Colombian Government Selects TerriData as Official Platform for Regional Statistics

In the framework of the FOINCIDE project, the second component working with national policies for territorial financing and management has developed TerriData, a tool to consolidate and disseminate data on Colombian subnational governments.

TerriData was developed by a team from the Ministry of Planning with technical and financial support from SKL International and was partly inspired by KOLADA (www.kolada.se), an on-line tool that makes it possible to review and compare key data from Sweden’s municipalities.

After TerriDatas progress, Colombia’s National Department of Statistics and the Committee of Territorial Public Statistics have decided to make TerriData (terridata.dnp.gov.co) the country’s official platform for regional statistics and data. TerriData houses data on demographics, education, health, public services and finances and security for the 32 “departamentos” (roughly equivalent to provinces) and the more than 1,100 municipalities.

The endorsement by the National Department of Statistics also means that all the data published in TerriData will comply with the rigorous standards set the Department for all official statistical operations. This guarantees a high level of quality for TerriData’s contents.

This decision will certainly make TerriData the central hub for Colombia’s regional data and will draw users from the national and subnational governments and academia, providing relevant and useful information for public officials, researchers and ordinary citizens. TerriData’s website was launched in November of last year and the application for mobile devices is currently under development and will be made widely available next April.

The  FOINCIDE  project  is  designed  to  contribute  both  to  increasing citizen   participation   and   socio-political  inclusion,   as   well   as   to strengthen  the  decision making processes and provide tools  for improved administration and  public  policies, based  on  the  exchange  of  experiences,  and  in  clear articulation  and coordination between the municipal and national levels. The project will be implemented until December 2018 with a possible extension to December 2020.