Data-Driven Journalism Enabled by the Africa Data Hub
Sarah Findlay is 'Africa Data Hub' Project Lead at Open Cities Lab. We explore the importance and key features of the Africa Data Hub, responsibly sourced data, enabling trust in the media, value offered by the Africa Data Hub, how to collaborate with them and their plans to have a quantifiable impact.
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About Africa Data Hub
- Across the continent, important datasets are either inaccessible to the public, or are difficult to locate, retrieve and analyse.
- Africa Data Hub serves to fill this gap by providing a free one-stop-shop for newsrooms, researchers and the public to access near real-time COVID-19-related data in user-friendly formats.
- Seeks to support and promote quality data-driven journalism and in turn, facilitate evidence-based decision-making about the pandemic across the continent.
How to get individuals to trust the data they receive from the media?
- Trust in media and government is at an all-time low.
- Can be overcome by providing accuracy and credibility
- Unpack sources and methodology on how data was collected
How to get individuals to actually trust the media?
- Newsrooms need to make it clear why journalism is important.
- There is a gap where newsrooms assume everyone knows why they are important.
- Put effort into providing consumers of news with critical literacy skills to understand what a credible news story looks like and what to look out for. Sarah explains further.
Why an Africa Data Hub and where the need stemmed from?
- Good and accurate data is essential to decision making (individual, national and international level)
- Accurate data help to deploy resources where it is needed most.
- Poor data means decisions are made with inaccurate information resulting in not understanding what is happening on the ground.
Major consequences when data is not responsibly sourced
- Trust is a critical element and if that is missing we struggle to move forward as a society.
- Leads to poor decision-making.
Key features of the Africa Data hub and value offered to journalists and newsrooms
- Data repository
- Mapped data
- Vaccine tracker (first of its kind in the world)
The value offered to public sector and business in Africa
- Portal and data freely available to anyone.
- Data is a critical resource and tool for us to implement change across different spheres of government and industries.
- Ability to explore what Covid has meant to various different sectors.
Role players involved in making it a successful project
- Open Cities Labs (OCL)
- OpenUp Civic Technology & Open Data Specialists
- Data visualization company Odipo Dev in Nairobi.
- The data visualization company Orodata in Nigeria,
- The South African data journalists’ group Media Hack Collective.
- Media Monitoring Africa is the fifth partner who is contributing most significantly to the monitoring and evaluation aspects of the project.
Next steps and future vision for Africa Data Hub
- Seeks to become go top data repository on the continent.
- Currently Covid adjacent data but eventually a Health data repository
- Expand to newsrooms and research institutions across the continent.
- Stimulate data-driven storytelling and journalism.
- Capacity building and training.
Options for industry to collaborate with Africa Data Hub
- Industry can provide datasets that are relevant to journalists and the public.
How to get in contact with Africa Data Hub
About Sarah Findlay
‘’I love telling the stories through and about data. I am a social ecologist by training but my work has always focused on the intersection of social justice, human rights, science and broader sustainability issues.
Three years ago, my work took a different direction and I became a programme coordinator in Media Monitoring Africa's Policy and Quality Unit. My well-established research skills and my experience in systems thinking allowed me to sink my teeth into the complexities and nuance of in-depth media research, analysis and policy development from the start.
While my time at MMA confirmed my natural aptitude for project management and multi-tasking, where at any one time I juggled multiple projects, teams, and outputs, I also used this time to explore new creative ways of external communication, including the design of graphics, reports, and presentations.
Research, data analysis, and creative communication remain firmly engrained in my interests and skills. I am now in a new consulting space where I share my knack for wordsmithery, data, and infographics with a broader client base.’’
Source: LinkedIn
About the Africa Data Hub
The COVID-19 pandemic has thrown up an array of data-related challenges. Across the continent, important datasets are either inaccessible to the public, or are difficult to locate, retrieve and analyse. In some cases, the data simply does not exist yet. The Africa Data Hub serves to fill this gap by providing a free one-stop-shop for newsrooms, researchers, and the public to access near real-time COVID-19-related data in user-friendly formats.
In so doing, the Africa Data Hub seeks to support and promote quality data-driven journalism and in turn, facilitate evidence-based decision-making about the pandemic across the continent.
Visit: https://www.africadatahub.org/
About Open Cities Lab
We work to build inclusion and participatory democracy in cities and urban spaces through empowering citizens, building trust and accountability in civic space, and capacitating government.
CITIZEN EMPOWERMENT
We empower citizens to know their rights and understand the data, knowledge, mechanisms, and processes they can use to make their lives, and those of their communities, better. ‘Better’ means more inclusive and participative, both in ‘hard’ topics such as service delivery and built environment, as well as social cohesion, dignity, placemaking, and community building.
BUILDING GOVERNMENT CAPACITY
We work proactively with the government to build capacity for informed decision-making and evidence-based policy and planning, with a focus on areas where this can uplift vulnerable and excluded communities. We enable co-design of existing and new processes and mechanisms for including citizens in decision-making, including sharing and opening data and information, and ‘crowding-in’ of intelligence and insight.
TRUST & ACCOUNTABILITY IN CIVIC SPACE
We work with key actors including communities, the media, academia, and government to build accountability and trust in civic space. This includes fair and independent media, monitoring and transparent oversight of power, such as state-owned enterprises, and increasingly, the use of AI and machine learning in areas that affect privacy and democracy.
Visit: https://opencitieslab.org/
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