Openaid.se - making the transparency guarantee a reality
As part of efforts to improve aid effectiveness and apply the principle of public access to official documents in a more modern way, a transparency guarantee has been introduced into Swedish development assistance. The guarantee means that everyone who is interested can follow the entire aid chain, from overall decisions on the direction and distribution of development assistance to specific decisions, payments, implementation and monitoring. Now the guarantee has been made more tangible with the launch of the Openaid.se information service.
As a leading aid donor with a long tradition of openness and a clear democracy agenda, Sweden has particular reason to meet the requirements for transparency that have recently gained attention in international development assistance.
Today´s digitised world makes it easier to apply the principle of public access to official documents. From now on, all non-classified information on development assistance will be made available online. This is also in keeping with the eGovernment Delegations instructions concerning openness in public administration.
This openness is also part of the international Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness. Increased transparency will facilitate accountability and counteract corruption.
The transparency guarantee means:
- The principle of public access to official documents will be applied in a modern way in aid administration, whereby aid information is actively made available rather than passively.
- Swedish aid administration will openly report operations financed by the Swedish central government budget under the expenditure area `International development cooperation` and will account for how the aid is used: When, how, to whom and for what purpose has money been paid? According to what decision-making information, on what conditions and with what results are operations financed by the Swedish aid budget implemented.
- Information about development assistance will be freely and functionally available. Aid information will be published digitally in an open format. It will be published without undue delay and be continually updated.
The idea is that everyone interested can follow the whole aid chain, from overall decisions on the direction and distribution of aid to specific decisions, payments, implementation and monitoring.
The Openaid.se information service
The Ministry for Foreign Affairs, in cooperation with Sida, has developed the information service Openaid.se to make the transparency guarantee tangible. It now contains aid information from 2007 to 2010. It also contains historical data from the 1970s to the 1990s, in so far as it is available electronically. Data from 2000 and onwards becomes more and more detailed. Openaid.se primarily shows data at contribution level, which makes it possible to follow different contributions and their component parts at both country level and sectoral level.
Openaid.se is a prototype and will be further developed in terms of content and functionality to eventually include all actors handling Swedish development assistance funds. This task has been given to Sida.
Openaid.se is not a regular website, rather data is available in an open format called an Application Programming Interface (API), which makes it easier for those who want to reuse data and develop it in their own forms.
Sweden has become the fourth country to join the International Aid Transparency Initiative. This means that Openaid.se is now in line with the IATI standard. As a result, Swedish open aid data can be compared with that of other countries.
A presentation in English is provided via the link in the right column.
