Independent Evaluation

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) has a Centre for Humanitarian Data in The Hague with the goal to increase the use and impact of data in the humanitarian sector. The vision is to create a future where all people involved in a humanitarian emergency have access to the data they need, when and how they need it, to make responsible and informed decisions. The audience for the Centre includes OCHA staff and humanitarian partners in the field and at headquarters.
 
The Centre focuses on four workstreams: data services, data policy, data literacy, and network engagement. The Centre’s data services work includes direct management of the Humanitarian Data Exchange (HDX) platform and the Humanitarian Exchange Language (HXL) data standard. Data services also supports the adoption of the International Aid Transparency Initiative (IATI) financial data standard.
 
The Centre’s data literacy work focuses on improving the data skills of technical and non-technical humanitarians. In the area of data policy, the Centre has created a working draft of the OCHA Data Responsibility Guidelines and provides support to staff and partners to improve approaches in this area. Finally, the Centre works to further build and engage an active community in support of its mission and objectives through a number of events and communication activities.
 
The Centre was established on the basis of an initial three-year business plan, with a detailed results framework to track progress on a regular basis. The Centre has four objectives which map to its four workstreams:

1. Increase the interoperability of humanitarian data through shared standards and integrated systems (data services);
2. Increase the trust and cooperation across organizations sharing data in humanitarian response (data policy);
3. Increase the capability of people to access and use data in support of humanitarian efforts (data literacy);
4. Increase the number of active partners engaged with the Centre (network engagement).

The results framework also includes three outcome indicators. The Centre worked with the Overseas Development Institute’s Humanitarian Policy Group in early 2018 on an assessment of the results framework, in particular to finalize the outcome indicators and develop the baseline measurements.
 
Following this research, the Centre made some adjustments to the three outcomes which were finalized as:

1. Increase the speed of data from the end of data collection to published product;
2. Increase the number and strength of connections with the Centre, across categories of engagement; and
3. Increase the use of HDX.

The Centre’s business model has two defining aspects: a geographically distributed team and implementation support from UNOPS. The Centre has a small number of staff based in The Hague and Geneva, with field teams in Dakar, Nairobi, and Jakarta, among other locations.