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<body class='hmmessage'><div dir='ltr'><p style="margin-bottom: 1.5em; border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 13px; vertical-align: baseline; orphans: 4; color: rgb(68, 68, 68); font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 19.5px;">On July 8, 2011, President Mwai Kibaki officially launched the Kenya Open Data Initiative at a public event attended by more than 3,000<br>people. The new Internet portal compiled previously scattered or hard-to-access government information and made it available to the<br>public for free. </p><p style="margin-bottom: 1.5em; border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 13px; vertical-align: baseline; orphans: 4; color: rgb(68, 68, 68); font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 19.5px;"></p><p style="margin-bottom: 1.5em; border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 13px; vertical-align: baseline; orphans: 4; color: rgb(68, 68, 68); font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 19.5px;"></p><p style="margin-bottom: 1.5em; border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 13px; vertical-align: baseline; orphans: 4; color: rgb(68, 68, 68); font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 19.5px;"><br></p><p style="margin-bottom: 1.5em; border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 13px; vertical-align: baseline; orphans: 4; color: rgb(68, 68, 68); font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 19.5px;">Kenya launched its initiative at a time when a number of countries were also putting government information online. The United States led the global open data movement, launching its site in 2009. Britain’s official data site went online a year later. Within three years, 31 countries — including Australia, Canada, Chile, Denmark, Estonia, Italy, Moldova, Morocco, the United Arab Emirates, and Uruguay — had created similar portals. Multilateral organizations embraced the concept as well; The World Bank inaugurated its own open data website in 2010. Read on.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1.5em; border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 13px; vertical-align: baseline; orphans: 4; color: rgb(68, 68, 68); font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 19.5px;"><br></p><p style="margin-bottom: 1.5em; border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 13px; vertical-align: baseline; orphans: 4; color: rgb(68, 68, 68); font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 19.5px;"><a href="http://www.africahot.com/en/2013/08/17/bridging-kenyas-data-divide-by-rushda-majeed-foreign-policy-blog/" target="_blank" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">http://www.africahot.com/en/2013/08/17/bridging-kenyas-data-divide-by-rushda-majeed-foreign-policy-blog/</a></p><div><br></div> </div></body>
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