Let’s go occupy data street

I know it is exciting to be a part of the data revolution. It feels rebellious, almost unfettered by the institutional boundaries and the day-to-day stuff we all have to deal with. Like those who started a movement on another street, the freedom of possibilities makes us want to go ‘Occupy Data Street’! But data also takes careful planning, costing and the ability to work together. Without collaboration, as a UN on the ground, we cannot occupy this space. This blog post is my way of sharing a few things we are learning together, with all our UN ‘friends and family’ also collecting and looking at the same data.

Vertical and static approaches to data are a thing of the past

In Zambia, I recall that we had multiple UN agencies working with the central statistical office. We did so for decades, and quite separately. We were all helping a Zambian institution collect numbers for the census, demographic household surveys, poverty mapping, special issues surveys, electoral registers, water and land use surveys, and anonymous HIV and gender based violence focus group data. These data-gathering projects proliferated to a level of exhaustion - for the client!

I hope the days of our stoically vertical and often static data sets are over. They no longer serve in a world of increasingly complex development challenges and responses. Most data sets are no longer what the new development agenda calls for. Today, where we can go that extra mile by collecting and analyzing together, we absolutely need to. We cannot justify the cost of such ‘lone ranger’ operations anymore.

And why would we want to go it alone?

The richer evidence with combined data and analytics helps us navigate much more complex waters. In the case of Zambia, pooling of data and stories on the movement of people, the rains and land use patterns, cultural practices, market opportunities and immunization coverage tells us much more about the seeming contradictions of this country, which is peaceful and economically surging, yet where so many still die young and where the majority of girls do not complete secondary school. The richer evidence can also tell us more about the interventions that could make a difference.

We go ‘public’ even with each other

Even when we do not really want to share our data with each other, we are being pushed to go public.  Within the UN we are putting more out in shared public spaces and having it used, questioned and improved on by many others. This sharing of data should be one of our calling cards as a UN system. It used to be so in a number of countries and it can be again.

Getting to the most vulnerable comes at a cost

If you want to go deeply local, following the lines of poverty and inequality, it does not come cheap. It often takes well over twice the time, requires hands-on local outreach to go door-to-door, and comes with a higher price tag. So action has to be designed, costed and planned with that in mind.

Over the years we have had long, hard negotiations with some donors on what it takes to contribute to improving material and child health services in rural as well as peri-urban poor communities. Some partners were reluctant to extend civic education, voter registration, basic education and skills training initiatives into the Bangweulu Swamps or across the floodplains and sandy deserts of the Western Province in Zambia. Covering these sparsely populated, remote hamlets came with a heavy bill. And yet, these folks did not have birth certificates, no voter i.d’s, hardly a primary education. We kept saying ‘leave no one behind’ and ‘these people count’.

Get scrappy with new data

When gathering data in Zambia, we realized there is more cell phone coverage out there, even in rural parts of the country, than we thought. Some of our teams were using mobile technology for their surveys and they were getting much better coverage, particularly in areas of health status and services. Yes, some of it relied on somewhat scrappy sample sizes based on cell company records, and you never quite knew how many or what you missed and, yes, it was difficult to quality assure. But even such random sampling can work for some purposes. As long as the size and spread makes ‘good enough’ sense in statistical and practical terms, why not? We’ve seen this trend in mobile technology explode in so many countries, so why not benefit more from it?

Delivering together provides more ‘aha’ moments and results

A single UN programme that supports national statistical capacities, instead of a multitude of small projects, is a great start. The beauty of Delivering as One on national data and statistical capacity support is that we can provide a design that makes good political, financial and results sense. Examples of such work include our support to bolder MDG acceleration and tracking, and for understanding rapid changes in youth and voter demographics, and the rise of silent killers such as non-communicable diseases.

It is really great when the broader UN team and partners experience the ‘aha’ moments that good data brings. When the effort is shared together and supportive of local needs, it is quite exhilarating to see what eyes, minds and doors good data can open. It can change the course of our UN joint programmes and has done so in a number of countries innovating with the new UNDAFs. Better joined-up data and evidence has also helped centre our normative base – with the core issues of human rights, inequalities and injustices addressed with less angst and sensitivity.

It is exciting to see UN Country Teams stepping up, joining the innovations and being a part of ‘Occupy Data Street’. The revolution is well underway, and this is a call to action!