Data Standardization and Coding

The face of aid is changing. Many traditional donors are making great strides towards improving the quality and transparency of their aid information. Newer development partners such as Brazil and China are participating more and more in South-South cooperation and other investments in the developing world. As countries and organizations face the challenges of changing demands for information, AidData is here to help. AidData offers data standardization and aid information management services designed to help aid and cooperation agencies make their information more internationally comparable and available to various audiences.

AidData has invested hundreds of hours in standardizing information from nearly 100 cooperation agencies around the globe. This experience is now being used to help cooperation agencies and partner countries make their information more accessible to users and beneficiaries. To date, AidData has gathered activity-level data from many emerging development partners and multilateral donors whose data have never been systematically collected and standardized before. AidData's work with the International Aid Transparency Initiative also ensures that this work is compatible with the emerging global standard for publishing development cooperation information. AidData’s technology team is also working with partners to develop new and better tools for sharing and comparing information between institutions.

AidData also augments project-level information in some cases by extending and translating project descriptions and classifying projects with consistent purpose codes and activity codes. This follows a multi-step methodology to ensure data quality and solicit feedback from cooperation agencies and users on the accuracy of the coding. These codes can help those interested in a particular sector quickly identify activities of interest. The AidData sector coding scheme has already been adapted for several partners.

Publishing through the AidData web portal

AidData has worked extensively with countries and multilateral organizations across the globe to bring together a more comprehensive picture of all development cooperation activities going on throughout the world. As a privately funded initiative, AidData can provide a non-political platform for development partners who wish to participate in transparent development, enable coordination between agencies and inform development researchers. In the past, AidData has provided assistance with data collection and standardization at no cost to the publishing agency. To find out more about partnering with AidData in this way, please contact us.

Open data for international development

AidData increases aid transparency by providing tools, visualizations, services, and data related to development finance. more...

Data Standardization and Coding

Publishing through the AidData web portal