World Data Forum: start of a revolution

THE World Data Forum is a significant platform towards Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), says independent African body African Monitor.

The director of African Monitor, Namhla Mniki-Mangaliso, said on the sidelines of the UN’s first-ever World Data Forum (WDF) under way at the Cape Town International Convention Centre that it was significant that the first global data forum was taking place in Africa with strong leadership from Statstics SA.

Mniki-Mangaliso said data access and utilisation had long been the limited to the privileged.

“This cannot continue if Agenda 2063 and the SDGs are to be achieved. Our work is greatly hindered by limited access to technology and limited access to official data. Therefore, it is important for us that a forum like this is willing to realistically talk about how African citizens can fully benefit from open data systems and new technologies, and how we can increase data transparency at the local level. Achieving these goals will require integrated action on social, environmental and economic sectors, with a focus on inclusive, participatory development.”

Wu Hongbo, the under-secretary of the UN’s Department of Economic Affairs, said in his opening speech this week that the WDF was established to intensify co-operation for data and statistics across various communities, including information technology, geospatial information managers, data scientists, private sector, civil society and data users. He said the forum was a unique opportunity for technical and political discussions on the opportunities and challenges in producing and using information, data and statistics to facilitate global sustainable development and to ensure progress towards the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

“This forum takes place at a crucial time for strengthening data and statistical capacity around the world. We have begun the second year of implementing the 2030 Agenda, an agenda that will guide international development efforts and national policy making through 2030. Accurate, reliable, timely and disaggregated data is essential to achieving the 2030 Agenda’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals.”

Hongbo said the new agenda poses enormous challenges for the global statistical community and it was imperative to modernise, improve capacity and co-operate at a truly global level.

“In particular, National Statistical Offices (NSOs) have a key role to play. “They constitute the core of national information systems… responsible for ensuring reliable and high quality statistics, in line with international standards to ensure data quality and comparability across countries, in full alignment with the fundamental principles of official statistics.”

He said it was also essential to strengthen national statistical capacities in countries where financial and human resources for statistics are lacking and that all national statistical offices should become the new data hubs to gather and provide the necessary data to inform policies, and monitor progress:

“To make this happen, we will need governments, international organisations, businesses, academia and civil society to work together. We expect this forum to offer the space for partnerships to be created or strengthened.

“We look forward to new commitment on strengthening statistical systems and on building a growing consensus on data principles and other policy issues like open data and data privacy.”

Hongbo wants users to get behind the Cape Town Global Action Plan for Sustainable Development Data, which calls for the full, active and focused commitment of government, policy leaders and the international community to undertake key actions under six strategic areas.

These include co-ordination and strategic leadership, innovation and modernisation of national statistical systems, strengthening of statistical systems, dissemination of data on sustainable development, building of partnerships and mobilisation of resources.

“I am delighted to launch this first important event for collective action to harness the data revolution for sustainable development,” Hongbo said.