UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has asked an Independent Expert Advisory Group to make concrete recommendations on bringing about a data revolution in sustainable development. The group will present its recommendations during this public event.

What is the Data Revolution?

Data are the lifeblood of decision-making, and the raw material for accountability. Without data, we cannot know how many people are born and die; how many men and women still live in poverty; how many children need educating, and how many teachers to train or schools to build; the prevalence and incidence of diseases; if water is polluted or if the fish stocks in the ocean are dangerously low; how many adolescent girls are getting pregnant and what policies are effective in helping them; what companies are trading and whether demand for their product is expanding.

To know what we need to know involves a deliberate and systematic effort of finding out. It means seeking out high quality information that can be compared over time, between and within countries, and continuing to do so, year after year. It means careful planning, spending money on technical expertise, robust systems, and ever changing technologies. It means building public trust in the data, and expanding people’s ability to use it.

Join us for a discussion of the just-released report of the UN Secretary General’s expert group, set up to answer some of these questions, and hear what the group proposes should be done.