In The Guardian: how and why South Africa set its data free
Following on from our earlier post about South Africa’s free mapping data, we got in touch with Derek Clarke, head of the CDSM (South Africa’s mapping agency) to ask him what effect the imposition of zero costs – a corollary of the 2000 Promotion of Access to Information Act. (That’s a Google cache link, in HTML.)
In South Africa’s freedom includes its data, we ask whether the move from a charging system, which used to bring in 5% of the budget, has brought any benefits – either in reducing waste, or expanding use, or both.
Derek Clarke, head of the agency, says yes to both: most of the clients for the CDSM’s mapping data before were government agencies, and in Clarke’s pithy words “government paying itself makes no sense but causes administrative waste.” And has use grown? Yes, by 500% (we make that sixfold), he says.
Is it a model for others? Clarke again:
“This model should be applicable to all developing countries where the government must play a developmental role. The same situation does not apply to developed countries with mature markets. However, governments of developed countries should evaluate the opportunity cost of geospatial data – it may be more beneficial to make data free.”
We’ve put the questions and answers from Mr Clarke online already, but the article aims to deal with the critiques we know will follow from any suggestion that the UK might have something to learn from South Africa…
- The following posts may be related...(the database guesses):
- South Africa: mapping is free (and so is other government information) (4 March 2007; score: 56.4%)
- We're going to see the minister.. (14 July 2007; score: 26.44%)
- Ed Parsons, formerly of Ordnance Survey, now of Google (8 April 2007; score: 20.66%)
- Derek Clarke, head of South Africa's mapping agency, responds to our questions (8 March 2007; score: 19.01%)
- Using Gapminder to compare the countries studied by OS: how did they choose? (24 June 2009; score: 18.17%)
March 12th, 2007 at 11:57 pm
Here’s an example from a developed country.
In the Netherlands, some innovative experiments in mapping planning law relied on free sharing of data between a Province, over a dozen municipalities, some Chambers of Commerce, and other private sector organizations. Such integration of data would not have happened if the different organisations had to negotiate contracts in advance.
The result was a demonstration that it is possible to find development sites in half an hour when the planning zones and laws are integrated into a GIS, instead of spending 6 months writing to councils.
Once the free demonstration has been achieved, then it becomes possible to set up a charging system for a commercial venture. Unfortunately, it is harder to get free trials out of British agencies than it is in the Netherlands.