UNECE Survey - Part 4: Issues and Obstacles

The UN-IGIF is a reference guide to support governments in the development and strengthening of integrated geospatial information management practices and their inclusion in national plans and strategies. It is also intended to be used as a tool for engagement that will lead to better “coordination, collaboration and coherence across government when working towards strengthening national geospatial information management” (UN-IGIF Part 1 - Overarching Strategic Framework). 

It has nine strategic pathways which relate to three broader areas of influence: governance, technology, and people.

• Governance and Institutions
• Legal and Policy
• Financial
• Data (& Technical Infrastructure)
• Innovation
• Standards
• Partnerships
• Capacity and Education
• Communication and Engagement

Given the importance and relevance of this framework to the integration of geospatial and statistical information, the UNECE Survey asked respondents to rate, from their organisation's perspective, the degree of impact that each strategic pathway had on their ability to progress data integration activities and were asked to provide further information on those ratings. We will be looking at the UN-IGIF in much more detail in a later post.

1. Financial

Financial issues were identified as the biggest obstacle to the greater integration of statistical and geospatial data across the UNECE region, with 54% of survey respondents ranking it as high impact. The level of impact was drastically higher for organisations in target countries (73%) than non-target countries (48%), but relatively similar for NSIs (56%) and NMCAs (50%). Respondents noted the lack of financial support, both through the appropriate allocation of government funding and the lack of investment by international and EU donors, as the biggest financial obstacle to greater data integration. They emphasised that the issue would only be compounded by the impact of future planned budget cuts at some government levels, threatening the sustainability of systems and the technical infrastructure required for effective and efficient data lifecycles. One respondent highlighted the lack of sustainable financial resources necessary to create and maintain their national spatial data infrastructure which was particularly impacting the improvement and implementation of national and international standards for their primary geospatial datasets. Another noted that part of their organisational budget came from custom work packages from government and private organisations, but the overly bureaucratic procedures required to get such work funded and initiated required lot of staff time and resource that could be better spent elsewhere. Several respondents also highlighted the importance of, and need for, adequate investment in staff training to ensure highly qualified staff could contribute effectively to data integration activities. Also of importance was the ability to fund and maintain innovative hardware and software packages and the efficiency gains they could bring. Overall, as one participant aptly summarised, there is a need for decision-makers to understand the concrete benefits of data integration so they can invest in such activities and raise the capacity of key institutions and the qualifications of staff. New financial models are needed based on investment needs and funding sources for the delivery of integrated statistics and geospatial information management.

2. Communication and Engagement

Issues relating to communication and engagement were ranked as having the second highest impact on the greater integration of geospatial and statistical information, with 43% of respondents rating it as high impact. A marginally higher number of respondents from target country organisations rated it as high impact (47%) than from non-target countries (42%). A much more marked difference was, however, evident by organisation type as 72% of respondents from NMCAs rated it as high impact in comparison to 31% of respondents from NSIs, indicating that more efforts were required to improve communication and engagement strategies towards geospatial organisations in particular. Respondents highlighted the need for greater engagement with decision-makers at strategic levels through the development of stronger communication strategies which emphasise key messages around the benefits of integrating statistical and geospatial information and its importance for evidence-based decision-making to support the 2030 Agenda and the achievement of its SDGs. Some respondents also noted the need for more open communication between NSIs and NMCAs, a shared commitment to data integration activities, and established and agreed roles to progress data integration at national levels, particularly centred around the promotion of National Spatial Data Infrastructures and their role in supporting all stages of the statistical process. It is clear that new communication and engagement strategies are needed to promote the benefits of data integration to a much broader target audience than present, actively engaging with decision-makers from target country organisations and NMCAs in particular. In growing awareness of, and acquiring buy-in to, data integration activities, real progress can be made, and the benefits truly realised.

3. Data & Technical Infrastructure

Data and technical infrastructure issues were ranked as having the third highest impact on the integration of geospatial and statistical data, with 42% of respondents rating it as high impact. The level of impact was much higher for target countries (53%) than non-target countries (38%) and, similarly, for NSIs (49%) than NMCAs (28%). This clearly indicates that more efforts are required to support data integration activities within NSIs, particularly in the target country areas. Respondents cited that the biggest obstacles related to data interoperability, with different data collection and storage methods, unstandardised data formats, and a lack of unique identifiers resulting in an inability to integrate data sources from different institutions. The quality, currency and completeness of available data was also noted as impacting data integration activities, as was the ability to make data available to share and reuse through robust and secure technical infrastructures and standardised procedures. Limitations in hardware and software components, particularly relating to performance issues, the need for major system upgrades and additional servers, as well as support for dedicated software packages, were further impacting the ability to progress data integration activities. In many ways, the issues and obstacles cited above are very much a consequence of the financial issues discussed above as well as the lack of appropriate standards for data harmonisation. A multi-faceted approach is therefore necessary to ensure that data, and the technical infrastructure it sits within, is suitable for data integration activities that are sustainable into the future.