March 7, 2016 By Yeabu Bangura
Code for Africa, in collaboration with Right to Access Information Commission and the Open Data Council, with support from Open Aid Partnership at the World Bank, Friday, 4March, ended a one-day training on the importance of open data and awareness raising on the concept and its importance to economic development.
The training was held at the Ministry of Information and Communication conference room at Youyi building and participants included bloggers, web developers and media practitioners.
One of the trainers, who is also a web developer and advocate, Serah Njambi, explained that the training was geared towards educating the public about the importance of open data, adding that the concept gives power to citizens to have enough and adequate information about their country.
Ms. Njambi said for most people data do not make sense because of the manner in which they are presented to the public, adding that open data placed on the internet must be friendly, open to be used, re-used and redistributed in different technological environments.
According to her, open data must be accessible, available in modified form and licensed, as well as useable by other persons in different parts of the world.
“Open data should be used, reused, and replicated by another person. There should be no restrictions on the use of data by sector or location,” she said.
She pointed out that open data would help promote transparency, accountability and increased awareness of the tenets of open aid partnership by the masses, especially civil society and other non-state actors.
She added that open data would promote networking with ministries, departments and agencies on public data management for effective service delivery and that prioritising the release of open data would facilitate economic, social and cultural interaction.