in a number of different points about data quality in Africa. Few of the articles are later released as open access.…(more)
6 March 2015
PARIS21 a short video on Youtube titled Less than 1%. The video argues that less than 1% of ODA goes to statistical capacity so it’s time for a data revolution.…(more)
5 March 2015
Diana Hinova publishes a post on the One Young World blog titled What doesn’t get counted doesn’t count. The article highlights gaps in data on domestic violence and calls for a gender revolution.…(more)
5 March 2015
Voice of America publishes an article by Lizabeth Paulat titled Uganda’s ‘Right to Know’ Data Revolution. The article describes efforts to increase access to information and to make data more accessible in Uganda.…(more)
4 March 2015
The World Economic Forum hosts a workshop in Barcelona, Spain on the Local Data Revolution. A summary of the report is published. The summary highlights the need to have human-centered design at the center of innovation. Some comments made suggested that while technology can create new opportunities, people must use the data and put it to use for it to have any impact…(more)
4 March 2015
Jonah Busch publishes a blog post on the Center for Global Development website titled Disruptive Data Disputes Documentation of Deforestation. The article describes two competing narratives about deforestation in the tropics; one from official statistics suggested deforestation was declining, while another based on satellite data found an increase in deforestation.…(more)
4 March 2015
The UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network publishes a blog post about a side event at the UNSC meeting titled UN Workshop Side Event on a Needs Assessment for SDG Monitoring. The post highlights some of the comments from the UNSC report.…(more)
3-5 March 2015
The 46th UN Statistical Commission meeting is held in New York with the theme Better Data, Better Lives. The meeting addressed a few issues related to the data revolution, including an assessment of the feasibility of 304 indicators for the Sustainable Development Goals.…(more)
3 March 2015
Kieron Mahony writes a series a post on the UK’s Government Statistical Service blog titled Live from New York: Better Lives, Better Data. The post highlights thoughts from the UNSC meeting, including several thoughts about the data revolution.…(more)
3 March 2015
The Education for All features a post titled How will higher education be integrated in the post 2015 education and development agenda? The post discusses the need for the SDGs to address higher education.…(more)
3 March 2015
PARIS21 releases a youtube video called The Vital Count – Civil Registration and Vital Statistics. The video features discussions about CRVS in several countries.…(more)
2 March 2015
The UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs blog post titled Securing better data for better lives. The post discusses the UN Statistical Commission meeting, highlighting the role of national statistical systems in the SDGs and the data revolution
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27 February 2015
Sylvia Beagles publishes a blog post on the Help Age blog titled A post-2015 framework for all ages. The post highlights the need for better data on issues across all age groups, particularly older age groups…(more)
26 February 2015
Markets for Good publishes an article by Bernard Sabiti and Bill Anderson titled Adventures in the Data Revolution: Collecting Ugandan Data. The article describes an effort to assess education data in rural Uganda. The post highlights the challenges of collecting data, including an offer from a district official to drive 60 Km to send an email. The authors conclude that having data is not the beginning of the data revolution; it is an important component of the story…(more)
26 February 2015
UN Dispatch publishes a podcast episode titled What We Know About What We Don’t Know About Development. It begins with an interview with Morten Jerven and then continues with someone who is doing something about the problem of data in development, Myra Buvinich of Data2X.…(more)
25 February 2015
Bill Anderson publishes a blog post on the Development Initiatives website titled Some Thoughts on the Data Revolution in Uganda. The article aims to provide insights on how the theories of the data revolution compare to the experiences in the specific context of Uganda.…(more)
24 February 2015
Nathaniel Heller publishes a blog post on the Results for Development website titled Can the Data Revolution Save Traditional Aid Agencies? The article discusses the potential of the data revolution to provide better information about what activities are actually in demand in developing countries to “traditional” donors.…(more)
20 February 2015
Jonathan Gray publishes an article on the Guardian website titled Five Ways Open Data Can Boost Democracy Around the World. The list provided examples of open data being used for the following purposes: 1) Fairer taxes 2) Protecting the Public Purse 3) Controlling Corporate Lobbyists 4) Fighting Pollution 5) Holding Politicians to Account.…(more)
19 February 2015
The Economist publishes a letter to the editor from Johannes Jutting at PARIS21. The letter criticizes an article about Bjorn Lomborg and Morten Jerven’s recent estimates of the cost of monitoring the SDGs. Jerven’s methods greatly exaggerates the likely costs of monitoring the SDGs.…(more)
18 February 2015
Elias Radelius publishes a summary of a 6 February meeting on the Openaid Sweden website titled Why All Actors Should Join the Data Revolution. The meeting highlighted several major themes including the need for country-led efforts and the potential of the Global Pulse project.…(more)
18 February 2015
Elizabeth Sabet and co-authors publish a blog post on the World Bank Data website titled Big Data needs better questions. The post discusses a recent publication titled Big Data in Action for Development. The report draws on use cases of big data for development and highlights that data don’t speak for themselves; users must begin with a question and then turn to data for answers.…(more)
18 February 2015
Mariana Dahan publishes a blog post on the World Bank website titled Towards a World That Counts: An ID for Every Woman and Every Child. The post discusses an event titled Data2X and the Gender Data Revolution which focused on the problems associated with gender data and the need for identification for all women and children…(more) Video of the event can be found here.
17 February 2015
Josh Powell publishes a post on the Development Gateway blog titled Launching a Geospatial Data Revolution. The post highlights three major challenges in launching a geospatial data revolution: 1) Matching Data to Government Needs 2) Equipping countries with data, tools, and skills and 3) Shifting from a culture of data reporting to a culture of data use.…(more)
14 February 2015
The Financial Express publishes an article written by Abdul Bayes No Accurate Statistics Yet on Rural Economy. The statement highlights existing gaps in agricultural statistics in Bangladesh. The author laments the quality of statistics in the area and argues that more should be done to improve them…(more)
February 2015
The World Health Organization’s Pacific Technical Support website publishes an article titled Getting Everyone in the Picture by 2024: Civil Registration and Vital Statistics in the Pacific. The statement highlights existing gaps in agricultural statistics in Bangladesh. The author laments the quality of statistics in the area and argues that more should be done to improve them
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13 February 2015
The ECDPM publishes an article titled Civil Registration and Vital Statistics in Conflict and Emergencies: Will the Momentum Be Used to Address the Right Challenges? The article highlights the Third Conference of African Ministers Responsible for Civil Registration and discusses, broadly, the movement to improve civil registration and vital statistics (CRVS). Efforts to improve CRVS are within the broader data revolution and should address the political obstacles to improvement…(more)
12 February 2015
The African Herald Express publishes a press release on the Open Data Institute’s recent white paper on open data in Nigeria. The document highlights the current status of open data, some use cases from around the world and provides recommendations for the future.…(more)
12 February 2015
Leigh Philips writes an article on the Road to Paris website about the Sustainable Development Goals. The article focuses, in particular, on a recent report from the International Council for Science and the International Social Science Council on the proposed SDGs. The authors find significant problems with the measurability and value of many of the proposed indicators, among other issues.…(more)
12 February 2015
The Open Data Institute publishes a white paper titled Supporting sustainable development with open data. The paper highlights several cases of open data being used in development and suggests ways to use open data in the post-2015 context in light of the data revolution.…(more)
12 February 2015
The Pakistan Data Portal publishes a blog post titled Challenges for the data revolution in Pakistan. The post discusses some of the technical problems with education data published in Pakistan, including comparability, validity, missing entries, timeliness and nomenclature.…(more)
11 February 2015
Josh Powell publishes a blog post on the Development Gateway website titled Staging a Geospatial Data Revolution. The post describes the current state of geospatial data, particularly for development finance data within the context of the data revolution.…(more)
9 February 2015
An article was published on the AidData website titledThis week: Unlocking old problems with new tools. The article looks at gender imbalance data in different countries and analyzes the reasons for the imbalances. The article argues that the data revolution can’t solve all problems but can provide important insights for solving them.…(more)
4 February 2015
The University of the Western Cape publishes a summary of an event held on the data revolution titled The data revolution and sustainable development for all. The event included speakers from the IEAG group, such as Enrico Giovannini and Pali Lehola.…(more)
2 February 2015
The Chronicle of Higher Education publishes an article titled Big Data. Big Obstacles. The article highlights the potential of big data from social media and other sources being used to improve social science research. The authors call for government agencies to provide more data to researchers and argue that big data should be seen as compliments to official statistics.
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2 February 2015
Lee Mwiti writes an article in the Mail and Guardian Africa titled Let’s face it folks, Africa is flying data blind, but a big revolution may be coming. The article discusses the problems in African statistics and expressed optimism that the Data Revolution could lead to improved statistics.…(more)