Open Data Maturity

The European data portal, data.europa.eu, has published the Open Data Maturity Index 2024, an annual report that assesses the level of open data maturity of European countries.

The 34 participating countries, including the 27 EU Member States, four candidate countries (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Albania, Serbia and Ukraine) and three European Free Trade Association countries (Iceland, Norway and Switzerland) were surveyed.

In this year's edition, Spain obtains an overall rating of 95% out of 100%. This places it in sixth place overall. As reflected in the following image, for yet another year, Spain is in the group of so-called trendsetter countries (trendsetter) , which are those with the best scores in the ranking, and which also include France, Poland, Ukraine, Slovakia, Ireland, Lithuania, Czech Republic, Italy, Estonia and Cyprus.

Figure 1: Groups of participating countries according to their overall open data maturity score.

Above the EU27 average in all four dimensions analysed

The Policy Dimension, focusing on open data policies in different countries, analyses the existence of national governance models for open data management and the measures that have been put in place to implement existing strategies.  In these aspects, Spain scored 96% compared to the European average of 91%. The most positive aspects identified are:

• Alignment with European policies: The report highlights that Spain is fully aligned with the European Open Data Directive, among other recent data-related regulations that have come into force.
• Well-defined action plans: It highlights the strategies deployed in different public administrations focused on incentivising the publication and re-use of data generated in real time and data from citizens.
• Strengthening competences: It focuses on how Spain has developed training programmes to improve the skills of civil servants in managing and publishing open data, ensuring quality standards and fostering a data culture in public administration.

The Impact Dimension analyses the activities carried out to monitor and measure both the re-use of open data, and the impact created as a result of this re-use.  Year after year, this has been the least mature dimension in Europe. Thus, compared to an EU average of 80%, Spain obtains a score of 100% for the development of numerous actions, among which the following stand out:

• Multi-sectoral collaboration: The report highlights how our country is presented as an example of interaction between public administrations, private companies and civil society, materialized in examples such as the close ties between the public sector and the Multisectoral Association of Information (ASEDIE), which produces year after year the ASEDIE report on the reuse of public sector information.
• Examples of re-use in key sectors: It shows how Spain has promoted numerous cases of open data reuse in strategic areas such as the environment, mobility and energy.
• Innovation in communication: The document highlights the effort invested in innovative communication strategies to raise public awareness of the value of data, and especially young audiences. Also noteworthy is the production of podcasts featuring interviews with open data experts, accompanied by short promotional videos.

The Portal Dimension focuses on analysing the functionalities of the national platform to enableusers to access open data and interact within the community. With 96% compared to 82% in the EU27, Spain is positioned as one of the European benchmarks in improving user experience and optimising national portals. The highlights of the report are:  

• Sustainability and continuous improvement: According to the report, Spain has demonstrated a strong commitment to the sustainability of the national open data platform (datos.gob.es) and its adaptation to new technological demands.

• Interaction with users: One of the great strengths is the active promotion from the platform of the datasets available and of the channels through which users can request data that are not available in the National Catalogue.

Finally, the Quality Dimension examines the mechanisms for ensuring the quality of (meta)data. Here Spain scores 88% compared to 79% in the EU. Spain continues to stand out with initiatives that ensure the reliability, accessibility and standardisation of open data. Some of the strengths highlighted in the report are:  

• Metadata automation: It highlights the use of advanced techniques for automatic metadata collection, reducing reliance on manual processes and improving accuracy and real-time updating. 
• Guidelines for data and metadata quality: Spain provides many practical guidelines to improve the publication and quality of open data, including anonymisation techniques, publication in tabular formats (CSV) and the use of APIs.

Continuing to innovate to maintain Spain's advanced position in open data maturity

While Spain continues to stand out in the EU thanks to its open data ecosystem, efforts must continue. To this end, the same report identifies lines of work for countries, such as Spain, that seek to maintain their advanced position in open data maturity and to continue innovating. Among others, the following recommendations are made:

1. Consolidating open data ecosystems: Strengthen thematic communities of providers and re-users by prioritising High Value Datasets (HVDs) in their development and promotion.
2. Promoting coordination: Align the national strategy with the needs of agencies and local authorities.
3. Develop country-specific impact metrics: Collaborate with universities, research institutions and others to develop impact assessment frameworks.
4. Measure and disseminate the impact of open data: Conduct regular (annual or biannual) assessments of the economic, environmental and social impact of open data, promoting the results to generate political support.
5. Facilitate the participation of the open data community: Ensure that providers improve the publication of data based on user feedback and ratings.
6. Increase the quality of data and metadata: Use automated tools and validations to improve publication standards, including adopting artificial intelligence technology to optimise metadata quality.
7. Promote successful reuse cases: Publish and promote success stories in the use of open data, interact with providers and users to identify innovative needs and applications.

Overall, the report shows good progress on open data across Europe. Although there are areas for improvement, the European open data landscape is consolidating, with Spain at the top of the table. Read here the complete Open Data Maturity Index 2024.

The European Data Portal, data.europa.eu, has just published its Data Maturity Index, an index that assesses the level of maturity of European countries in terms of open data. For its elaboration, an evaluation survey has been carried out and has been completed by 35 countries, including the 27 Member States of the European Union, three countries of the European Free Trade Association (Iceland, Norway and Switzerland) and five candidate countries (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Albania, Serbia and Serbia and Ukraine).  

In this year's edition, Spain obtained a score of 95% out of 100%. This places it in fifth place overall and in fourth place if only European Union (EU27) member countries are taken into account. This figure represents an improvement of three percentage points over last year's score and places Spain 12 points above the EU27 average (83%).  

The top positions in the ranking are occupied by France, Poland, Ukraine and Estonia. 

Above the EU27 average in all dimensions analyzed 

The index is accompanied by a report containing the analysis carried out and an overview of the good practices applied in Europe. In the case of Spain, it is above the EU-27 average in the four indicators analyzed:  

• Policy, focused on the open data policies of the different countries. It analyzes the existence of national governance models for open data management and the measures that have been applied to implement existing strategies. This is the indicator in which Spain obtains a higher score, with 99% compared to 89% in the EU27. The report highlights how the country's national open data strategy helps promote the openness of public information through innovative and structured actions in collaboration with public and private partners. Among other issues, the strategy includes the objective of identifying business models and business success stories to share successful practices. The report also highlights the existence of various digital strategies that complement specific policies on open data, such as the national artificial intelligence strategy, which includes provisions related to the availability of open data for the operation and training of artificial intelligence systems. 

• Impact, which analyzes the activities undertaken to monitor and measure both the reuse of open data and the impact created by such reuse. Traditionally, this has been the least mature dimension across Europe. Nevertheless, Spain scores 96% compared to 77% in the EU27. The best results are achieved in measuring the impact of open data use cases in the environmental, economic and political sectors.  

• Portal, focused on evaluating the functionalities of the national platform that allow users to access open data and help drive interaction within the community. With 96% compared to 85% in the EU27, Spain stands out in the use of analytical tools to understand user behavior, and in the implementation of strategies to ensure the sustainability of the portal and increase its visibility, including presence in social networks. It also highlights the existence of a private area that allows editors to act according to the feedback received. 

• Quality, which examines the mechanisms for ensuring the quality of (meta)data. Here Spain scores 88% compared to 82% in the EU27. Spain's score is driven by compliance with the DCAT-AP standard (providing educational materials for publishers), the existence of a systematic approach to ensure that metadata is up to date, and the wide range of data offered, both historical and current. 

The report also measures how EU27 countries are progressing in the implementation of the implementing regulation on high-value datasets. In this section, Spain ranks ninth, with 68% implementation. In general, Member States are making more progress on geospatial and statistical datasets. Progress is also being made on the underlying technical and legal requirements.  

Overall recommendations 

The report includes a number of recommendations for Spain, among other countries, including encouraging the development of initiatives at the local and regional level, fostering better coordination between teams, and activating the network of open data officers to implement monitoring activities within their organizations. Emphasis is also placed on the need to promote existing open data courses and promote new training materials, paying special attention to developing strategic awareness of the reuse and impact of open data.

Overall, the report shows good progress in open data across Europe. Although there are areas for improvement, the European open data landscape is consolidating, with Spain at the top of the table.  

In 2024, new waves of implementation of the European data strategy will present national teams with new challenges. On the one hand, they will have to redouble their efforts to inform citizens of the new data sources arising from initiatives such as the Data Governance Act and the data spaces. In this sense, coordination will be necessary between the new figures arising from these legislative developments and the traditional world of open data, enhancing the obvious synergies between the two to boost the data economy and collectivize the value generated. 

Like every other year, the EU Open Data Portal has just published the results of its report Open Data Maturity 2022. It is a study that assesses the maturity of European countries in the field of open data and it provides an overview of the good practices followed in Europe, which can be transferred to other national and local contexts. Both the member states of the European Union (EU-27) and other countries in the region have participated in the study.

Spain has achieved a score of 92%, thirteen points above the EU27 average. With this score, it is in the leading group. France secured first place, followed by Ukraine and Poland.

Spain is above the European average for the 4 indicators analysed

The report measures maturity in relation to four aspects of open data:

• Policy, focused on the open data strategies of the different countries.
• Impact, which analyses the activities carried out to monitor and measure the reuse of open data and their impact.
• Portal, focused on evaluating the functions and characteristics of the national platform that allows users to access open data and promote interaction within the community.
• Quality, which examines mechanisms to ensure the quality of (meta)data.

In all four categories, Spain is ahead of the EU27 average, particularly standing out in the policy section. Some of the aspects that the report highlights in Spain are the open mechanisms for communicating and interacting from datos.gob.es with the open data community, the use of dashboards to monitor the use of datasets or some specific examples of use cases such as Climate change scenario viewer or Gijón in a click.

With this score, Spain falls within the so-called trendsetter group. The countries that belong to this group stand out for their strong commitment to open data, borne out by an advanced strategy, more mature platforms and an active methodology for measuring the impact of open data.

3 key trends in Europe

This year's analysis highlights three trends at European level:

1. EU Member States are preparing for the implementation of the high-value datasets regulation. Directive 2019/1024 highlighted, amongst other issues, a specific regime for the so-called high-value data, in other words, those whose reuse is associated with considerable benefits for society, the environment and the economy. Although their implementing regulation has not yet been made public, 96% of EU Member States are already working on the identification of high-value data, especially in the categories of statistical, geospatial, Earth observation, environmental and meteorological data. In addition, 85% are already prepared to monitor and measure their level of reuse and 63% to ensure their interoperability with available data sets from other countries.  Spain is no exception and it is one of the most advanced countries in this regard.
2. Measuring the impact of open data is a priority for EU Member States, but it is a major challenge too. Countries are still interested in understanding and capturing open data reuse and value creation, but compiling data on the impact created remains challenging, especially in the economic area.
3. In a post-pandemic world, European countries face new and old common challenges. The impact of the war in Ukraine has affected all countries, both socially and economically. Open data have proven to serve as a mechanism to help refugees or improve energy management. Other common challenges highlighted in the report are the lack of resources and qualified personnel or the difficulty in coordinating between the different levels of the administration, inter alia.

Recommendations to keep moving ahead in the field of open data

The report ends with a series of recommendations by groups of countries. In the case of open data trendsetters, the group to which Spain belongs, the report recommends focusing on maintaining the current ecosystem, experimenting and sharing knowledge.

To be precise, the focus should be placed on improving and consolidating open data ecosystems through the development of thematic communities of providers and reusers. It is also recommended to collaborate with data.europa.eu, other national data teams, universities and research institutions to develop an experimental impact evaluation framework.

High-value data sets stand out as one of the areas to prioritise, based on that which was previously indicated in Directive 2019/1024. In addition to preparing for the Data Governance Regulation, evaluating the existing options to expand the portals and assuming the role of public registry for those organisations linked to the altruistic transfer of data.

You can read the full report via this link.

For the seventh consecutive year, the European Data Portal has presented its Open Data Maturity assessment. This is a report that analyses a series of indicators to measure the maturity of open data across Europe, in order to understand the progress of each country, make comparisons and find areas for improvement.

This year, Spain ranks third with a score of 95%, 14 points above the European average (81%). First place goes to France (98%), followed by Ireland (also with 95%).

Spain, above the European average in all the analyzed categories

As every year, the report measures 4 categories:

• Policy, focusing on the existence of specific policies and strategies to promote open data at the national level.
• Impact, which analyzes activities to monitor and measure the reuse of open data.
• Portal, which evaluates the existing functions in the national platform (in the case of our country, datos.gob.es) to access open data and interact with the community.
• Quality, which studies the mechanisms that guarantee the quality of (meta)data.

Spain is ahead of Europe in all categories:

In total, Spain's score has increased by one percentage point compared to 2020, when it stood at 94%. It stands out especially in the impact category, where it is in first position with 100% of the score. The report highlights how the Aporta Initiative conducts an annual national survey to ascertain the control over the use of data by the various national, regional and local public bodies. It also highlights the collaborations that the institutions carry out with universities, such as the agreement adopted by the Valencian Government with all public universities in the Community to work together in training and research activities related to transparency and open data.

Our country continues in the group of open data prescribers

As part of the analysis, the European Portal groups all participating countries into four groups based on the assessment of open data maturity during 2021. With its score, Spain continues to place itself in the leading group of open data in Europe, called trend-setters. The group with the best results is completed by France, Ireland, Poland, Estonia and Ukraine.

These countries are characterized by an advanced open data policy and a platform with a wide range of functions to meet the needs of advanced users and publishers. They are also countries where there are initiatives to ensure the publication of high-quality data and compliance with the DCAT-AP European open data cataloging profile, and where communities around data reuse are in place. Finally, it is highlighted that there are established methodologies in place to assess the impact of data in the different domains.

Europe's average score rises

In 2021, the average score relating to open data maturity of EU27 countries is 81%, an increase of three percentage points compared to 2020.

The report highlights three trends observed in all the countries analysed:

• Member States are updating their policies to transpose the Open Data Directive into their national legislation. More and more countries are carrying out the transposition process. In the case of Spain, it was included in the Royal Decree-Law 24/2021, approved last December 2 by the Congress. It is worth mentioning that the Open Data Directive still requires the adoption of a future implementing regulation by the European Commission, where the list of high-value datasets to be provided free of charge through APIs is included.
• Understanding, monitoring and measuring the impact of open data is becoming more important. The impact dimension has seen the most growth in the last year, while the quality indicator is the least mature. In recent years, impact has been measured mainly through activities such as maintaining records of data downloads or creating lists of use cases. This year there has been a clear trend towards in-depth studies, such as desk research or surveys, to quantify and verify the impact of open data.
• The COVID-19 pandemic continues to highlight the value and impact of open data.  Last year, the health situation led to highlight the importance of systematically collecting data and making it available to the public in an up-to-date manner. This year, the available data is complemented by statistics related to vaccination.

Future recommendations

The report ends with a series of recommendations for each group of countries. In the case of prescribers, a group that includes Spain, some issues are highlighted, such as continuing to develop thematic communities of providers and reusers, giving priority to the high-value data categories highlighted in the Open Data Directive. In this sense, Spain is moving forward with the creation of specific hubs for various sectors such as tourism or health.

Other examples of recommendations are to collaborate with other national and international teams to develop an experimental impact assessment framework and with academic institutions to provide advanced courses and training on open data.

You can see the full report here and the Spain report here.

Once again, the European Data Portal has just published its Open Data Maturity Report 2019, which measures the development achieved in the field of open data in Europe. And, as in previous years, Spain occupies the second position, which makes it a prescriber in terms of open data.

According to the report, the average of open data maturity of the EU28 is 66%, only one percentage point above the data obtained in 2018. In the case of Spain, the score obtained has been 90%, three points more than in 2018 and well above the European average. Only Ireland, with 91%, is ahead of Spain.

With this score, Spain is part of the so-called group of Trend setters, along with Ireland and France. The countries that belong to this group are characterized by having an advanced open data strategy and a strong commitment to open data as a strategic asset to drive digital transformation.

In 2018, this group was formed by five countries, but only three have remained in 2019. Spain, like the rest of European leaders, has had to improve its score to continue remaining in the leading group.

At a general level, the report highlights that Europe is entering a consolidation phase, where the focus has been shifted from quantity to quality of published data. Once policies and open data platforms are implemented, European countries are trying to ensure the value of the data by driving its reuse.

Spain is above the European average in the 4 indicators analyzed

To produce the report, the European Data Portal has analyzed 4 key indicators: policy, portal, impact and quality. The growth of Spain has been driven by the portal and impact dimensions, as seen below.

• The “political” dimension analyzes existing policies and strategies to promote open data at the national level, as well as the existence of governance models. Spain's score in this section is 90% -the EU is 74%-, although it has decreased compared to 2018. This is because, although there are specific policies to boost open data, there is still work to be done for its implementation

• The “portal” dimension has been the one that has experienced the greatest growth in the last year, going from 78% in 2018 to 89% in 2019. This dimension focuses on the level of maturity of national open data platforms. For this, it analyzes the functionality, the use (user analysis), the data variety and the approach used to guarantee the sustainability of the platform.

• The “impact” dimension, in which Spain has obtained the best score, assesses the existence of methodologies to monitor and measure the reuse and impact of open data. In this case, the score obtained has been 100%, with a growth of 3 points compared to 2018.

• Finally, the “quality” dimension, which explores the level of automation of European platforms, the accuracy and reliability of the available data and the level of compliance in terms of the DCAT-AP metadata standard, has remained virtually the same as last year: 77% in 2019 compared to 78% in 2018.

Recommendations for further progress on open data

As in previous editions, the report ends with a series of recommendations for all the countries analyzed. In the case of Trend setters, the group to which Spain belongs, the following conclusions are included, among others:

• Promote thematic data ecosystems around the thematic domains defined in the recent Directive on Open Data and the re-use of Public Sector Information.
• Boost data in real time.
• Continue the work on improving the quality of metadata and data by boosting the use of tools (for example, for the validation of metadata).
• Work with training institutions to provide advanced open data courses and training.
• Engage universities and research institutions to develop country-specific metrics to measure impact.

You can see the factsheet of Spain in this link and those of the rest of the countries here.

Open data  indexes and Barometers are intended to reflect the international ranking of countries in their implementation of open data policies. Although it is practically impossible to measure exactly the level of openness, there are certain initiatives that give an overview of the interest in open data in the different countries of the world. In recent months, some of these indexes have been published, which, although they value different aspects related to open data, have the same purpose. How many global indexes are currently being produced in the world on open data? Do they reflect different realities? What methodology do they employ? What countries are analyzed? In this article we provide a description of the four most important indexes and some of their peculiarities.

Open Data Barometer (ODB) – World Wide Web Foundation

On June 1 the latest Open Data Barometer, prepared annually by the World Wide Web Foundation since 2013, was published. The Open Data Barometer assesses the policies and practices of open data that are being developed by 115 countries worldwide. Specifically, the Web Foundation measures how Governments make their data available to their citizens based on three main sources of information: evaluation questionnaires completed by experts, government self-assessments and other data from international databases.

The ODB analyzes three blocks of indicators aimed at measuring the progress of open data initiatives, implementation of open data programs and impact of open data in business, politics and civil society. It also analyzes the existence and quality of 15 sets of key data at national level (from government budgets, the census, public spending and public transport timetables, to crime statistics, environment or public contracts ...), the data refresh rate, accessibility, possibility of reuse, whether free of charge, type of license, interoperability, and so on. In short, more than 150 researchers and government representatives who make possible the production of a report which includes a set of conclusions on the general state of the open data sector in the world.

Informe anual European Data Portal  

On March 4 - World Open Data Day - the European Public Data Portal released its annual report in which it analyzes the level of maturity of the open data ecosystem in Europe. In the second edition of the report, the portal evaluates 31 countries (the 28 members of the European Union plus Norway, Switzerland and Liechtenstein). According to this report, the state of open data across Europe has improved overall but it also highlights significant discrepancies between countries, as well as political, legal and technical barriers.

In order to identify the level of a country's maturity two blocks of indicators are set, aimed at measuring the maturity of open data throughout Europe: the availability of open data and the maturity of data portals. The first assesses a variety of  aspects of open data policies in each state and to what extent each country carries out actions to measure the social and economic impact of data reuse. The second analyzes the level of maturity of the open data portals, measures the usability of the platforms, as well as the ease of data reuse and data access.

Global Open Data Index (GODI) – Open Knowledge Foundation

The Global Open Data Index, better known as GODI, is produced by the Open Knowledge Foundation. On 15 June, OKF published its global index of open data for 2017 which analyzes 94 countries and territories in the world. Through this index ten categories of data are analyzed. To measure the openness of these ten data types, Open Data Index bases its rating on responses to a questionnaire that includes questions about the format, openness, update rate or periodicity of publication of the data. The scores for each of these are added to create a final ranking where the level of openness of each national dataset is also displayed. This collaborative  initiative is open to any citizen who wants to become a country analyst.

Índice OURData Index – OCDE

The OURData Index (Open, Useful, Government Re-usable Data) analyzes the situation of open data in 28 countries belonging to the OECD (Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development). The OECD OURData Index evaluates the efforts made by governments to implement open data in three critical areas: openness, usability and reuse of government data. The index data comes from member countries and focuses on government efforts to ensure the availability and accessibility of public sector data and to encourage greater reuse. The index is based on OECD methodology and the guidelines of the G8 OGD (Open Goverment Data) Charter. The OECD OGD analysis includes: business information, records, patent and trademark information, public bidding databases, geographic information, legal information, weather information, social data and transport information.

Experts point out that such studies should not be considered an accurate reflection of the real situation, because they are partial analyses selecting specific criteria and metrics, providing an incomplete picture of the open data ecosystem. Nonetheless, such indexes or rankings are useful for interested citizens, civil organizations and groups, and for politicians and data publishers. These rankings are especially helpful for those fields where open data is still an incipient subject.

The open data contribute to the political, social and economic sustainability of a country. The European Commission, aware of the value of the re-use of the public sector information for the eurozone growth, tracks regularly the state members in order to asses the progress achieved in their open data policies.

In this way, at the beginning of the year, the European Data Portal published its first report on the assessment of the maturity of the open data ecosystem: a detailed document where the results obtained by the EU28+ in 2015 are shown. Nevertheless, according to the monitoring performed by this initiative, the second edition of this study has been published, which shows the updated data from 2016 in comparison with the previous year.

The measurement is built on two key indicators Open Data Readiness and Portal Maturity, thereby covering the level of development of national activities promoting open data as well as the level of development of national portals.

According to the document’s data, in 2016 the 31 countries assessed in this report progressed by 28.6% in comparison with the results obtained in 2015. In fact, all the nations have completed over 55% of their journey towards the openness of public sector information, showing that they have successfully developed a basic approach to address open data policies. However, significant discrepancies across countries still exist. Though some countries are still in the process of creating a national open data portal, other countries have already launched new initiatives and are redefining their multiannual strategy.

This reports has been accompanied with an interactive panel, published on the European Data Portal, which shows the results of the key performance indicators that assess the open data maturity. These KPIs include the level of development of the national open data policies, an assessment of the available characteristics in these platforms, as well as the expected impact of the open data policies.

This online dashboard includes the information classified by country to help the user compare the existing differences in the openness of public data in the European Union. In this way, it is possible to create slides for each state member (together with Norway, Switzerland and Liechtenstein) to know all the details as regards their initiatives, catalogues, barriers, best practices, achievements and next steps.

Thanks to the analysis and summary done by the European programme, it is possible to know that Spain is in the first position in the EU, leading the ranking of open data maturity (as shown in the next figure), due to the high scores obtained in the different indicators: norms, policies, national coordination, portal usability, re-use or availability of the open data.

The greatest progress obtained by the country in comparison with 2015 has been the significant increase of open data impact, especially in the economic field. In fact, Spain scored the maximum of 120 points from 90 points scored in the previous year. It should be highlighted that only two countries have been identified as very ready, these are France (84.4%) and Spain (92.2%). Moreover, this last has done a great work to measure the social impact of open data, scoring the 100% of the possible points.