6 BLOCKS OF OPEN DATA

The Kenyan ExperienceBy Al Kags, Chair

Kenya Open Data Taskforce

THE OPEN DATA INITIATIVE MIND MAPTHE OPEN DATA INITIATIVE MIND MAP

THE SIX BLOCKS

• LEADERSHIP• POLICY & LEGAL FRAMEWORK• TECHNOLOGY & APPS• CAPACITY BUILDING• CITIZEN ENGAGEMENT• INNOVATION & FINANCING

(COLOUR CODE FROM MINDMAP)

LEADERSHIP (KEY POINTS TO THINK

ABOUT)•The arguments for different

audiences – Development vs. Accountability, Selling Open to Politicians

•The availability of a champion – Someone who understands how to navigate the politics and the technocracy to win support across the board.

•Support at the highest level – The President of Kenya has been at the forefront of

supporting Open

POLICY & FRAMEWORKS(KEY POINTS TO THINK

ABOUT)•Legislation & Constitution – Article

35 of Kenyan Constitution, Freedom of Information Bill etc.

•Cabinet Leadership – Create the necessary structures to ensure continuous supply side (publishing of data), creation & strengthening of necessary government bodies to manage process

•Judicial perspective – to promote openness through precedents and enforcement

TECHNOLOGY & APPS(KEY POINTS TO THINK

ABOUT)•Solid World Class Platform – For

data curation and visualisation (Kenya used Socrata)

•Encourage Application Development – For interesting narrative development depending on relevance

CAPACITY BUILDING(KEY POINTS TO THINK

ABOUT)•Demonstrate benefits of Open for

development – To C-Level Government executives in order to promote supply of data

•Facilitate knowledge of technical data handlers – For better curation, for more data acquisition (enable them to see more creative data as they come across it, and better narrative creation)

•Facilitate knowledge of ICT Officers – for better definition of ICT projects to support Open

CITIZEN ENGAGEMENT(KEY POINTS TO THINK

ABOUT)•Grow user community –

Academia, Non-profits/ Development workers, private sector, media•Link the user community to app

developers – to enable better visualisation and narrative development

INNOVATION & FINANCING(KEY POINTS TO THINK ABOUT)

•Encourage Application development – Hackerthons & User competitions, Media Data Journalism

•Encourage private sector participation – make it a sustainable endeavour for growing the knowledge economy

Importance of Partnership

• Successful Open Data initiatives are Partnerships between Governments, Civil Societies and Private Sector– In Kenya, the World Bank was an important

facilitator and partner of this (access to information, expertise and finance)

• Successful national Open Data initiatives must be actively led by Government (for sustainability)

IT WAS A LABOR OF LOVE BY COMMITTED PEOPLE.

Roll Credits (the Kenya Open Data Task

Force)• Dr. Bitange Ndemo, PS,

Information & Communications• Al Kags, Chairman• Paul Kukubo, Kenya ICT

Board• Kaburo Kobia, Kenya ICT

Board• Cleophas Kiio, Kenya National

Bureau of Statistics• Jay Bhalla, Independent

Consultant• Chris Finch, World Bank• Tracey Lane, World Bank• Athman Mohamed,

Trademark East Africa

• Angie Gachui, Triple Bottom line Associates

• Gladwell Otieno, Africog• Michael Murungi, Kenya

Law Reports • Ory Okolloh, Google• Dennis Gikunda, Google• Daudi Were, iHub• Juliana Rotich, iHub, • Vincent Mugambi,

Microsoft• Philip Thigo, Sodnet

http://www.opendata.go.ke

Contact Al Kags

alkags@good.co.ke