The Swedish National Geodata collaboration agreement

by | Jan 20, 2022

Keywords

Principle 1, collaboration, NGIA, NSI, geospatial data agreements, INSPIRE

Description

The GSGF Europe requests National Statistical Institutes and National Geospatial Agencies to build formal working relationships on institutional agreements. This use case describes a model for collaboration between producers and users of geospatial data to ensure access to non-open data for use within public administration in Sweden.

The Swedish National Geodata Collaboration Agreement is an example of a multi-lateral agreement between public users and producers of geospatial information to maximise benefits of the NSDI. The collaboration was launched in 2011 in order to fulfil the obligations of the INSPIRE directive, yet it goes beyond the aspirations of INSPIRE as it reaches further than the scope of data themes of INSPIRE. The very basic concept of the collaboration is that parties sign one agreement and pay one annual fee but get access to geospatial data products from all data providers. This concept stands in sharp contrast to the situation before 2011, where data acquisition entailed complex business models and expensive agreements.

Parties to the agreement are authorities with a data management responsibility according to the Swedish Act and Ordinance on Spatial Information, based on the INSPIRE directive, and municipalities, government agencies and other public organisations. The collaboration is managed by the Swedish National Geospatial Agency (Lantmäteriet).

The contents of the Product Catalogue offered under the agreement has changed significantly over time, mainly due to the fact that a growing number of data sets in the original catalogue is now published and accessed as open data. However, the Geodata Collaboration Agreement still plays a crucial role for public administrations to access data that is not open data.

In general terms, data sharing is a cost-effective way of enabling the entire public sector the use of high quality data for a wide variety of tasks. By making spatial data available as services on the web, it is also easier for the private sector to benefit from this infrastructure, as it gives easier access with known conditions and licenses.

One of the most obvious benefits of the cooperation is reduced administration regarding licensing and data acquisition. The simple and straight forward business model makes it easy to budget future (next years) costs for geospatial Information. The situation before the Geodata Collaboration suffered from multiple agreements between data providers and users and complex terms of use obstructing flexible use of data and creation of services.

More information

Read more about The Swedish National Geodata collaboration agreement: https://www.lantmateriet.se/en/maps-and-geographic-information/avtal-for-geodatasamverkan/