Author(s): Ministry of Communications and Information Technology
Resource Type: Case studies
Countries: State of Palestine
SDG: GOAL 16. Peace and Justice Strong Institutions
Keywords: Access to Information, Transparency, Accountability, Open Data, Open government, E-Government, Citizen Engagement, Public Sector Innovation, Collaboration
Open Government Data Initiative
Source in Arabic: ENACT Case Study - Open Data Initiative, Palestine
The Open Government Data Initiative promotes innovation and provides government data to facilitate access to information through the open data portal. It contributes to enhancing transparency and strengthening government performance, thereby building trust between the government and citizens and enhancing partnerships between sectors. In 2022, Palestine ranked 19th globally in the Open Data Inventory (ODIN), with a one-level increase from 2020 data.
Principles supported
- Responsiveness
- Trust
- Transparency
- Inclusiveness
- Effectiveness
Technology focus
Data centres - Artificial intelligence - Big data - Open Data - Immersive technologies (extended reality technologies such as VR, AR & Mixed Reality (MR) - Blockchain - Geospatial technologies (GIS, GPS and remote sensing) - Internet of Things
Purpose
The initiative aims to support public institutions on publishing government data and making it accessible through the Open Data Portal. It also aims to enhance transparency and government performance, which builds public trust and encourages partnerships between the public, private and academic sectors. This openness encourages entrepreneurship and the development of companies that use government data and support the Palestinian economy.
Contributors/ Partners
- Government institutions, including the Ministries of Communication, Education, Higher Education, Tourism, Health, Finance, Labour, Agriculture, Economy, Transportation, Justice, Local authorities, Interior, and the Investment Promotion Agency, Monetary Authority, Personnel Council, and Central Bureau of Statistics and its system entities.
- Civil society institutions that include Leaders International, and the Center for Continuing Education of the Birzeit University.
Functions and/or Features
- Develop the open data portal and provide training on data processing, classification, and publication.
- Publishing various government data, 39 data sets, from the participating public institutions.
- Prepare and adopt a policy paper for open data, while the draft laws on the Right to Access Information and Personal Data Protection are in the review phase before adoption.
Outcomes, impacts & changes
- Launch a unified portal for open access to data.
- Training the national team for open data and its subcommittees.
- Convene capacity building workshops on open data and open government, and their concepts and challenges.
- Provide training on the preparation of data, and data analysis, classification and dissemination.
- Enhancing accountability and cooperation between public institutions.
- Adopt the open data policy and raise public awareness about it.
- Apply open data standards in statistical indicators.
Challenges
- Adoption of the draft laws for the Right to Access Information and Personal Data Protection.
- Availability of financing and expertise in open data.
Lessons learned
- The importance of organizing the Open Data Hackathon (2023) in promoting innovation and the digital economy, developing data sets, and encouraging entrepreneurship and startups.
- Possibility of benefiting from the Hackathon for the development of solutions that rely on open data for addressing challenges.
Useful links
Palestinian Central bureau of Statistics (PCBS) in ODIN ranking
