Open source key to exchanging best practices in digital government

When the Singapore government made its form builder tool, FormSG, open-source, the Cambodian government picked it up and even added a scheduling function to improve the overall use of the tool.

Apart from Cambodia, FormSG has been adopted by Sri Lanka - with both governments customising it within their respective web domains.

“If we can pool our intelligence, share the work we do and learn from each other, there’s so much that we can accomplish and build the future of what governments look like,” said Open Government Products (OGP)’s Director, Li Hongyi, at the Digital Public Goods Alliance (DPGA) Annual Members Meeting on November 13 in Singapore.

Aside from FormSG, the Cambodian government has implemented four other products released by the Singapore government this year, including Plumber, GoGovSG, Postman, and OpenAttestation.

As the first one held in Asia, the meeting was co-hosted by DPGA and the Singapore government to share knowledge around the use of DPGs to solve public problems.

OGP is the experimental tech development arm of GovTech Singapore, and it joined DPGA as a member this March.

GovInsider spoke to representatives from OGP and DPGA at the sidelines of the meeting to find out more about the role of open sourcing in advancing digital governments, as well as upcoming trends in DPGs.

The United Nations (UN) defines DPGs as open-source software, data, artificial intelligence (AI) models, open standards and open content that help attain sustainable development goals.

To subscribe to the GovInsider bulletin click here.

Singapore’s case: Digital public goods as a level-playing field

When it comes to ensuring that a DPG is a success, it is not enough to only look at how well-engineered the tech is, said OGP’s International Tech Strategy Lead, Cheryl Lee.

One needs to consider whether the tech solves a particular problem in the local context given a unique set of circumstances, she noted.

This is why a two-way exchange between members is key to sharing best practices on implementing technologies to solve a public problem.

Lee added that OGP’s membership within DPGA furthers the knowledge exchange and actual collaboration work between ASEAN countries.

“The implementation was led by a very competent team. All we had to do was to close the awareness gap.

“In this context, it was very clear that awareness was the issue and the moment they knew about [the products], they could take them and run them,” she explained.

Singapore also works closely with Malaysia, with the two countries frequently exchanging ideas for their respective open data portals, which are data.gov.sg and data.gov.my, said OGP’s Head of Developer Relations, Alwyn Tan.

While adapting the product, the Malaysian government built custom data visualisations to make data more relevant and interactive for their users - an idea that was subsequently adopted by data.gov.sg.

Coupled with frequent and consistent data updates, this allows users to quickly see trends in the data, both Tan and Lee noted.

In his sharing, OGP’s Li highlighted that the Malaysian government also incorporated components to promote open data literacy among citizens, as well as to make it easier for agencies to tap on open government data for their own applications.

To subscribe to the GovInsider bulletin click here.

Global South as an active contributor

The Global South is “turning the narrative up on its head,” said DPGA’s Director, Communications & Programs, Jameson Voisin.

He noted that members from developing countries are not merely adopters, but active contributors of DPGs.

The Sierra Leone government, for example, added OpenG2P as a DPG in alignment with the DPG Standard last year. OpenG2P is an open-source platform that helps governments and non-profit organisations digitise their social protection programmes.

DPGA’s Chief Operating Officer, Lucy Harris, shared that contributor countries are also increasingly recognising the need to use or build upon other existing goods.

GovInsider earlier reported how adopting open-source technologies is a means for governments to reduce energy consumption used in software development, and achieve green AI ambitions.

DPGA found that while 126 countries have developed DPGs, 198 countries and territories are currently using these goods – with more than 80 countries worldwide relying on these goods to power essential services like healthcare and education.

What’s next?

For OGP, making DPGs more usable and ease of deployment are among the key priorities when it comes to international collaboration in this space, said OGP’s Tan.

“There’s some work to strip out Singapore-specific terms and context [to adapt for international use cases].

“The other aspect is trying to make these products easier to deploy. We’re currently looking at how to make use of cloud infrastructure to run the products,” he explained.

For DPGA, Harris highlighted three trends that the organisation is noticing, including tapping on DPGs to power digital public infrastructure (DPI).

For instance, Estonia’s X-Road data exchange layer is available as a DPG.

The other priority is finding consensus on AI systems as DPGs, in which DPGA has convened a working group alongside UNICEF to propose a set of qualifying criteria.

“How are we going to assess DPGs that have AI in them, and the impact of the myriad of decisions that have to be made along the way?” was one of the key questions highlighted by Harris.

The last priority is a renewed interest in open data, particularly on the possibility of what kind of government data can be open to the public.

“It’s been long thought that governments can’t do open data in healthcare, but there are ways to anonymise the data points to release it so that other stakeholders can study it, and it can really move medical science forward dramatically,” she noted.

GovInsider previously covered the emergence of privacy-enhancing technologies that can anonymise data in government and healthcare.