Coordination of the open data ecosystem development (BA0021)

Which public issue will this obligation address?

Research on open data readiness in Bosnia and Herzegovina indicates that the country is at a very early stage in implementing the open data initiative. This reflects a lack of prioritization of open data at the senior level, lack of information and limited awareness of its benefits, insufficient IT staff, the absence of systematic database management, and generally underdeveloped information management practices across institutions.

The research also notes that the adoption of the Information Security Management Policy in BiH Institutions 2017–2022 demonstrated strategic-level readiness of institutions to adopt such policies; however, civil servants’ familiarity with this policy and its implementation remain limited. No specific documents on data management and protection currently exist. The BiH Interoperability Framework, adopted in 2018, could partially address these gaps and provide common frameworks for open data management.

On the other hand, there is an extensive regulatory and financial framework for open data, the process of public administration reform, as well as a clear and continuous role of the Public Administration Reform Coordinator’s Office and the Open Government Partnership in initiating and coordinating the data opening.

The term ‘open data’ refers to making public data held by various public administration bodies available to the public (primarily to private-sector legal entities, citizens and non-governmental organisations). Such data should be made available in a format that allows searching, free use and the ability to transform and process the data for various purposes (e.g. commercial use, anti-corruption efforts, etc.).

Although the current demand for open data in Bosnia and Herzegovina is modest, there is a significant increase in the interest of citizens, companies and organisations in open data. Citizens also express a growing need for e-services and easy access to public sector information, which requires interoperability and data openness. Furthermore, open data would enhance the functioning of public administration, as research has shown that service delivery to citizens is often slowed and complicated by public officials’ inability to access data held by other public administration institutions.

What is the obligation?

The obligation will directly address the above-mentioned issue by establishing an open data portal, ensuring its operational functionality and promoting the active role of institutions in publishing data. The open data portal is a platform where public sector-owned data is published, collected, categorized, searched and distributed. Its primary objective is to make public administration data accessible from a single (central) location - the portal, thereby promoting the use of public (open) data and enabling cooperation between the public and private sectors, particularly in the field of information technologies, through the development of (non-)commercial applications that provide added value to users of public sector data (information and documents).

One of the components of the project Support for Public Administration Reform in Bosnia and Herzegovina was aimed at making the open data portal fully operational. The open data portal was developed and presented to institutions and relevant non-governmental organisations through a technical support project provided to the Public Administration Reform Coordinator’s Office. The plan is to initiate the operational availability and promotion of the Open Data Portal based on this platform, in cooperation with relevant institutions, such as the General Secretariat of the Council of Ministers of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Given the portal’s design, architecture and underlying mechanisms (data and metadata publication, links to open published data and data catalogue harvesting), the key benefit for end users is enhanced searchability and access to a larger volume of high-quality open data in a single location. Furthermore, the portal’s design, modelled on the EU reference portal, facilitates greater data reuse by providing structured, category-based access, similar to the EU portal. This approach is essential for application developers, who can use open data from a single up-to-date and authorized source to generate new value from institutional data and offer such applications to a broader audience of interested users.

In this context, the obligation of the Public Administration Reform Coordinator’s Office will be to establish effective coordination that will enable the publication and operational launch of the portal developed through the above-mentioned project, by:
- establishing institutional cooperation with key BiH institutions to set out and agree on the institutional framework for the portal’s operation;
- advocating, in cooperation with key institutions, for the publication of the first datasets from pilot BiH institutions;
- undertaking appropriate advocacy (initiation) activities at other administrative levels, aimed at taking over the developed methodological and IT solutions, thereby creating the conditions for broader integration of open data across Bosnia and Herzegovina. This will significantly enhance the transparency of public administration, contribute to reducing corruption and generate numerous other positive effects.

In line with the Strategic Framework for Public Administration Reform in BiH 2018–2022 (2027), reform area Service Delivery 4.2.25, these activities will establish and promote open data portals in accordance with the EU Directive (2019/1024 Directive on open data).

How does the obligation contribute to resolving the public issue?

Functionality of the open data portal, along with the proactive publication of information, will provide transparent insight into the work of institutions and the decisions made on behalf of citizens. This approach facilitates citizens’ access to information, replacing the need to submit a request on a prescribed form, navigate the legal framework, wait for a response, or pay fees for access. Instead, institutions proactively publish information in a format that allows for searching, free use, as well as transformation and processing for various purposes. Moreover, the proactive publication of information on the open data portal ensures that the information held by an institution is available to everyone, not only to those who submit requests for access to information.

Why is this obligation relevant to the OGP values?

The operation of the open data portal has a direct impact on the efficiency of public administration and the competitiveness of the economy, highlighting the key values of modern governance, such as transparency, accountability, citizen participation in decision-making, integrity, anti-corruption and related principles.

Additional information

The obligation to proactively publish information is also supported by:
- the Universal Declaration of Human Rights;
- the European principles of good public administration;
- national legislation (Law on Public Procurement of BiH, laws on administration, laws on free access to information...);
- the Strategic Framework for Public Administration Reform in Bosnia and Herzegovina 2018–2022;
- Directive 2019/1024 on open data and the reuse of public sector information;
- the European Commission’s communication Towards a common European data space (SWD(2018)125 final);
- the Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions – A Digital Single Market Strategy for Europe (COM/2015/0192 final).

Milestones:

Establishment of a user-friendly, interactive open data portal: Invite institutions (selected for piloting) to establish and prepare data sets from various fields and publish them on the portal as open data. | 1 January 2025 – 30 March 2025
Conduct consultations with stakeholders outside the administration to assess the need for open data. | 1 March 2025 – 31 May 2025
Identify data sets with the highest potential for usefulness and reusability. | 1 May 2025 – 31 July 2025
Advocate for the opening of previously identified data sets and the development of data opening coordination within institutions, as well as with the private sector and the academic community; develop a strategic focus and raise awareness through promotional events organized in cooperation with participating institutions and civil society organisations for representatives all other institutions at the BiH level and representatives of other administrative levels, as well as for representatives of other non-governmental organisations, academic and business community, professional associations, etc., including: at least two conferences and two round tables per year and the promotion of the key objectives of the public data ecosystem (values, reuse and use, benefits of open data). | 1 July 2025 – 31 December 2025
Develop a training program on open data for employees of the BiH institutions in cooperation with Civil Service Agency of BiH. | 1 January 2026 – 31 March 2026
Initiate and coordinate the availability of open data at other administrative levels based on the completed pilot project for BiH institutions. | 1 March 2026 – 31 December 2026