Open Nepal Report
Open Nepal Initiative – a collective effort of a coalition of organizations including freedom1 Forum, NGO Federation, Young Innovations and the aidinfo program at Development Initiative – was launched amid a function in the capital on Thursday. The Open Nepal launch is an important event of Open Nepal Week beginning from June 2 that includes media roundtable discussion, data literacy bootcamp and hackathon.
It is a platform to promote the availability of better data and provide tools, skills and support to help those in the development ecosystem to access, analyze and use data for more inclusive and effective development.
Making welcome remarks, Chairman of the freedom1 Forum, Taranath Dahal, said:
• The initiative for the open Nepal and open data was taken with the motto that every citizen should be provided data/information in an understandable form and format.
• Only availability of information/data was not adequate to ensure people’s accessibility to information, he said, adding that the usable and consumable data was the need of hour to transform society through good governance which is the result of transparency and accountability where open data is fundamental.
• Open data has emerged as a crucial issue recently across the globe. Information is a source of power, yet people’s access to that information is very limited.
• For people to benefit from information, it needs to be simplified and disseminated widely.
• The Open Nepal Week begun from June 2 and brought together various national and international experts on data/information, development, information technology, journalists, civil society representatives would create atmosphere for building open Nepal with open data.
On the occasion, keynote speaker, principal advisor to the Finance Ministry, Dr Chiranjivi Nepal, said:
• Openness is the only tool that can increase the wealth of nations. Openness can uplift countries, uplift people, uplift the poor.
• We believe in knowledge. Knowledge is information. Knowledge is wealth. When we share information, we are sharing wealth.
• Aid transparency is not sufficient at present in Nepal. It is confusing that we are talking about open data, but aid transparency is not yet adequate in Nepal. The challenge to Nepal is budget transparency, so people know where the government is spending money.
• I would like to say to the team behind Open Nepal that this is a good initiative, and we are in support. For people who want to be open, the Government of Nepal is always there to help you.
Dr Netra Timilsina, past President of NGO Federation while moderating the session said that the Open Nepal Initiative was the outcome of lessons from the scoping phase during 2012.
Similarly, Victoria Room, a policy advisor from the Development Initiatives, Krishna Sapkota, an Executive Director at the freedom1 Forum, Hum Bhandari from NGO Federation of Nepal spoke about the aims, activities and outcomes of the Open Nepal project.
Miss Room said:
• The open Nepal is a collaborative platform to promote the availability of better data and provide tools, skills and support to help those in the development ecosystem to access, analyse and use data for more inclusive and effective development.
• Open Nepal was not aiming to replace the existing information systems and processes (e.g. AMP) – instead it sets out to build on those existing systems and processes, and provide a hub to support different actors to access, analyse and use the data to maximum value (e.g. by joining up the data from aid and budget systems with data on needs).
• It is about supporting existing work and linking those with data expertise to those who are doing monitoring, accountability, and service delivery work.
Mr Sapkota said:
• freedom1 Forum in the Open Nepal project aims to strengthen capacity of economic-beat journalists and parliamentarian secretariat employees to make them able to use, analyse and impart aid information as intermediaries,
• Reach out to citizen for increasing their awareness level on ATA issues through budget/aid literacy program, booklets and radio programs will be our another key area for intervention of the initiative,
• Establish a baseline of data availability, use and skills and measure impacts and share the lessons learned. Research on use and impact of open data in Nepal is another focus
Launching a portal –www.opendatanepal.org, Chief Executive Officer at the Young Innovation, Bibhusan Bista, said:
• Open data is all about participation from top to bottom. The portal was aimed at making every data
• Open Nepal is more than a technical platform, it’s an opportunity for wider reach and participation.
Development Data Specialist from the Open Aid Partnerhsip, Pernilla Näsfors,said:
• The Open Aid Partnership has prioritized working in Nepal to support government and aid donors to increase their transparency
and enhance results by better targeting and coordinating their activities at all levels, particularly to accelerate social and
economic development for the poorest people, and the historically marginalized and underserved, as well as to unleash the
power of free, open data to boost shared prosperity in Nepal.
Anjesh Tuladhar of the Young Innovation said:
• The hackathon of June 5 was not hacking data/information but the activities oriented to creativity.
• It was the development of applications from data relating to the motto of open data and open Nepal.
• Various 19 pitches were mulled during the hackathon. There was ideation on the applications relating to Nepali context as election, budget, school finder, foreign aid and others.
Craig Hammer, Data Literacy Bootcamp Trainer from the World Bank said,
• The first two days- date literacy bootcamp were focused on distillation of data, its analysis, extraction and sifting.
• How information could be made accessible to ever people was the goal program. Making data/information consumable was important need.
• How Kenya had made remarkable shift with such data literacy was exemplary as data literacy program was aimed at empowering people.
Open Nepal coordinator, Pavitra Rana said:
• We want development to be more inclusive and more effective. For this to happen, the development process needs to be more open.
Simon Parrish, of Development Initiatives, said:
• The principle behind Open Development is that development processes should be open to all parties concerned in a way that guarantees transparency, open participation and communication, and integrity in decision-making.
• It is about all stakeholders having the information and resources that they need to hold governments, donors, and service delivery organisations (etc.) accountable and to make well-informed decisions to improve their lives.”
Basudev Neupane said:
• While forming the NGO federation, information was focused most. Nepal could replicate the water point mapping project launched in the east African countries.
Data analyst at Development Initiatives, Karen Rono, sharing east African (Tanzania, Kenya, and Uganda) experience, said:
• Poverty in east Africa is because of the lack of information,
• Want to make date informed decision, build capacity of CSOs,
• Government is responsive once the people are engaged in development,
Senior Analyst (Open Data) at Development Initiatives, Ben Taylor said:
• Open data is for transparency,
• Data were made on budget, exam results, tax, water point mapping,
• Slow digitalization process, data hugging syndrome, lack of freedom1 of information acts, lack of informed citizenry were the challenges of open data in east Africa
• Open data does not have to be complicated. It is for open development (community development, ecosystem, openness of all components of development)
There was a session of Group Discussion on Better Information. Media, government, NGOs, INGOs, donors, academy, developers were the groups. Some findings of the group discussions were:
• Journalists still don’t get data/information from INGO/NGO, development partners (donors), government
• There is a lack of usable and informative data
• It is challenging for the developers to reach the poor,
• Data that is used for geo-coding sometimes needs to be purchased, but they are quite expensive,
• Format of data is difficult
• Lack of sub-national data
• There is not centralized database in Nepal, and large volume of date is missing,
• Data is not in digital format
• Lack of knowledge to use data technology