After analyzing the European framework that will shape the world of data in 2021, it is time to focus on our country. The Spanish strategy linked to the world of data is aligned with the European one. As we will see below, a large part of the European measures have been included in the national strategies.

At the end of 2020, two major strategic plans were presented that mark the lines to be followed this year: the Digital Spain Plan 2025 and the IV Open Government Plan of Spain 2020-2024.

Digital Spain Plan 2025

The Digital Agenda for 2025, presented in November, includes among its strategic axes “moving towards a data economy, guaranteeing security and privacy and taking advantage of the opportunities offered by Artificial Intelligence with the objective that, at least, 25% of companies use Artificial Intelligence and Big Data within five years. ”

Among its measurements are:

• The implementation of a National Artificial Intelligence Strategy. This strategy, which was already published in December of last year, includes a series of measures related to the availability of open data, an essential component for the proper functioning and training of Artificial Intelligence systems. Some of these measures are the development of accessible repositories, the provision of assistance to companies in defining open or shared data strategies, or the creation of a multidisciplinary open data working group in the state public sector. It should be noted that in 2019 the Ministry of Science and Innovation published the Spanish R & D & I Strategy in Artificial Intelligence, which highlighted the role of datos.gob.es in making open data available to citizens and had an impact in the need to establish mechanisms so that the administration can safely and ethically exploit the data generated by other administrations and even by private companies, all with the aim of improving public services, guaranteeing social welfare and individual and public safety .

• Creation of a data office. This body, which will have a Chief Data Officer (CDO) in charge, will be in charge of designing and proposing strategies that make public data of the Administrations available to companies and citizens. Among other functions, it will have to establish the necessary measures to promote the sharing and use of public and private data, create environments to safely share data between companies and public administrations in an aligned and coordinated way, invest in the generation of "lakes sectoral data” and propose governance mechanisms.

• Among its ten points, the Digital Spain Plan 2025 includes the impulse of the digitization of Public Administration with the aim of improving its efficiency and effectiveness. In this sense, the Digitalization Plan of Public Administrations 2021 -2025 has been made public, which highlights, among other issues, the intention to evolve the model of access to public and private information to facilitate the development of high-quality services. added value, based on the work carried out by the Aporta Initiative.

• Promotion of shared data spaces. Spain will play an active role in the European strategy "European Cloud Federation". Work will be done to promote private investments in Data Centers and an Iberian space will be promoted, together with Portugal, to promote the development of advanced data computing technologies.

The plan also includes the need to digitize specific areas of the administrations to reinforce their effectiveness and efficiency. Among other issues, a public administration based on secure data will be promoted. The provision of information with an “Open Data” orientation will be promoted, as well as the analysis of consolidated data, or the automation of processes, always with a special focus on data protection. A secure framework for the interconnection and management of data in the field of public health will also be developed.

IV Open Government Plan of Spain 2020-2024

The IV Open Government Plan of Spain 2020-2024 includes 10 commitments assumed by public administrations to “reinforce transparency and accountability, improve participation, establish systems of public integrity, and train and sensitize citizens and staff public employee in matters of Open Government .”

The plan includes different measures related to open data and the reuse of public data, such as:

• The transposition of Directive (EU) 2019/1024 on open data and the reuse of public sector information into the Spanish legal system to provide the necessary legal coverage that would make it possible to expand the scope and scope of reuse. The deadline for adaptation to our regulatory framework ends in June of this year.

• The reform of the law on transparency, access to information and good governance to facilitate compliance with the obligations of active publicity and favor the exercise of the right of access to information.

• Improving the provision of real-time access to dynamic data through appropriate technical means, increasing the provision of valuable public data for reuse.

• The promotion of data sets with high reuse value, through their selection, the definition of common vocabularies and their publication. Likewise, permanent contact will be established with the community of reusers to promote the use and improve the catalog, as well as with the business community and civil society to facilitate access to public information.

Based on these two major strategic plans, the national lines of action in the field of open data will be articulated, which will also be included in the Digital Rights Charter that will be released in 2021 - after an open consultation process -. This letter will guarantee the right of access to public information, and it is indicated that public administrations will be governed by the principle of transparency and data reuse.

You can see a summary of the strategies related to the data that will mark 2021 in Europe and Spain in this link.

Spain already has a new National Artificial Intelligence Strategy. The document, which includes 600 million euros for measures related to artificial intelligence (AI), was presented on December 2 at the Palacio de la Moncloa.

The National Strategy for Artificial Intelligence (known as ENIA) is component 16 of the Plan for the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience of the Spanish economy, and one of the fundamental proposals of the Digital Spain Agenda 2025 in its line 9 of action, which highlights AI as a key element for boosting the growth of our economy in the coming years. In addition, the new strategy is aligned with the European action plans developed in this area, and especially with the White Paper on Artificial Intelligence.

Objectives and lines of action

The ENIA is a dynamic and flexible framework, open to the contribution of companies, citizens, social agents and the rest of the administrations, which was created with 7 objectives: scientific excellence and innovation, the projection of the Spanish language, the creation of qualified employment, the transformation of the Spanish productive fabric, the creation of an environment of trust in relation to AI and the promotion of an inclusive and sustainable AI that takes into account humanist values.

To achieve these objectives, 6 lines of action have been created, which bring together a total of 30 measures to be developed in the period 2020-2025:

In short, the aim is to create a national ecosystem of innovative, competitive and ethical artificial intelligence. And to do this, it is essential to have large volumes of quality and interoperable data and metadata, which are accessible, complete, secure and respectful of privacy.

Open data in the National Strategy of Artificial Intelligence

The availability of open data is essential for the proper functioning of artificial intelligence, since the algorithms must be fed and trained by data whose quality and availability allows continuous improvement. In this way we can create value services that impact on the improvement of society and the economy.

The National Strategy for Artificial Intelligence highlights how, thanks to the various initiatives undertaken in recent years, Spain has become a European benchmark for open data, highlighting the role of the Aporta Initiative in promoting the openness and reuse of public information.

In strategic axis 3 of the document, several key areas are highlighted where to act linked to AI data platforms and technological infrastructures:

• Developing the regulatory framework for open data, to define a strategy for publication and access to public data from administrations in multilingual formats, and to ensure the correct and safe use of the data.
• Promote actions in the field of data platforms, models, algorithms, inference engines and cyber security, with the focus on boosting research and innovation. Reference is made to the need to promote Digital Enabling Technologies such as connectivity infrastructures, massive data environments (cloud) or process automation and control, paying special attention to Strategic Supercomputing Capabilities (HPC).
• Promote the specific development of AI technologies in the field of natural language processing, promoting the use of Spanish in the world. In this sense, the National Plan of Language Technologies will be promoted and the LEIA project, developed by the Royal Spanish Academy for the defense, projection and good use of the Spanish language in the digital universe, will be supported.

In the specific case of open data, one of the first measures highlighted is the creation of the Data Office at the state level that will coordinate all public administrations in order to homogenize the storage, access and processing of data. To strengthen this action, a Chief Data Officer will be appointed.  In addition, a multidisciplinary working group on open data in the state public sector will be set up to highlight the efforts that have been made in the field of data in Spain and to continue promoting the openness and reuse of public sector information.

The strategy also considers the private sector, and highlights the need to promote the development of accessible repositories and to guide companies in the definition of open or shared data strategies. In this sense, shared spaces of sectorial and industrial data will be created, which will facilitate the creation of AI applications. Furthermore, mention is made of the need to offer data disaggregated by sex, age, nationality and territory, in such a way as to eliminate biases linked to these aspects.

In order to stimulate the use and governance of public and citizen data, the creation of the Data for Social Welfare Project is established as an objective, where open and citizen-generated data will play a key role in promoting accountability and public participation in government.

Other highlights of the ENIA

In addition to actions related to open data, the National Strategy of Artificial Intelligence includes more transversal actions, for example:

• The incorporation of AI in the public administration will be promoted, improving from transparency and effective decision-making to productivity and quality of service (making management and the relationship with citizens more efficient). Here the Aporta Initiative has been playing a key role with its support to public sector bodies in the publication of quality data and the promotion of its reuse. Open data repositories will be created to allow optimal access to the information needed to develop new services and applications for the public and private sectors. In this sense, an innovation laboratory (GobTechLab) will be created and training programs will be carried out.
• The aim is to promote scientific research through the creation of a Spanish Network of Excellence in AI with research and training programs and the setting up of new technological development centers. Special attention will be given to closing the gender gap.
• A program of aid to companies for the development of AI and data solutions will be launched, and the network of Digital innovation Hubs will be reinforced. A NextTech Fund for public-private venture capital will be created.
• Talent will be promoted through the National Digital Skills Plan. AI-related elements will be introduced in schools and the university and professional AI training offer will be boosted. The SpAIn Talent Hub program will be developed in coordination with ICEX Invest to attract foreign investment and talent.
• A novelty of the strategy is that it takes into account ethical and social regulation to fight discrimination. Observatories for ethical and legal evaluation of algorithmic systems will be created and the Digital Rights Charter, currently under revision, will be developed.

In short, we are facing a necessary strategy to boost the growth of AI in Spain, promoting our society and economy, and improving our international competitiveness.

Measuring the impact of open data is not always easy. As we saw a few weeks ago, there are several theoretical models that are not easy to implement, so we have to look for different approaches. In the Aporta Initiative we use a mixed approach, as explained here: a quantitative analysis through indicators on data publication and its characteristics, and a qualitative one through the collection of cases of data use.

This approach is also used by various local, regional and state initiatives in our country. In today's article, we will focus on concrete examples of mechanisms implemented by Spanish open data initiatives to monitor and measure the impact of the use of their data.

Quantitative analysis

One of the first steps in monitoring impact is to know quantitatively if users are accessing the published data. To do this we can use different tools.

Dashboards

Thanks to the incorporation of web analytics tools in open data platforms, such as Google Analytics or Motomo (which until 2018 was called PIWIK), a series of indicators can be set around data consumption variables, such as how many users visit the web, what is their origin, which data sets are most in demand or in what format they are downloaded. All of this information is of great value when it comes to making decisions that imply improvements to continue promoting the reuse of public information.

With this data, dashboards can be created so that users can also know this information. This is the case of the Castellón Provincial Council, the Madrid City Council, the Catalan Government, Renfe, the Basque Government or the datos.gob.es itself.

Conducting surveys and periodic studies

In addition, it is advisable to carry out frequent public consultations and studies that allow us to know directly the impact of our data. The ONTSI periodically carries out a characterization study of the sector, and an analysis of the Public Administrations as reusers of their own data and that of third parties. Another example is the report on the Infomediary Sector of ASEDIE, now in its 8th edition. This report measures the products and services based on open data that have been generated. Both reports use a stable methodology that allows comparisons between different years. 

Qualitative analysis

It consists of the identification of use cases through different mechanisms, such as

Application and enterprise tracking

Thanks to the mapping of open data use cases, we can know what the impact of a certain data set is. In many open data platforms, whether local, regional or state, we can find a section of applications or companies with examples and reuse success stories that in turn serve as reference and inspiration for the creation of new value services. In the case of datos.gob.es, we have a form for companies or applications that wish to register their information, but we also carry out a proactive search, through contact with the main actors in the ecosystem and media alerts.

Other examples of portals that have applications sections are Andalusia, Castilla y Leon, Navarra, Barcelona, Santander, Malaga, Zaragoza, Valencia, Vitoria or Bilbao, although there are many more.

Implementation of data communities

In order to be aware of new developments in the field of reuse and to exchange knowledge and experiences to align the data publication strategy with the needs of reusers, some initiatives have opted for the implementation of communities. This is the case of the Basque Country, which has created a space to centralize everything that happens around the reuse of its data. This community has been especially useful to collect and measure the work that has been developed on COVID-19 using open data. Under its umbrella there are also activities and competitions that encourage reuse.

For its part, the Castellón Provincial Council has created a Provincial Council of Reusers, a mixed public-private body made up of technicians from the provincial institution itself, and people with recognized professional backgrounds in different economic sectors. These professionals meet once a quarter to hold a conversation to monitor use cases and which favours constant feedback and the enrichment of the Provincial Council's open data strategy. 

The National Library of Spain is working along the same lines and has launched a collaborative work platform so that those citizens who wish to do so can participate in specific projects to enrich the Library's data, making it more accessible and easier to reuse.

In short, all these activities allow monitoring the activity of an open data initiative and its impact on society. They help us to know what challenges we are solving in fields as important for humanity as the environment, health or education. In this way, we will be able to know its evolution over time and easily detect trends and possible areas of improvement, which will lead us to distribute the efforts and resources available in a more effective way.  

Content elaborated by datos.gob.es team.

We have been talking about the digital transformation for years, but perhaps it has been in the last few months when we have had to stay at home and resort to teleworking or e-commerce, that we have noticed the need for it the most. Many companies have had to transform quickly, adapting their internal processes, their relationship with customers and even their business models to new needs.

However, the digital transformation is nothing new, and before the health crisis there were already many organizations with a long way to go. This is reflected in the Digital Economy and Society Index (DESI), which each year measures the performance and evolution of the EU Member States in terms of digital competitiveness.

DESI INDEX

The DESI Index performs its analysis based on 5 indicators: Digital Public Services, Connectivity, Human Capital, Integration of Digital Technology and Use of Internet Services.

In this index, Spain is above the European Union average, occupying the eleventh position, with unequal scores in the various markers:

• The score where our country stands out the most is Digital Public Services, where it is in second place in Europe, improving its position with respect to last year, thanks to the application of a default digital strategy throughout its central administration. One of the indicators driving Spain's position in this dimension is open data, where we are in second place in terms of maturity in Europe. We are also above average in the availability and use of e-government services.
• Spain also performs well in the area of connectivity (5th place), driven by the good implementation of high-speed networks: 80% of households have fiber optic coverage, well above the EU average (34%).
• In contrast, Spain is below the EU average in the human capital indicator (16th place), with 43% of people between 16 and 74 years of age still lacking digital skills. It does improve on last year's percentage of ICT graduates and specialists in total employment. The report highlights the government's efforts to improve this situation, with actions such as the Strategic Plan for Vocational Training in the Education System 2019-2022, which seeks to create forty new degrees in different ICT fields.
• With regard to the integration of digital technology, Spain ranks 13th, in line with the EU average. Spanish companies take advantage of the opportunities offered by digital technologies and are above Europe in the use of electronic information exchange systems (43% compared to 34%), although slightly below in access to macrodata analysis (11% compared to 12) and the use of the cloud (16% compared to 18%). With regard to emerging technologies, the report highlights that Spain has developed a significant number of coordination measures, especially in the field of cyber security.
• Finally, the use of Internet services has increased since the previous year, and the country has obtained results above the EU average. However, it is worth mentioning that it is still used more for leisure activities (consuming multimedia content), than for day-to-day business, such as banking or e-commerce.

The study was carried out before the pandemic, so the results do not include the actions carried out in recent months, such as the publication of the Digital Agenda 2025, which includes the promotion of a Data Economy. The measures to be developed include the implementation of an Artificial Intelligence Strategy, the development of a Data Office with a Chief Data Officer at the head and the creation of an Artificial Intelligence Advisory Council, among others.

OTHER REPORTS ON DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION IN SPAIN

In addition to the DESI index, in recent months two reports of particular importance when it comes to digitalization have been published in our country: the "Digital Society in Spain Report 2019" and the "COTEC 2020" report.

Digital Society in Spain 2019 Report

This report, published by the Telefónica Foundation, includes data and indicators that describe the state of Spanish society in relation to the media, uses and digital services. Specifically, it focuses on the deployment of telecommunications infrastructure, the level of implementation of the most advanced technologies and the state of the art of Spanish digital life.

The conclusions of the report are very much in line with the DESI index, which it takes as a reference. It highlights that 9 out of 10 inhabitants are Internet users, and that the gender gap in cyberspace has been completely eliminated, although an age gap still exists. The report also highlights that our country has a very good connection, with ultra-fast network coverage in three out of every four homes.

The study indicates that the main technological currents that are shaping the digital transition in Spain revolve around artificial intelligence, industry 4.0 and cyber security, with the first one standing out above all: while in 2013 only one out of every fifty emerging companies focused its activity on artificial intelligence, now one out of every twelve do so.

The report ends with an analysis of the degree of digital development presented by the Autonomous Communities, describing the current situation and the challenges facing each region.

You can read the full report at this link.

COTEC 2020 Report

The COTEC report, on the other hand, focuses on a fundamental aspect to boost the digital transformation: the R&D+I. The report shows us the innovation map in Spain, through the analysis of the main indicators and national, regional and international strategies.

The report analyzes data from 2018 and shows that R&D has gained weight in the productive structure for the second consecutive year, driven mainly by private investment. However, we are still far from countries like France, Italy or Germany.

The autonomous communities maintain heterogeneous levels of effort. The five most advanced regions are the Basque Country, Madrid, Navarre, Catalonia and Castile and Leon).

The report also focuses on education, where it highlights that Spain has a higher rate than the European average in STEM graduates, but with a much wider gender gap than in most surrounding countries. It should be noted that our country has a low proportion of people with an average educational level, since we have a high rate of population that leaves school at an early age, and a high percentage of young people who graduate from university.

You can read the full report at this link.

After taking a look at these reports, we can conclude that both the public and private sectors are making an effort to promote the digital transformation of Spain in order to make the digital transformation and innovation a driver of economic and social development in our country. There are still areas for improvement, but there is no denying the interest in tackling the challenges ahead.

Making a city "smart" is not easy. According to the report Smart cities: understanding the challenges and opportunities, the budget constraints and the lack of infrastructure are the two main barriers for populations wanting to implement Smart cities initiatives. In this context, interoperability and collaborative platforms that allow the sharing of resources are key to success.

It was with this idea that the Ciudades Abiertas (Open Cities) project emerged 3 years ago, an open, collaborative and interoperable government platform, which was a beneficiary of the II Call for Smart Cities.

Collaboration between municipalities based on 4 lines of action

The Ciudades Abiertas project is led by Red.es and four city councils: A Coruña, Madrid, Santiago de Compostela and Zaragoza. Together, these city councils are developing various initiatives that can be reused by other bodies.

Recently, Ciudades Abiertas has updated its website, incorporating a new design, a highlights section with the latest news of the project and additional functionalities such as execution indicators.

The actions have been developed around 4 pillars:

• Open data: Open data is the most critical requirement of Smart Cities, as the above-mentioned study rightly pointed out. In this sense, the Open Cities project provides the technical and conceptual means necessary for the "management of unique shared data, open by default, georeferenced and semantically annotated by the city". Work is currently underway on the publication of a generic data REST API - or the development of a SPARQL access point to perform complex queries on several datasets at once, among other actions.
• Vocabulariums: The platform offers a catalogue of common and open vocabularies and data structures on Github for use by participating municipalities or any other entity. You can already access the vocabularies on the Municipal Agenda, Population Register or Public Bicycle, the last one to be incorporated in April of this year. They are currently working on other vocabularies such as Traffic or Budget and Budgetary Execution. Within this framework, a couple of videos have also been created to inform about what the vocabularies are and how they are generated and to raise awareness about the advantages of their use, in a simple and didactic way.
• Participation:  The project seeks to promote citizen participation in several of the legislative, implementation and control activities carried out by the municipalities, in areas such as participatory budgets or day-to-day management. To this end, a methodology has been developed and two catalogues are provided, one of participatory processes and the other of instruments for participation. A list has also been included with specific examples of participatory processes that can be taken as a reference when setting up an initiative of this type.
• Transparency: Accountability is also a fundamental area of Smart Cities, so mechanisms are needed to ensure that all activities carried out by the council are provided with full transparency. One way to provide this information is through simple visualizations, easy to understand by citizens without technical knowledge. The project explores different ways to facilitate these visualisations. Two interesting reports have been prepared: Report with the Analysis of External Visualisation Systems and the Report with the Analysis of Visualisation Extensions for CKAN.

Next steps

The Open Cities project is still in full development. Among the activities to be developed in the coming months is the definition of new vocabularies until completing those recommended by the UNE 178301:2015 standard, or the creation of a general scorecard that allows comparisons of all the transparency indicators between cities, thanks to the homogenization of the data and its availability in reusable formats. They are also working, through collaborative workshops with citizens, on the design of visualizations that allow to offer information on transparency in an interactive way and with a simple language.

All these actions will facilitate the creation of new Smart Cities projects not only in these cities but in various territories throughout the country.

The Multisectorial Information Association (ASEDIE), which brings together the infomediary companies of our country, has, among its objectives, to promote the use, reuse and distribution of information, both public and private, creating value-added products. In this sense, it has launched an initiative to promote the complete opening of three datasets by all the Autonomous Communities (ACs), following unified criteria that facilitate their reuse.

Specifically, the idea is to open three databases, including the tax identification number of each of the entities. These databases are:

• Cooperatives
• Associations
• Foundations

These datasets have been called the "Top 3 ASEDIE 2019". This action was presented in last year''s edition of the Infomediary Sector Report and the evolution of its result has been included in the latest edition of this year''s report. It is worth noting that 764 companies participated in the 2020 edition, an increase of 10% over the previous edition. This increase in participation reflects the growth of the sector in Spain, both in the number of companies and employees working in this activity, and in its turnover, with an aggregate turnover of more than 2 billion euros.

Driving the opening of three new data sets

Since 2018, ASEDIE has been urging those responsible for the databases of cooperatives, associations and foundations in the 17 Autonomous Communities to make an effort to:

1. Identify and open the 3 requested databases
2. Unify download formats
3. Unify the forms to be filled in when registering

These actions mean going one step further in the commitment to information quality, facilitating its standardization. According to ASEDIE studies, 60% of infomediary companies highlight that the main barrier to the reuse of information is that it is only available in some Autonomous Communities or Town Councils. With actions such as the one developed by ASEDIE, it would be possible to homogenize the available information helping to break down this barrier.

2019: a not very encouraging situation, but with a great margin for improvement and projection

During 2019, ASEDIE only found this type of data open in very localized areas of Spain, such as the two mesetas, the coastal areas and the two archipelagos (Balearic and Canary Islands). The overall picture reflected that, in many Communities, most of these three databases remained closed or open without CIF.

2020: great improvements achieved in the sector in recent months.

In this case, the Asedie 2020 Report shows that the situation has improved considerably compared to the previous year, as new areas can be seen where the Autonomous Communities have opened these three databases.

At the date of the presentation of the Report, there were already eight Communities with open databases of Associations, Cooperatives and Foundations. In Navarra, two databases that was closed the previous year were opened in 2020, although without a tax identification number. The Basque Country has two completely open databases and one in the absence of a tax identification number. In Catalonia, these three databases are now completely open with a tax identification number, while in Aragon, the database for cooperatives has been opened in the absence of a tax identification number.

The autonomous community that has had the greatest performance over the last year has been the Balearic Islands, as it has shifted from having the three closed to opening them completely in just one year. The community of Castilla y León is another of those that have all three databases completely open.

The situation will also continue to improve over the coming months, as it is estimated, according to the report, that 88% of the Autonomous Communities are considering action plans to open or improve the publicity of registers of this type.

Next steps: continue to push for the opening of homogenized data

Once ASEDIE has achieved the necessary momentum and after the good reception by the Autonomous Regions, on 18 March the "Top 3 Asedie 2020" was presented, so that this work of opening and homogenization does not stop and the Autonomous Regions that already have the first Top 3 open, will continue with their work:

• Commercial establishments
• Industrial parks
• SAT records

In short, thanks to these initiatives, public-private collaboration will be boosted by making it easier for companies to reuse public information, which will have a great impact on the generation of new business and wealth.