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{
    "id": 6433,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/6433/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 440,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Dr. Otichilo",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 131,
        "legal_name": "Wilber Ottichilo Khasilwa",
        "slug": "wilber-ottichilo"
    },
    "content": "THAT, noting that sustainable development requires access to data, information, knowledge and understanding about the environment and natural resources including socio-economic opportunities; aware that about 80% of the data and information required for planning and decision making is spatial or geographic in nature (Geo- Information) and is currently processed effectively and efficiently using Geographic Information System (GIS) technology; further aware that information is currently not readily available and accessible to users due to lack of harmonized and coordinated development of Spatial Data Infrastructure (SDI) among other reasons; concerned that rational planning and decision making both at the national and county levels is not possible without the establishment of Data and Information Infrastructure; this House urges the Government to urgently formulate a Geo-Information Policy and establish a Secretariat that will coordinate the development of a web-based Spatial Data Infrastructure at both national and county levels in order to allow users to readily have access to data and information in line with Article 35 of the Constitution. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I wish to support this Motion by first giving a brief technical description about what geo-information is. After that I wish to give the current status of data and information in this country. I will then look at the national challenges as regards data and information and, finally, I will look at what type of policy are we looking for to achieve what this Motion is set to achieve. About 80 per cent and information required for planning and decision making relates to geographical space, typically involving locations or position data. The position data that is referenced is normally referred to as geo-information. Most of these data is land information. As you realize, land is the basic resource for human development. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, rapid development in new information and communication technologies has greatly revolutionalized the way data and information is acquired, analyzed, used, stored and disseminated. Some of these technologies that are now used to analyze and store data include, geographical information system, global positioning system for acquisition of data, digital mapping and internet for access to data. Geo-information is very essential to economic planning and national development and is universally regarded as a critical national resource, particularly as it relates to land information. Thus, when information about geography, social and economic conditions and policies and institutions is readily accessible, creative problem solving can lead to sound decisions with lasting positive impact in people’s life. Geo-information is particularly vital for optimizing the productive use of a country’s human and natural resources. It can also help direct development in ways that meet maximum human needs at the lowest environmental cost, for example, by identifying key land, key water and wildlife resources and how to maintain their productive capacity. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, the social benefit derived from using geo- information to make decisions about provision of services is that, it is transparent and fair. It is also not prone to corruption because the information will be readily available to everybody. Lastly, geo-information is used to provide substantial and sustainable development and it is urgent that new leaders are developed at both national and local level whereby they can apply these technologies so that the information generated is used for decision making. Currently, majority of our leaders rarely use qualitative data and information in their planning and decision making process. That is why some of the projects have had quite a lot of problems. Data is not used as a major input into the decision making process. What is the status of our information and data in this country? Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, currently, data and information in our country cannot be accessed easily since it is largely stored in analogue form by various agencies of Government and the private sector for their own use and application. For example, the Ministry of Lands collects and stores all information about land. The Kenya National Bureau of Statistics collects and stores socio-economic data while the Ministry of Finance collects and stores economic data. The challenges the users face in accessing and using the data and information are numerous; they include access to data and information, varying standards and formats of data – data in this country is in varying standards and formats and so it is not very easy to utilize. This is because of unnecessary overlaps and duplication in the collection of data; serious lack of meta-data, which is data on other data. It explains how the other data has been collected. This is very important for a user because without knowing how the data was collected and for what purposes, it becomes difficult to use the data. That is one of the key problems we face in this country. What is our national challenge? Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, currently, there is no co-ordinated production, management and dissemination of Geo-Spatial Data Sets that are commonly used by many agencies, neither is there any policy for data quality, access, sharing and exchange. To address these challenges, there is an urgent need to formulate a geo-information policy that when implemented will lead to the building of a geo-information infrastructure using GIS technology. This is important in the building of roads, telecommunication networks, and provision of basic services. The geo-information infrastructure, which is technically known as “spatial data infrastructure” is absolutely necessary for rational and sustainable planning, management and exploitation of our rich natural resources. The infrastructure is also vital for optimizing the productive use of our country’s human and natural resources. It is also very important in communicating to the rest of the world the country’s comparative advantage in investment, promoting investment by reducing investor risk and lowering transaction costs. It improves all aspects of governance and empowering of people to directly participate in development. The development of the infrastructure will further promote business in the provision, analysis, and presentation of information. The information will become a commodity that will be readily accessed at a market place. Currently, the development and use of geo-information in creating wealth and prosperity in Africa and this country is greatly hampered by poor development of ICT infrastructure, lack of enabling environment, poverty, poor governance, and lack of realization that information is the most important commodity in the 21st Century. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, the type of policy that this Motion is asking this country to formulate is one that will put all the issues I have raised into law, so that we are able to use our information effectively. What type of geo-information policy are we looking for? We are looking for a policy that will guide the development and operations of national spatial data infrastructure. The policy should address the following:- Production, archiving and maintenance of fundamental thematic geo-spatial data base, particularly the land information. This land information is so crucial for this country. The other aspect that this policy should have is the standardization of data production, transfer and exchange and hardware as well as software. The provision, standardization and maintenance of meta-data for every geo-spatial data hold in the national spatial data infrastructure. This policy needs to provide for legal issues pertaining to ownership or custodianship of data sets, copyrights, intellectual property and confidentiality, privacy and liability. The policy also needs to have modalities on how data would be accessed and its security. Modalities for the organization and arrangement of a national spatial data infrastructure need to be put in place. These include the funding of the development and maintenance of the national spatial data infrastructure; the commercial aspects with provision and guidelines for access and data fees; capacity building in terms of manpower and technology transfer; provision of synergy and amicable resolution of possible conflicts among all users of this data sets."
}