Improving Microdata Dissemination and Use inby Developing Countries Two International Initiatives

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Improving Microdata Dissemination and Use in/by
Developing Countries Two International
Initiatives
Beijing, 5-7 June 2007

• Olivier Dupriez
• World Bank / IHSN
• odupriez_at_worldbank.org

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Outline

• Production of microdata
• Supply
• Issues
• International initiatives IHSN and ADP
• Conclusion what role for the research community
  ?

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Microdata production

• Considerable, largely hidden
• Mostly sample surveys by official producers
• Ad-hoc, donor driven national survey programs
• Key role of international programs (DHS, LSMS,
  MICS, others)
• For official purposes mainly minor role of local
  research community (weak)
• Issues of comparability, reliability, timeliness,
  relevance

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Microdata supply for research

• Limited/ad hoc supply by national producers.
  Obstacles are
• Legal (confidentiality)
• Political
• Financial (rarely budgeted by sponsors)
• But mainly technical and psychological
• Fear of criticism and contradiction
• No incentive (e.g., no positive feedback from
  users)

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Taking action

• Supporting the supply and demand, not only the
  production, to
• Unlock the data
• Reduce the burden
• Improve quality and relevance of future data
• This requires specific support, tools and
  guidelines, better partnership with the research
  community.

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Main issues

• Documentation low priority for producers and
  sponsors no specific guidelines
• Dissemination few countries have formal policy
  and procedures
• Preservation many data/metadata lost or
  unreadable
• ? Two recent initiatives IHSN and ADP

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International Household Survey Network (IHSN)

• A network of international agencies established
  in 2004 for
• Harmonizing survey instruments for better
  comparability
• Fostering coordination among international
  agencies for better planning
• Developing tools and guidelines for improved
  microdata management, dissemination and use.

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What tools and guidelines?

• Microdata documentation tools and guidelines,
  based on international metadata standards
  (DDI/DCMI)
• Practical dissemination policy guidelines
• Cataloguing and dissemination tools
• Anonymization tools and guidelines

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IHSN Documentation toolMicrodata Management
Toolkit

• A specialized DDI/DCMI metadata editor (with
  Nesstar)
• Free for NSOs in developing countries
• In Arabic, English, French, Russian and Spanish

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IHSN Documentation guidelines

• Quick Reference Guide for Survey Managers
• Quick Reference Guide for Data Archivists
• DDI Reviewers Feedback form
• And others.

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IHSN Dissemination toolMicrodata Management
Toolkit

• XML to HTML-PDF Generator (open source)
• Data / metadata on line or on CD-ROM
• Open source

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IHSN Dissemination toolNational Data Archive
website
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IHSN Dissemination guidelines

• Integrated in the National Data Archive website.
• Inspired by
• UNECE
• ICPSR
• UKDA
• And others

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IHSN Anonymization tools

• For solving legal and perception issues
• Need user-friendly tools
• On-going work
• Open source routines for Stata (C plug-ins)
• Need practical guidelines
• Little expertise available

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Accelerated Data Program (ADP)

• Support to countries started in 2006
• Original goal filling data gaps
• TASK 1 Establish national microdata archives
• Using IHSN tools and guidelines
• With OECD/P21, WB, IADB, ESCAP, UNICEF
• Considerable interest (different motivations)

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Accelerated Data Program (ADP)

• 20 countries expect 40 by end-2008

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Accelerated Data Program (ADP)

• TASK 2 Improve future data collection
• Just starting
• Assess the relevance, reliability, comparability
  of existing microdata
• To improve the design of future surveys
• By analyzing key topics using all available data
• TASK 3 Support data collection

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Conclusion

• Lots of data are produced
• In most cases not for academic research
• In most cases largely unexploited
• In most cases imperfect
• Improved partnership with the research community
  would add value to these data
• More accessible, comparable, relevant
• But we need to support producers and give them
  good reasons to supply the data

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What role for the research community?

• Support to national data archiving
• Contribute to data preparation (a valuable
  experience for researchers !)
• Later partnerships with global catalogs and
  repositories
• Participation in IHSN harmonization work and in
  ADP Task 2

www.surveynetwork.org