Dear Sitting Chair Mr. Munroe:
The objective of the GYEITI seeks to offer the Guyanese people factual and comprehensible information about the extractive sector in Guyana and the financial flows between the extractive industries and the GoG, in order to facilitate an informed debate about the extractive sector value chain in Guyana. And this objective can be realized vis-à-vis the open data format, which is the first priority in the GYEITI work plan 2023-2024.
The EITI International Secretariat encourages EITI countries to embrace the open data format in EITI implementation. The Open Data Handbook (Open Knowledge) defines open data, thus:
“Open data is data that can be freely used, re-used and shared by anyone – subject only, at most,
to the requirement to attribute and share alike.”
In compliance with EITI Requirement 7.2, EITI countries may “Agree a clear open data policy on the access, release and re-use of EITI data…Make the data available in an open data format online and publicise its availability.”
The open data format is accessible in these formats: comma-separated values (CSV), Extensible Markup Language (XML), JavaScript Object Notation (JSON), and Microsoft Excel. Accessibility refers to the ease with which information is acquired. And so, the EITI International Secretariat, through EITI Requirement 7.2, has been urging EITI countries to deliver granular, machine-readable and interoperable data, which will facilitate their re-use and redistribution as well as blending with other datasets from other EITI countries for analytic purposes.
Programs and machines can handle some types of data formats better than other formats. For instance, machines have difficulty disseminating and analyzing information in a PDF format. And so, it would be advisable to amass data in these established machine-readable file formats, viz: XML, JSON, CSV, and Microsoft Excel. The HTML, PDF, DOC, GIF, JPEG, and PPT formats are not machine-readable, and, therefore, inappropriate for the open data format.
Accordingly, in referencing subcomponent 1 of the GYEITI 2023-2024 work plan, the first prioritized objective is to improve public awareness and accessibility of the extractive sector information through an open data format. And so, after having several consultations with the BDO LLP, here is its Microsoft Excel version of the open data format (attached) pertaining to the GYEITI FY 2020 IA Report; a useful starting point to grapple with the open data format, a requirement of the 2023-2024 work plan and the EITI Requirement 7.2.
Thus, given the numerous deficiencies exposed by the previous validation assessment and the necessity of preparing for the prevalidation and the 2024 validation assessment, the GYEITI Secretariat’s main focus will be the implementation of the 2023-2024 work plan. Therefore, the Secretariat’s work activities, among other things, must be ensconced within the framework of the current work plan, in order to correct the lingering deficiencies.
Best,
Prem Misir, PhD, MPH, MPhil, BSSc (Hons.), FRSPH
National Coordinator
GYEITI National Secretariat
55 Main Street, Georgetown, Guyana
Office: (592) 231-2504 X 315