Cayman placed just 66th on data access global survey
(CNS): The Cayman Islands was ranked at number 66 in a recent global survey examining accessibility to government data in a list of 149 countries. Although the local freedom of information law has been lauded on the international stage, this survey by the Global Open Data Index looked at how easy it was to access data and information and to interpret that information. Scoring just 395 points, compared to Taiwan, which topped the table with 1010 points, access to data in Cayman was patchy and not always easy to interpret or in a format that could be easily used.
According to the results published last week, Cayman did best regarding the budget, getting 55% of the points available, but when it came to government spending, Cayman was given just 10% of the possible score. In some cases data was simply not available, such as pollution emissions, and in some case it was just not updated.
The Global Open Data Index tracks data and the way it is released, assessing its accessibility to the public, media and civil society. Each year the organization produces an annual ranking of countries, peer reviewed by local open data experts.
“The Global Open Data Index measures and benchmarks the openness of data around the world, and then presents this information in a way that is easy to understand and use. This increases its usefulness as an advocacy tool and broadens its impact,” the UK-based NGO said on its website.
According to the Global Open Data, each year governments make more data available in an open format and by crowd-sourcing this data, communities around the world can learn more about the data available and ensures that the results reflect the experience of civil society in finding open information, rather than government claims of openness.
Category: Politics
