Open Data Across Canada – A Snapshot

February 1, 2016

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“Open data is data that can be freely used, shared and built-on by anyone, anywhere, for any purpose.” – Open Knowledge Foundation

The governments of Alberta, British Columbia and Canada conducted a survey on open data of all Canadian provinces and territories in 2015. Open data programs have become increasingly popular across the country, and we wanted to have a better picture of who is active in Canada, what open data programs look like, and what impact they’re having.

Check out this infographic for a snapshot of the results.

Who has open data?

As recently as five years ago, no one in Canada had an open data portal. Today:

  • Half of Canadian federal, provincial, and territorial jurisdictions have open data portals and programs (7 out of 14 – including Canada, BC, Alberta, Ontario, Quebec, Newfoundland and Labrador, and Yukon).
  • Canada’s open data portals are small but mighty: They have 10 or fewer staff, budgets of $500,000 or less, and have been running for 5 years or less, but almost 250,000 datasets are available for download.
  • Nova Scotia is developing its portal over the coming year.
  • All six remaining jurisdictions are studying whether to create open data portals.

What are open data principles?

All of the active jurisdictions also agreed that open data portals should be built according to three key principles:

  • Government data should be easy to reuse and available in open formats.
  • Government data should be easily discoverable, and Canadians should be able to find all open data via any portal.
  • Governments should engage with citizens, especially to prioritize data for release.

Six of the active jurisdictions use an open licence, which allows people to freely reuse any of the information.

Who’s using open data?

The survey found that there’s a strong market for open data. In all seven active jurisdictions, the number one type of feedback is a request for more data.

Open data is being requested by individuals, businesses, and governments equally. This shows that open data is useful for a broad range of groups.

What data are people looking for?

The key feature of any open data portal is the data itself.

A dataset is a collection of interrelated data records organized in a specific way in a computer-readable medium.

The most downloaded dataset types fall into three general categories:

Better services

  • Baby names
  • Education
  • Public transit
  • Scientific research data
  • Health

Better transparency

  • Budget/financial
  • Procurement/contracts
  • Elected official expenditures
  • Crime and Justice
  • Civil service expenditures

Innovative business

  • Geographical/Geospatial
  • Natural Resources
  • Environment Employment/labour
  • Demographics
  • Socioeconomics statistics
 

How are people using the data?

Data is being used to create apps and services to solve problems, and to save time and money. Real-time transit info, career path tools, and healthy food locators are just some of the types of products that have resulted from reusing open data. Similar services developed through our Canadian Open Data Experience (CODE) appathon include:

  • High School Down, Where Next?  helps young Canadians make decisions about their career path based on geography, potential income, tuition cost and other factors.
  • Farm Canada lets farmers look up commodity prices, buy and sell equipment, and receive market updates.

Here are a few other examples of apps being developed in Canada:

  • RerouteMe helps commuters avoid construction, accidents and traffic congestion, using traffic and mapping data.
  • MapYourProperty helps the land development and real estate industry use land planning data and determine property potential.

What’s next for open data in Canada?

Survey respondents also said they want to create common standards, explore how to make it easier for people to find data from multiple government sources, and study how best to implement open data programs. We’ll work through Open Data Canada, our federal-provincial-territorial-municipal forum, to make progress on these issues.

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Rules of Engagement

We look forward to hearing from you. Your ideas and feedback are central to the development of both the Open Government portal and the Government of Canada’s approach to Open Government.

While comments are moderated, the portal will not censor any comments except in a few specific cases, listed below. Accounts acting contrary to these rules may be temporarily or permanently disabled.

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Our team cannot commit to replying to every message or comment, but we look forward to continuing the conversation whenever possible. Please note that responses will be provided in the same language that was used in the original comment.

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Comments

Submitted by open-ouvert on June 22, 2022 - 9:06 PM

Bonjour Ghanem,

Ce système de commentaires mène à l'équipe responsable pour la transparence et la responsabilisation au sein de la fonction publique. Nous hébergeons des ensembles de données et des registres portant sur divers sujets, y compris des statistiques concernant l'immigration, les demandes de permis de travail et de visas, mais nous ne fournissons pas ces services directement.

Pour vous renseigner davantage sur le processus de demande pour un permis de travail au Canada, nous vous suggérons de consulter le site Web suivant:

-Visa pour visiteurs: Comment présenter une demande de visa de visiteur - Canada.ca

-Permis de travail: Travailler au Canada - Canada.ca

 

Pour toute autre question, nous vous suggérons de communiquer directement avec Immigration, Réfugiés et Citoyenneté Canada à leur Centre de soutien à la clientèle: https://www.canada.ca/fr/immigration-refugies-citoyennete/organisation/contactez-ircc/centre-soutien-clientele.html

Bien à vous, 

L'équipe du Gouvernement ouvert

 

Submitted by abd alhadi fahouraji on September 01, 2017 - 7:54 PM

Sir, I am a Syrian refugee and I live in Lebanon with my wife and three children. I want asylum for my three children. I suffer. I have been aborted by young Lebanese. I look forward to my request. We are not believers. The Lebanese people treat us with racism and bad living. Here we are non-believers. Wared for asylum and help and my children were kidnapped by a serviceman with a son, we are not faithful and I want asylum for safety for my children

Submitted by open-ouvert on September 07, 2017 - 5:35 PM

Hello, I'm sorry to hear about your situation. This comment system leads to the team responsible for transparency and accountability work in the public service. We host datasets and records about many things, including historic statistics on immigration and visa applications, but we do not deal with these services directly. I also removed your phone number for your own privacy. I would recommend you contact UNHCR Canada for assistance: http://www.unhcr.ca/contact-us/ You can go to the following website to learn more about immigration: Immigration, Refugees, and Citizenship Canada: http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/immigrate/apply.asp Refugees and Asylum: http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/refugees/index.asp Here is how they can apply to become refugees: http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/information/applications/conref.asp You can email your local IRCC office for direct help: http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/information/offices/index.asp I hope this helps. Warmest Regards, Sabrina The Open Government team

Submitted by Terri MacDonald on February 13, 2017 - 9:58 PM

Hi, I'm a researcher at Selkirk College in BC and I am working on a SSHRC funded project entitled "Open Data for Open Government in Rural BC" Would you be willing to share the survey with me so that I can determine if it would be useful to use in our research? Thanks, Terri

Submitted by Victor Kuntzevitsky on December 26, 2016 - 6:35 PM

Thank you for prioritizing such an important initiative! Please continue on doing the hard work you do. Open Data Canada is an extremely useful resource for the betterment of our country.

Submitted by Shelley Galloway on October 21, 2016 - 2:57 AM

I would like to access data to help me teach grade 8 Math. I am a teacher near Whitby Ontario.

Submitted by History Lesson on June 01, 2016 - 8:43 PM

Open Data and access to it has been around for decades (phone books, business directories, maps, libraries, census', forum, indexes, etc.)... One thing that has changed more recently, is the terminology "open data" (before it was called, information, records, directories, indexes, collections... sometimes they were digital, sometimes they were print - often in both), and more collaboration to make it available, and in easier formats to ingest. It's very dangerous to insinuate that open data didn't exist prior to 2011 in Canada, at any level... Many many Canadians, especially those serving in public service have poured years of their lives collecting, and making available data of all sorts and kinds in many jurisdictions domestically, and internationally. Digitally, and in print. It's fantastic that there appear to be more, and better portals for locating "open data", and I'm sure we all look forward to more of it, and greater access, and reach. What a blessing it is that more people are being vocal about wanting access to this data, new and historical. It's great! ... but come on... it's been around for way more than 5 years... - History Lesson

Submitted by Kate on April 13, 2016 - 4:02 PM

I was very interested in the Farm Canada open data portal, and used the link to access it. Unfortunately, at least two pages give a 101 File Not Found error. The rest of the pages appear to have placeholder content only, nothing that allows access to data. Is this still being developed, and if so, when will it have working functionality?

Submitted by open-ouvert on April 13, 2016 - 8:45 PM

Kate - thanks for your comment. Farm Canada is not part of the open.canada.ca portal - I would suggest that you contact Adam Michaleski, one of the app developers, at adam3039@gmail.com. I'm sure he can provide answers to your questions. Karin - the open-ouvert team

Submitted by Catherine Bickram on April 05, 2016 - 12:37 PM

It's very disingenuous to say that "As recently as five years ago, no one in Canada had an open data portal". Perhaps our definitions of "open data" differ, but there have been Federal sites like Geogratis and GeoBase that have around much longer than 5 years. It is absolutely exciting to see the interest and development around making data freely available, but this is not a new and novel concept, it undermines the perseverance and determination of those that have gone before you.

Submitted by Grace on February 16, 2016 - 5:16 PM

I think that open data portals should be easily discoverable, and Canadians should be able to find all open data via any portal. How to find data from multiple government sources? Grace

Submitted by open-ouvert on February 16, 2016 - 8:33 PM

Hi Grace, We list all Canadian data portals we know about here: http://open.canada.ca/en/maps/open-data-canada Multiple jurisdictions (including the Government of Canada) are working together to explore the possibility of federated data - that is, being able to search multiple data sources from one place. If you'd like updates, you can join our mailing list here: http://open.canada.ca/en/forms/receive-open-government-email-form Thank you, Kent on behalf of the open government team