Open Data Infrastructure for City Resilience Launched at GIS for a Sustainable World
Resurgence has launched in Geneva, with the Making Cities Resilient Campaign of the UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNSIDR), a major new resource to help cities use open data to build their disaster resilience. Open Data Infrastructure for City Resilience is a roadmap, showcase and guide that features over 25 examples of cities from around the world that are innovating with open data to manage their risk.
‘City planners need accurate data, easy access to data and updated data to manage their disaster risk. It is important that data should be available to all stakeholders. That is why open data is important’, said Sanjaya Bhatia, the Head of the UNISDR Global Education Training Institute where the Making Cities Resilient Campaign is anchored.
Addressing the plenary of the GIS for a Sustainable World Conference organised by Esri and UNITAR’s Operational Satellite Application Programme (UNOSAT), Mark Harvey, CEO of Resurgence outlined why cities need to think less about data as the new oil for their economic development and rather more about its potential – as open data – as a critical infrastructure and an enabler of the open innovation that is needed to reduce risk and build resilience in cities. ‘Any infrastructure needs investment, governance and management – this also applies to the development of open data infrastructure for cities. The Roadmap, Showcase and Guide provides a business case and practical inspiration to city planners to build this infrastructure. Importantly, it helps them to do this in close alignment with a city disaster resilience framework – the Ten Essentials – which over 3,500 cities have adopted as members of the UN Making Cities Resilient Campaign.
Open Data Infrastructure for Resilience was led by Resurgence and a global alliance of partners committed to mobilizing open data for urban resilience: Resilience Brokers, OpenNorth, GeoSUMR and Esri.