Rise of open government data ‘unstoppable’
Steady progress but publication of open data still fragmented and one-sided
Central government is publishing more of its data as ‘open data’. Saskia J. Stuiveling, the President of the Netherlands Court of Audit, said the government’s ‘steady progress’ would be unstoppable. Open data make the government more transparent and accessible, and provide the government itself with a better understanding of its own performance. Open data are also economically important: open data create more jobs and generate more revenue for the companies that use them. The cost of opening up government data are low but the benefits are high.
The government can still publish a lot more data as open data. Internationally, more information is published as open data, for example on the provision of health care, the findings of food safety inspections and trade register details. These findings are presented in the second Open Data Trend Report, which the Court of Audit published on 31 March 2015.