Executive Summary

The digital transformation and the development of new technologies have given rise to new opportunities to enhance public welfare through the utilization of data. Over the past decade, alongside the discourse on the social and public benefits stemming from data availability, the economic advantages derived from the private sector's use of available data have become a prominent topic. International experience suggests that the private sector gains significant profits not only from data generated through business and economic activities but also from open government data.

In recent years, studies assessing the possible economic benefits derived from the availability of open data were conducted actively in European Union countries. The present study is one of the first analytical works to estimate the economic aspects of open data by adapting the methodologies used in the EU countries and considering Georgia’s economic indicators. The study also highlights the sectors with high impact and high potential and identifies datasets whose availability is especially important and economically beneficial for private companies operating in Georgia.

The following activities were carried out to study the economic potential of open government data in Georgia:

      - Review of international literature - The existing literature on the development and economic benefits of the open data ecosystem was studied.

      - Development of the methodology - By adapting the methodologies used in EU countries, a methodology and methods were developed to determine the open data market size, including the direct and indirect market and the amount of new jobs created through the availability of open data, and to identify sectors with high impact and high potential in terms of open data use.

- Quantitative and qualitative research - A combination of qualitative and quantitative data collection methods was used to identify the needs of the private sector, including an online survey, focus group meetings, and in-depth interviews. A total of 100 companies were interviewed.

     - Examples of international practice - For specific sectors, in order to raise awareness on the importance of open data, examples of international best practice were provided. Among them, applications/services created by stakeholders with the use of data portals were identified.

      - Facilitating public-private dialogue (PPD) - A public-private dialogue was held on the issues of open government data needs, within the framework of which the main findings and recommendations of the study were presented.

The research identified a number of challenges in terms of open government data legislation and practice:

      - The country does not have a unified vision and strategy for improving access to open government data, as well as a unified regulatory legal framework for open government data.  

      - Despite the presence of an official open data portal, public institutions have not been publishing or updating data on it for years due to the lack of enforcement mechanisms.

      - Due to the inadequate enforcement of the Law on the Unified State Registry of Information, it is difficult to determine what datasets are kept in public institutions.

      - There is a need to raise awareness among the private, public, and civil sector representatives about the economic and other public welfare benefits of open government data.  

By adapting EU methodologies within the framework of the research, IDFI was able to make important calculations about open government data in Georgia. In particular, the research team determined that the approximate open data market size of Georgia is 0.9% of the GDP, which, taking into account the expected GDP of 2023, is equal to 714.2 million GEL. The direct market size of open data is 153.9 million GEL, and the indirect market size is 560.3 million GEL. In 2023, approximately 800 people were directly employed in open data in Georgia, and approximately 2,912 jobs were created indirectly by open data. 

According to the basic scenario of the development of the open data market, by 2030, the size of the Georgian open data market will be approximately 1 billion GEL, and in the case of high progress - 1.4 billion GEL. According to the basic scenario, 268 people will be additionally employed in open data in Georgia by 2030, and 3,802 people will be employed in the case of high progress. 

According to the methodology adapted to Georgia, financial and insurance activities, public administration, and information and communication sectors were identified as the sectors with the highest potential and impact in terms of the use of open data. Trade, transport, and industrial sectors were assessed as having medium potential and impact.

After identifying the sectors with the highest potential and impact on open data, within the framework of the study, taking into account the needs of the representatives of said sectors, datasets that are important for them were identified. The survey showed that companies most often process and are interested in data related to business, finance, and economics.

However, at least one respondent from each sector expressed interest in data related to tourism, agriculture, demographic and social issues, transport, and geospatial data/maps, identifying such data as necessary.

Among the most important open government datasets named by each sector were the registries of the National Agency of Public Registry, the website of the Public Procurement Agency, and the Reporting portal. According to the majority of the respondents, if these datasets became available through APIs (application programming interface), they would be able to easily process data and create desired applications.

      - Much of the data desired by the banking sector is related to the ability to access additional personal information about their customers. Nevertheless, their list includes datasets that, in their content, represent open government data and cover issues such as education, healthcare, agriculture, environmental protection, transport, construction, and others.

      - The datasets desired by the insurance sector are related to comprehensive health service and medication consumption statistics, comprehensive death statistics, real estate market prices, identification of insured and uninsured properties by cadastral codes, meteorological data, and more.

      - Desired datasets for representatives of the information and communication sector are related to cadastral maps, infrastructure projects, communication data of business entities and civil servants, government procurement, tourism and transport data, and others.

      - For the trade and transport sector, datasets containing detailed exports-imports data, detailed statistics on the production and consumption of individual products, information on the flow of passengers in vehicles, and more were identified.

Recommendations were prepared based on the research findings, primarily focusing on the development of a national strategy and a legal framework to regulate open government data in the country, the availability of datasets prioritized for the private sector in an open format by public institutions, conducting awareness campaigns regarding open government data, and enhancing the qualifications of civil servants.

 Recommendations

- The Government of Georgia should accelerate the process of elaborating and adopting the legislative framework and national strategy on open data.

- The practice of observing the economic results of open data and measuring the market of open data should be initiated at the national level.

- The country should ensure participation in the Open Data Maturity Index with the involvement of the relevant responsible agency.

- The National Statistics Office of Georgia should ensure the selection of the target population for the survey "Use of information and Communication Technologies in Enterprises" in such a way that makes it possible to generalize the results of the survey according to each sector.

- Review the rationale behind paid services related to the provision of information in the public sector. When making a decision, the expected economic results of disclosing a specific dataset should be taken into account.

- The Government of Georgia should ensure the adoption of policy documents that would define unified standards for the management and mandatory publication of open data in the public sector.

- The Government of Georgia and the LEPL Digital Governance Agency should jointly plan and implement an update of the Open Data Portal and a campaign to raise public awareness of the portal’s potential benefits.

- Public institutions should ensure as much as possible the formation and management of existing and planned datasets and registries in such a way that they can be placed on the Open Data Portal.

- Public institutions should ensure the separation of personal and/or other closed information from the datasets and registries at their disposal and their availability to the public in open data format, and in case of technical impossibility of doing so, produce the most detailed statistics on specific issues.

- Develop a uniform guide for civil servants to help them process/publish open data, as well as to improve the publication, updating, and management of open data on www.data.gov.ge within the framework of fulfilling the obligations defined by the Law of Georgia on the Unified State Registry.

- Public institutions should create electronic public survey modules that will allow any interested person to express their opinion regarding the openness and availability of data based on the specifics of the activities of the agency.

- All public institutions, to the extent possible, should ensure the placement of datasets and registries identified as a result of the research by the Institute for the Development of Freedom of Information on the open data portal (www.data.gov.ge).

- Considering the positions of private sector representatives, the availability of following datasets/portals via API is the most important: the registries of the National Agency of Public Registry (including real estate and business registries), the State Procurement Agency (procurement.gov.ge), and the Reporting (reportal.ge) portals.

- To implement innovative services based on open data, it is important for private sector representatives to actively study international best practices and to identify open government data needed for the development of such services in Georgia. 

- It is important for private companies to proactively communicate their needs regarding the availability of open government data with public institutions and engage in activities aimed at collecting and making data of interest to them available in open formats within the framework of public-private dialogue.

Please find the full Study below.

Open Government Data Needs Assessment Study

/public/upload/Analysis/OGD-Report-Final-ENG.pdf

Disclaimer: This report is made possible by the support of the American people through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The contents of this report do not necessarily reflect the views of USAID or the United States Government.