MUSKOKA MNCH TRACKING TOOL

The North-South Institute/Canadian International Development Platform/People & Code

The challenge(s)• Muskoka – MNCH is Canada’s signature foreign aid initiative, at $2.85bn

over 5yrs (announced 2010) it makes up the single largest share of Canadian aid

• The initiative has placed substantial emphasis on transparency/accountability from the start

• Lot of very useful “open data” related to the initiative is available• But this is fragmented, across sources, format types • The complicated nature of the commitment ($1.1bn in “new” funding +

$1.75bn in “baseline”) makes analysis challenging, despite open data• IATI doesn’t contain ‘marker’ or ‘coding’ for Musk/MNCH• Partner level traceability is not possible as no Canadian Musk/MNCH

executing partner (currently) publishes to IATI• Impact/results info is at a general level (compared to partner info)

The solution(s)• Work with a master list of Musk/MNCH unique IDs (across sources) to first

conduct a meta analysis of data sources • Convert and link various data sources and types into one hub (e.g.

MongoDB) to ready API for JSON access which would allow visualization (e.g. d3.js) – Sources: DFATD-IATI; DFATD-Open Data; IATI registry; IATI datastore – Types: XML, CSV; including manual upload to DB

• Demonstrate visualization that enables: – Tracking commitments vs. actual expenditures (burn rate)– Baseline vs. new funding breakdowns– Network/cluster graph of partnerships (type of organization, CSO, multilateral etc.) – Executing partners and organizations involved; subsectors/priorities– Country level mapped view; with disaggregation to project level– Results/impact– Allow extensibility to new data feeds (e.g. interchange with Can-MNCH alliance data)

Summary analysis • There are 687 unique projects overall, however:

– If you only query current projects browser (DFATD open data) you will find 574– Musk-MNCH browser has fewer – If you combine with historical (DFATD open data) you will find 496– If you looked in current IATI you will only see 158 – There are differences in what info is available via which source

• There are several good reasons for these differences (even though all are “open data” they have different ends); not just a problem of data joins, quality (there are some issues but not insurmountable)

• Not only do sources have differences in the extent of coverage, but also in attributes (which fields are covered)

• Overall, the initiative seems on-track, but it would be difficult to reach this assessment without triangulating various sources

Summary analysis

• Data currently allows coverage from 2010-11 to 2012-13 (prelim).

• By year 3 (of 5) $1.77bn of $2.85bn has been spent (62.1%) – $1.15bn in baseline and $0.62bn in new

• Vast majority of projects executed by foreign non-profit partners, i.e. multilateral agencies, directly through foreign governments; $1.13bn or 63.8%

• Canadian non-profits are second largest exec partner $347mn –dominated by few large partners like Micronutrients I; Aga Khan; Care; Plan; Save– Several “nulls” and breaks in data yet to be worked out

Recommendation • Given the small number of large partners (Canadian) involved, and an already

established network (Can-MNCH alliance), Muskoka-MNCH implementers could be excellent candidate for IATI publication pilot– Pilot could be worked into org work plans, could be limited (to start) to just Musk-MNCH projects

• Canadian Musk-MNCH partners could play valuable role in enhancing IATI results tracking fields by leveraging their own results/impact ME systems to enrich IATI data (and possibly the wider schema)

• IATI publication would be better positioned as lessons/Knowledge-Sharing exercise (than accounting/reporting) – In the process, IATI often reduces or eases other reporting burdens

• Official figures likely understate Canada’s contribution to global MNCH; not having complete picture of Canadian orgs resource allocation, investment, partnerships, we estimate, leaves out about 50% of the Canadian contribution

• Bringing this in view could enhance results & impact analysis, narrative and build further support for efforts

• Combination of open source tools, IATI data standard, community (tech, data, policy) support can make this happen

VISUAL MUSKOKA-MNCH TRACKING TOOL

Demonstration