Open Government Partnership (OGP) for the City of Skopje
Overview
In autumn 2021, SmartUp supported the City of Skopje's environment department in opening up its data, as part of the Resilient Skopje project. The City holds a large body of environmental and climate data: monitoring results, studies, permits and emission inventories. This data sat in separate files across units and was hard to find or reuse.
We set up the method, the catalogue and the working routines the City needed to prepare these datasets for the national open-data portal, as part of its Open Government Partnership commitments. All materials were produced in Macedonian.
The challenge
No shared method
Units had no common definition of a dataset, no agreed metadata and no way to decide what to publish first.
Data that was hard to find and reuse
Information lived in PDF reports, spreadsheets and individual computers, with no single place to collect and describe it.
No formal ownership
Open-data work depended on individual staff. The City needed a working group and a named person responsible for its portal profile.
Activities and methods
Skopje is home to about a third of the country's population, and decades of studies and monitoring have produced large databases that are not always used to their full value. We worked with the environment department through six strands of activity.
- Guidelines for open data. A four-step inventory method: review the laws, identify data sources, identify datasets, then register them. It came with quality criteria, a six-criterion scoring model to rank what to publish first, and a minimum standard of two stars on the five-star open-data scale.
- A dataset catalogue. A shared template using EU metadata vocabularies for theme, licence, frequency and language, so entries can later be exchanged with other portals.
- Working sessions with each unit. We introduced the initiative on 15 September 2021, then ran sessions with each unit of the department between 18 and 26 November. Staff described their datasets, and we scored each one against the six criteria.
- A shared data workspace. We mapped the materials staff already produced and grouped them into twelve themes, including air, water, soil, emissions control, climate change, green areas, nature protection and energy and transport. Staff confirmed the structure before documents were uploaded.
- Governance. We supported the City in forming a formal open-data working group by mayoral decision, and in nominating a person to manage its profile on the national open-data portal.
- Submission preparation. We prepared the prioritised datasets for submission to the national open-data portal.
Impact and learning
Guidelines and data catalogue. The project established guidelines and protocols for open data management and a detailed catalogue of datasets, giving the city an organised resource for data-driven decision-making and transparency.
Data collection workspace. SmartUp set up a structured shared workspace and a catalogue template to support data mapping and collection for the Open Data Portal, streamlining data management for the City of Skopje.
Datasets prepared for the national portal. Datasets were prepared for submission to the national open-data portal in line with the National Action Plan commitments. A shared workspace also made it easier for city staff to access and organise the data.
Stakeholder engagement and capacity building. Working sessions with the open-data working group and city departments strengthened collaboration and built capacity for open data practices among 14 city and UNDP staff.
Gallery
Planning similar work?
SmartUp can support research, co-creation, facilitation, digital tools, implementation, or learning documentation for related programmes.