Korea: Measuring eTourism Effectiveness, Metrics for Success in #gov20 and #etourism #t20korea

T20 - Tourism Ministers Meet in Korea to discuss ICT and Government 2.0

T20 - Tourism Ministers Meet in Korea to discuss ICT and Government 2.0

As many of you know, I don’t find things effective if we cant measure the success.  As I am about to speak at the T.20 Tourism (Dr. Ng Yen Yen discusses it in her blog) ministers Meeting in Buyeo, Korea, I thought a bit of comment and a challenge would be great.

The tourism stats for the past decade from the UNWTO are below.

(unit : thousand)
Country 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009
Republic
of Korea		 5,322 5,147 5,347 4,753 5,818 6,023 6,155 6,448 6,891 7,818
Argentina 2,909 2,620 2,820 2,995 3,457 3,823 4,173 4,562 4,665 4,329
Australia 4,931 4,856 4,841 4,746 5,215 5,499 5,532 5,644 5,586 5,584
Brazil 5,313 4,773 3,785 4,133 4,794 5,358 5,017 5,026 5,050 4,802
Canada 19,627 19,679 20,057 17,534 19,145 18,771 18,265 17,935 17,142 15,771
China 31,229 33,167 36,803 32,970 41,761 46,809 49,913 54,720 53,0149 50,875
France 77,190 75,202 77,012 75,048 74,433 74,988 77,916 80,853 79,218 74,200
Germany 18,983 17,861 17,969 18,399 20,137 21,500 23,569 24,421 24,884 24,224
India 2,649 2,537 2,384 2,726 3,457 3,919 4,447 5,082 5,283 5,109
Indonesia 5,064 5,153 5,033 4,467 5,321 5,002 4,871 5,506 6,234 6,324
Italy 41,181 39,563 39,799 39,604 37,071 36,513 41,058 43,654 42,734 43,239
Japan 4,757 4,772 5,239 5,212 6,138 6,728 7,334 8,347 8,351 6,790
Mexico 20,641 19,810 19,667 18,665 20,618 21,915 21,353 21,370 22,637 21,454
Russia - 19,457 21,279 20,443 19,892 19,940 20,149 20,605 21,566 19,420
Saudi
Arabia		 6,585 6,727 7,511 7,332 8,599 8,037 8,620 11,531 14,757 10,896
South
Africa		 5,872 5,787 6,430 6,505 6,678 7,369 8,396 9,091 9,592 7,012
Turkey 9,586 10,783 12,790 13,341 16,826 20,273 18,916 22,248 24,994 25,506
UK - - 22,307 22,787 25,678 28,039 30,654 30,870 30,142 28,033
USA 51,237 46,927 43,581 41,218 46,086 49,206 50,977 55,979 57,937 54,884
Spain 47,898 50,094 52,327 50,854 52,430 55,914 58,004 58,666 57,192 52,231
Belgium 6,457 6,452 6,720 6,690 6,710 6,747 6,995 7,045 7,165 6,814
Reference : UNWTO, Compendium of Tourism Statistics(06, 08, 10), World Tourism Barometer(2010. 6)

As I believe Government as a platform efforts (and Gov2.0 in general) should be measured by real business statistics and not simply ICT related KPI’s it would be great to start having our countries compete strongly on their competitiveness with regard to the amount of tourism interest they generate (or growth of tourism activity).

I say this partly because my pitch today is to connect your Government’s ICT but also to connect your governments general operations.  As governments embrace this type of reform, and open government data is a great place to start, we should start to see an impact in this area of interest.  As our governments become more open and engaging, the locale will start to attract multiple things:  foreign investment, permanent immigration and, yes, increased tourist activity (which is a great boon to the local economies and small businesses located in the country).

So, lets all drive our countries to compete for tourism dollars.  And let our cultural prowess be expressed through open government data initiatives targeting the outcome of increased tourist activity instead of just ICT oriented outputs.

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Panama: Innovation Driving #Gov20 Agenda

Panama Could be Leading Government 2.0 in Central America

Panama Could be Leading Government 2.0 in Central America

Just finished briefing the Autoridad Nacional para la Innovacion Gubernamentalfrom Panama.  Eduardo Jaen and his team are truly inspirational leaders focused on helping Panama reach its true potential.

Their 311 systemis a great platform upon which they will create part of their Government as a Platform strategy.  They will create opportunity for their citizens, their local software economy and local industry by utilizing their authority surrounding government data for the benefit of all citizens and the country’s national competitiveness.  And they highlighted the fact that they drove the idea of Internet access as a right in Panama, well before the Nordic countries of late.

It was great to see such personal engagement and passion and a critical eye toward the thoughts of the day as well as the ideas of the future.  I sensed only promise during my presentation and not fear, which is a vital component to the success of nations.  As well, their ability to address some of the tougher issues surrounding national competitiveness was a refreshing view into what could be a great Government 2.0 story in Central America.

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Government as a Platform: This Small Difference Makes ALL the difference

Government Should be Convener, Organizer and Provider of Reliable Data Streams

Government Should be Convener, Organizer and Provider of Reliable Data Streams

The Economist covers off on a great subject – Mining Social Networks.  It talks about the utilization inside private companies and the potential and actual use in public sector organizations.  I will leave the privacy concerns for a different post here on FixingPotholes, but for now I want to highlight a seemingly small issue that will be ALL the difference if we get it right.

The magazine covers the issue in the public sphere with examples where the public sector itself did the provision of the actual service.  I dont want to sugest there is not a role there to play, but it violates an important premise in our argument for utilizing Government as a platform and not a vending machine.

They cover the Recovery, Accountability and Transparency Board (RATB) fraud activity, which was accomplished internally.  The Army Criminal Investigations Board and the potentials within Medicare/Medicaid.  And the Richmond, Virginia police department.  All interesting examples.  All, at least as far as we know right now, accomplished internal to government and not by simply making the raw data available to a world of developers and companies interested in creating sustainable change through GaaP.

This difference may seem small, but it is vital.  The best, and most sustainable way to utilize this information is by making it open government data.  And it adds a new layer of functionality to it by having the processes being used for analysis public.  No questions about how these things are accomplished or questions about whether systems are being abused internally as the entire process takes place in the open.

I applaud The Economist for coverage of the issue and now simply ask that folks take a deep look, a pause and then decide upon the best, and most sustainable way forward.

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Matthew Burton: ACH Turns Open Government Data into Actionable #gov20 Policy Insight

 

Gunnar and Burton: Applying ACH to Non-Intelligence Policy Issues with Open Government Data

Gunnar and Burton: Applying ACH to Non-Intelligence Policy Issues with Open Government Data

Thanks to Gunnar posting over at GovFresh, we have some insight into some of the advanced policy work being done in the Gov20 world.  It is interesting to see this coming from the intelligence community and can be insightful in many more areas.

ACH has multiple applications outside of the defense or intelligence spheres.  In almost every area of public policy we have massively competing hypothesis.  In many cases we also have a multitude of data sources available to analyze that could lead us to more stable policy development long term.  It could also have a positive effect of cleaning up our political discourse or at least abrogating the difficulty that we have in separating out political rhetoric from long term policy development.

Take Argentina as an example.  During the late 80′s, Argentinian inflation was incredibly out of control.  People didn’t ask for their change in transactions because it wasn’t worth their time to wait.  Buying decisions had to be made in hours as opposed to days.  Mortgages and other long term credit were in disarray.  Domingo Cavallo was brought in by newly elected President Carlos Menem, a Peronist, to help stem the tide.  His austerity program, admittedly steeped in criticism in its detail, stopped the free fall.  But the challenge was too much value had dropped and lives destroyed because of the disconnect between what would have traditionally be understood from a Peronist point of view (or in general a left leaning point of view) and the austerity programs embraced by Cavallo.  Again, he stopped the hyperinflation, but the delay was caused by the fog of political/policy divisions.

What if Burton’s work were applied as countries start to feel the upcoming inflationary pressures?  Could it help guide policymakers in making tough decisions that Menem eventually made in a quicker way?  Could his solution be applied to issues steeped in politics?  What if we had used it to analyze global warming earlier?  What about micro-lending or LDC loan forgiveness?  What about the MDGs?

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Fixing Potholes

“All politics is local” says Tip O’Neil, one of my heroes. And there is nothing quite so local as the pothole that stops you from getting to work, or wrecks your car, or reduces your property values.

While it may seem simplistic, all of my years of Governmental experience truly boil down to this simplist of all challenges. A hole in the road. Our road. As a community. The foundation of our success, health or failure.

Can we truly address the worlds largest issues simply by addressing the world’s smallest?

Yes.

Matt

For whom the Bell Tolls: Citizens in California Demanding their City Back

EAVB_VSIQINVGIR

In Bell, California tempers boiled over.  Citizens stood up.  They engaged for change, directly.

And open government data may have stopped it, had it been implemented.  The city manager was receiving a salary of over $800,000 USD.  That is nearly twice President Obama’s salary.

Why did citizens not know.  The salary was decided on in secret.  Salaries were not reported.  And the pension board that did know, were not allowed to release the information.

So this is the other side of the concerns voiced earlier in this post about disclosing salaries.  We need to hit the right balance.  The risk is more than just folks pulling down irrational salaries.  In the case of Bell, California, these salaries blocked out the ability to fuly employ public safety officials.  It created layoffs, that should not have been necessary.  It starved out service delivery mechanisms that could have served her citizens well.

Instead, the secrecy protected an incredible salary, for just one man.

EAVB_VSIQINVGIR

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UK: Cameron demonstrates understanding that collaboration = leadership

I was heartened to read about the Prime Minister’s trip to India.  Not because global leaders travel to fun places, but rather because this location, this group, this effort, evinces an understanding that the new networked world can create leaders where the mass of developed world leaders never look.

Common Purpose looks to be an interesting organization.  And to see David Cameron go there to speak at least suggests to me that he may have  a commitment to non-traditional leadership.  I believe that true leaders are rare.  I believe they cross political lines.  I believe they come from strange places sometimes.  And, I believe this could be a signal that world leaders are going to embrace a new type of global leadership.  A bit of a rotational exchange from hierarchical leadership to a truly networked world.  To one where the least among us may lead a policy change, a growth agenda or a change to our world.

Cameron: A Change in Government Leadership?

Cameron: A Change in Government Leadership?

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