Sierra Leone Telegraph: 29 January 2024:
The Mo Ibrahim Foundation today presented its Ibrahim Index of African Governance (IIAG) 2023 report, titled The Power of Data for Governance: Closing data gaps to accelerate Africa’s transformation. data gaps to accelerate Africa’s transformation). The availability of reliable data is a pillar of Africa’s governance and development agendas.
The report highlights the essential role of data as a driver of progress, but also for evaluating the action of public authorities, defining strategic priorities and building trust in governments.
Drawing on the IIAG 2022 dataset, the 2023 report highlights a highly significant correlation between access to quality statistics and governance effectiveness in African countries between 2012 and 2021.
However, Africa remains the continent most affected by the lack of data, displaying the lowest levels of availability in terms of civil registration and statistics.
Many African countries lack basic data essential for developing public policies, including population censuses and registration of births and deaths.
Even in areas of progress, serious gaps remain, particularly in health infrastructure, the informal economy, the environment, violence against women, child labor or illicit financial flows.
In 14 African countries, the last population census dates back to before 2010. Only 3 African countries have a death registration system that records at least 90% of deaths.
While SDG 1 calls for the eradication of extreme poverty by 2030, only 5 African countries have data on the proportion of the population living below the international poverty line for the period 2019-2022
The underfunding of statistical systems remains a major challenge globally, with them receiving only 0.34% of total official development assistance (ODA). In Africa, ODA allocated to data and statistics almost halved between 2018 and 2021.
In addition to investing in data, the report indicates essential avenues for strengthening the impact of data and accelerating development on the continent: ensuring the independence of national statistical institutes, exploiting other data sources such as produced by citizens and data from private companies, and take advantage of new technologies such as artificial intelligence.
Mo Ibrahim, founder and president of the Foundation , underlined the importance of data for the implementation of development programs and the definition of public policies:
“Without data, we are moving blindly: policies are poorly targeted and progress is chaotic. If we truly want to leave no one behind, we must act urgently to close the data gap in Africa. Data is essential to achieving the African Union Agenda 2063 and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. I have long thought that the United Nations 2030 Agenda should have included an SDG 0 entitled “Reliable data for governance”. »
The report was presented in Accra, Ghana, at an event co-hosted with Afrobarometer. Since its creation, the Mo Ibrahim Foundation has energetically supported Afrobarometer, today the main African institute conducting opinion surveys on the continent.
Afrobarometer is the sole data source for the Citizen Voices section, which complements the IIAG dataset.
The report presentation follows a two-day meeting of the IIAG expert group in Accra. The renewed advisory body meets once a year in person in an African country to conduct consultations on the IIAG.
Download the Power of Data for Governance report
About the Mo Ibrahim Foundation
Created in 2006, the Mo Ibrahim Foundation carries Africa’s voice on global challenges. It produces data and analysis on the challenges facing the continent, invites stakeholders to discussions and supports initiatives to strengthen leadership and governance in Africa.
About the Ibrahim Index of African Governance (IIAG)
Published by the Mo Ibrahim Foundation since 2007, the Ibrahim Index of African Governance (IIAG) is the most comprehensive publicly available dataset measuring the governance performance of African countries. Every two years, the IIAG provides comparable data across the entire spectrum of African governance, from security to the rule of law, transparency, rights, participation, economic prospects, education, health and the environment, in 54 countries and over a period of ten years. The 2024 Index will be published in the second half of 2024 and will cover the period 2014-2023.
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