Dr Babatunde Omotosho
An address by Dr Babatunde Omotosso at the Second Edition of Innovate Africa held in Kigali from September 25-28 . This followed on the first one held in South Africa.
We have come to the end of the second mile in a journey of 54 miles. The second Symposium of Innovate Africa in Kigali, Rwanda, follows on from the maiden one that was held in Johannesburg, South Africa last year. There are, therefore, 52 more miles ahead of us, and I will shortly indicate where the third mile will be witnessed.
The programme and the expansive scope of themes addressed between the first and this second symposia revealed not only the growing intensity of interest, but the crucial importance and the urgency required in addressing the complex indivisibility of data, statistics and technology and the molten ecosystem in which it is anchored. The 50 odd leads of keynote speakers and panellists have been drawn from Africa, Europe, Asia and the Americas. They straddled demographics of age, sex and disciplines.
That the subject at hand is interdisciplinary is not in doubt, what raises eyebrows are the depth of roots of interconnectedness and their implications that revealed themselves during the last three days of intimate interactions.
As we tempered the discovery and revelation of value in statistics, data and technology, we traversed time, space, law, ethics, morality, democracy, participation, inequity, language, culture, politics, finance and finally power relations or the architecture of data governance.
On day one in the political session, we got our marching orders. In the main it was “you are immersed in a global mission critical domain of realising data and statistics as a public good – Make it work.”
The political intervention unleashed us into interactive discourse that revealed the levels of complexity in navigating our way through the minefield of the indivisible features of statistics, data and information technology.
Mindful of the fact that first, statistics and data are a product that is made available freely by citizens and artefacts of their creation – data and statistics are thus made freely available by participants as a byproduct of interactions and transactions.
Second, aggregation reveals insights necessary for policy and business design and third, and as a question, how does the public good become accessible and put to use for the benefit of people, planet and sustenance of the systems that are responsible for bringing it together to sustain data driven culture that leaves no one behind. The key issues that emerged throughout the three days were:
⦁who are the participants – local, national and global
⦁how value can be created through data, statistics and technology
⦁how that value can be beneficial to all in an equitable way
⦁how that value can be shared
⦁what governance models can work
We have had more than 50 presenters who addressed their insights into the field of data, statistics and technology. We have benefited from these insights and the task is how we shepherd these towards a beneficial impact for all to benefit from the public good.
Several use cases have been presented and these clarified the magnitude of the challenge that lie in our path and what we need to do to address the path. How do African countries exercise authority over their data was a repeated theme.
Data Governance Frameworks and intuitive practices that have emerged throughout the presentations and deliberations have created experience from which we should learn. But being deliberate and leading with purpose is central to design thinking and delivering impactful results.
In that regard exploring and searching for Data Governance Frameworks is the first and an integral task of the Innovate Africa symposia. The first two symposia have framed the questions and by the next symposium we should have been definitive on the path of data governance frameworks drawing from the work that has been done, which includes the resolutions that the statistics community took in Gabon at the tenth African symposium for Statistical Development (ASSD).
The Innovate Africa Symposium series takes the baton from the Africa Symposium on Statistical Development and heightens the Information Highway of the African Development Bank (AfDB), which is the enabler of the High Five AfDB strategic deliverables.
Compiling a report on the presentations and discussions would be a mammoth task to conclude today, but broad strokes are apparent and deep. We shall certainly produce a report that will be circulated with synthesized recommendations.
But even before we provide the report, there are two concrete proposals we make to our system. The first is for our work to report in the World Data Forum coming up in November in Columbia. It might be late now, but our good friend Ronald Jensen from the UN Statistics division is with us and should open the door on this important matter.
Secondly, we know we have enough time as regards this and again Ronald Jensen is here to ensure that our discussions feature at the High Level Forum at the United Nations Security Council in March 2025, but also as a side event. Third, we need to take forward the Gabon resolutions by the 10th ASSD on data and technology to heads of states of the African Union. As the AfDB we will advance the course.
Let me express great hope on how far this initiative will go. It started in Johannesburg under the guidance of our AfDB staff Louis Kouakou, Momar Kouta and Rafik Mahjoubi. It has exploded into the second vintage under the leadership of Louis Kouakou and Momar Kouta from the AfDB and our counterpart National Institute of Statistics Rwanda, Ivan Murenzi and for that I should thank you. Without the speakers and all of us it would have not been successful. We are also pleased that those who walked the path are still with us. The former statistician-general of South Africa Pali Lehohla who is here with us brings history to us and I thank him.
Dr Babatunde Omotosho is the Director of Statistics at the African Development Bank and he delivered this speech at the closing of the Second Symposium of Innovate Africa.
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