Realising the Data Revolution for Sustainable Development: Towards Capacity Development 4.0

Abstract

The ongoing data revolution, a significantly changed global context through the 2030 agenda and the necessity to use evidence more effectively in development co-operation have led to a clear momentum in international support of data and statistics. The UN World Data Forum in Cape Town represents an important milestone for the global debate, yet in view of the challenges at hand can only be a meaningful starting point. These dynamics need to be addressed at the national level worldwide and require more vigorous and concerted international support. The analysis presented in this paper demonstrates the need to speed up efforts in several regards. Recent years were to some extent supportive in bringing issues on data and statistics to a broader audience and closer to the management level of main stakeholders (including development agencies, partner countries’ government institutions’, etc.). Not least the dynamics of the 2030 Agenda and related initiatives were important elements for a stronger interest in related topics. At the same time the crucial role of data and statistics for the political-economy of countries and of development co-operation actors are often not addressed in discussions beyond rather narrow circles of experts and thus largely fail to translate into more effective co-operation.