Stories, ideas, and updates from DGers around the world

Bloomberg’s Data for Good Exchange (D4GX): Data Science for SDGs brought together data scientists, corporations, academics, practitioners, and civil society to discuss issues and explore opportunities related to data science and social good. Given DG’s recent work on the Administrative Data Driven Decisions (AD3) program and understanding national data ecosystems, we opened our D4GX workshop asking, “Show of hands – who thought today’s workshop would cover how to use data science and administrative data to report on SDG indicators?”

At DG, we pride ourselves in being a learning organization – focusing on continuous improvement and knowledge-building. We support this goal through a number of mechanisms, including holding post-mortem meetings at the end of every project. A post-mortem is a common method for project teams to review different perspectives on what went well, challenges faced, and what lessons could improve future projects.

VIFAA Kenya implementation began in April 2019. Across VIFAA, we see cross-stakeholder partnerships as a key entry point to meet country and regional fertilizer needs. In Kenya, we are leveraging these partnerships to co-develop work plans that specifically address key data – and data use – gaps. Our approach to strategic decision-making starts with addressing those data gaps. In consultation with country stakeholders each step of the way, we will also identify data sources and co-design fertilizer dashboards.

As in most organizations, Development Gateway’s leadership team is always exploring ways to support and retain our talented team members, and we take care to encourage our neighbors and similar organizations to do the same. Years of research has shown that staff retention is critical not only for the growth and stability of an organization, but also is a key element in employee satisfaction – teams that grow together through the years can be stronger and more cohesive.

“Knowledge sharing” is an undeniable buzzword in the international development space. However, the idea behind it is both simple and effective: by sharing similar experiences and learning from one another, teams can develop practical solutions to challenges. Often, they also discover their challenges are not unique – across DG’s global Aid Management Platform (AMP) network, our experience highlights how AMP country challenges and goals are often aligned.

Today, Development Gateway (DG) is pleased to announce the publication of the Managing for Feminist Results: Measuring Canada’s Feminist International Assistance Policy white paper, that outlines the challenges and opportunities that development agencies may face when adopting new and/or feminist policies.

“What do you think, Josh?” The questions kept coming to me, no matter how many times I reminded our counterparts in the government that my female colleague was the assessment lead, had more experience, and was an expert in this topic on which I was a relative novice. I redirected again to my colleague, only to have the process continue to repeat itself. 

With support from the Open Societies Initiative for West Africa (OSIWA), Development Gateway (DG) began conducting studies in July 2018 in Senegal, Guinea, and Nigeria to map data needs, availability, and use in the extractives sector. Last week at the EITI Global Conference in Paris, France, we shared key takeaways and findings on EI data needs in the session Leveraging Information Technology in EITI Mainstreaming. Today, we're sharing more details from our presentation and how takeaways are building into our EI data work in West Africa.

Across DG’s extractives work, our aim is to help ensure a country’s natural resources actually benefit citizens. This starts with greater openness around natural resource management, to build public engagement and accountability. Building on our existing work with EITI on the EITI Global Data Portal, we’re expanding country- and local-level extractives work through several initiatives – including in Nigeria in partnership with the Ford Foundation, to build an online data collection system for the audit process.

The 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) call on us to “leave no one behind.” At the same time, there is an urgent need to empower individuals and communities with access to information and skills to help them thrive in the growing digital economy. But what investments can transform “data-driven decision-making” from a global commitment to a key component of community-centered development?