Baby Steps to Realizing an Open Government System in the Region

Maurice McNaughton

Today’s event is part of the extended schedule of activities under the Development of the Caribbean and Code Sprint Initiative, coordinated by the Caribbean Open Institute for 2019. The regional initiative takes place simultaneously in seven countries and discusses how digital data impacts national development.  Director Maurice McNaughton says that while it will take some time for Belize and the region to realize an open government system, there are other measures that can be implemented during that time.

Maurice McNaughton, Director, Caribbean Open Institute

“There is the will, the intent, the belief that this is a public good and we should make it available so you have to get pass that. Certainly the conversations I have been involved in suggest fair degree of willingness on the part of the government to do that. Then the second is to have both the technical and the institutional capacity to do it so it does takes some work and effort and resources to get it done. And that’s why we say it is so important to make it a collaborative process. My approach is always let’s start doing things. We don’t have to wait on the perfect legislative framework, we don’t have to wait to be signatory to OPG—I mean those are important steps along the way in terms of the political intent. But let’s just start getting stuff done. In three weeks from now there is going to be a hackathon, the second Belize Developing the Caribbean Hackathon and there we are going to be exploring the important concept called smart communities. That’s an initiative which can happen today. We can engage with the ministry of tourism today, we engage with communities today. So my point is let’s take the baby steps and see what happens.”