A new study of the European Commission about the Open Data Maturity status of the EU member states showed that Bulgaria is amongst the top 10 in open data readiness and open data maturity, the press centre of the government announced.

Bulgaria’s commitment to open data is performed by the team of Deputy Prime Minister Rumyana Bachvarova.
“A year ago Bulgaria was not even in the rankings, because we didn’t have data portal, and now we are in the top ten,” the Deputy Prime Minister for Coalition Policy and Public Administration Rumyana Bachvarova said, speaking at the opening of the Data Time conference, which takes place in Sofia Tech Park. The event is organised by the Embassy of Great Britain, jointly with the team of the Deputy Prime Minister.

According to the survey results of the European Commission on open data, the leadership group involves countries such as Britain, Estonia and France, which are traditionally on the leading positions in conducting this type of policies.

“This means that thanks to our efforts, this year we are among the trend setters - the most advanced countries that have solid Open Data portals with elaborate functionalities and coordination mechanisms across domains,” Mrs Bachvarova noted.

In the beginning of her mandatethe Deputy Prime Ministers committed to open 119 sets of data by the end of 2015, as 116 have been opened up to now. There is a number of socially significant information among them. They are key recourse for policy making but also to exercise control over the effect of policies on the part of civil society and business, as well as one of the most efficient instruments for transparent and accountable governance.
British Ambassador to Bulgaria Emma Hopkins determined open data as extremely important, speaking at the opening of the Data Time conference. She stressed that this process contributes to the provision of better services to the public, the development of better government policies on the basis of current data and the promotion of business and innovation.

Bulgarian Deputy Prime Minister Rumyana Bachvarova and the Ambassador Emma Hopkins were adamant that the providing open access to public sector information in order to re-use it brings significant economic benefits. Generated by public sector data can be used to create innovative services and value-added products by businesses.

As another major success for achieving open government Deputy Prime Minister Bachvarova outlined adopted amendments to the Access to Public Information Act, in whose elaboration were actively involved representatives of her team.

Following these changes, public sector organizations are required to provide information in an open, machine-readable format together with their metadata, as the format and metadata match official open standards. The amendments provide for any public sector information created after April 1, 2016, to be maintained in electronic form. The range of institutions which may be requested information expanded - museums, libraries and archives. Data are published in the open data portal that already exists at http://opendata.government.bg/ and is regulated by law.