Open Data Day Vientiane – Open Knowledge International Blog

"Upon realising the need for open data outreach and promotion within Laos, the East-West Management Institute’s Open Development Initiative (EWMI-ODI) collaborated with the Faculty of Forestry Science, National University of Laos to host a workshop on ‘open data for research’on Open Data Day 2017, as part of a process to build a community of open data enthusiasts among students, researchers, professors, and civil society professionals. Read more on how it all begun in Laos, the current nature of open data in the country and how EWMI-ODI spearheaded the 2017 open data celebration.

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Open Data in Laos

Open Knowledge’s Global Open Data Index has not been able to rate Laos in their surveys due to the lack of ‘data availability online and in open format’. Similarly, the Open Data Barometer has not been able to rank Laos on the global map.

In 2016, the Open Data Inventory (ODIN), a rating that assesses the coverage and openness of official statistics, ranked Laos 141 out of 173 (with an overall score of 26%, 25% for coverage and 27% for openness). This reflects an improvement from 2015 (overall score of 21%, 34% for coverage and 8% for openness).

The country currently does not have Right to Information Law and has not signed on to be a member of the Open Government Partnership.

Fostering sustainable development with open data

The East-West Management Institute (EWMI) is rolling out a pioneering project, Open Development Initiative (ODI), an innovative online platform aggregating and sharing data to shed light on development trends in the Lower Mekong countries – Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, and Vietnam. It consists of a single unified open-source database supporting six websites, for each of the five Lower Mekong countries, and a regional site – Open Development Mekong (OD Mekong). This regional effort was built upon the flagship site of the Open Development Cambodia (ODC) initiative, which was launched in 2011 and has since been relied on by tens of thousands for objective and compelling data visualisations that illuminate the development and environmental challenges in Cambodia."