High-quality data = effective governance
2023 Ibrahim Index of African Governance (IIAG) report released
The Mo Ibrahim Foundation (MIF) unveiled its IIAG Series 2023 Report, The Power of Data for Governance: Closing Data Gaps to Accelerate Africa’s Transformation, in Accra, Ghana on Monday. Emphasising the pivotal role of sound data in Africa's governance and development, the report highlights its significance in propelling progress, evaluating government performance, shaping policy priorities, and fostering trust in governmental institutions.Examining data from the 2022 IIAG dataset, the report establishes a positive correlation between access to high-quality statistics and effective governance across African nations from 2012 to 2021. Despite this, Africa remains the most globally impacted continent by data gaps, especially in civil registration and vital statistics, where it exhibits the lowest availability.
Critical shortcomings persist in fundamental statistical components crucial for shaping public policies, including population censuses, and birth and death registration, particularly in several African countries. Even in areas where progress has been made, significant governance data gaps persist, encompassing health structures, the informal economy, environmental concerns, violence against women, child labour, and illicit financial flows.
Serious challenge
Global underfunding of data poses a serious challenge, with only 0.34% of Official Development Assistance (ODA) allocated to statistics. In Africa, ODA for data and statistics has nearly halved between 2018 and 2021.
The report advocates for increased investment in data and outlines strategies to enhance data impact and expedite development in Africa. These strategies include safeguarding the independence of National Statistical Offices, utilizing alternative data sources such as citizen-generated and private company data, and incorporating technologies like Artificial Intelligence and machine learning.
Mo Ibrahim, Founder and Chair of the Mo Ibrahim Foundation stressed the crucial role of data in achieving development and policy agendas in Africa. He emphasized the urgency of closing the data gap to avoid misdirected policies and hindered progress on the road to development, stating that "Without data, we are driving blind."
The launch event took place in Accra, Ghana, co-hosted with Afrobarometer, a leading African research institution conducting public attitude surveys on the continent. Afrobarometer's Citizens’ Voices dataset complements the IIAG dataset. The report launch followed a two-day meeting of the IIAG Expert Panel in Accra, where the advisory body convened for in-person consultations on the IIAG, an annual tradition held in different African countries.