Kyiv hosted the third All-Ukrainian Open Data Forum 2019. The focus of this year's event: Ukraine is on its way towards data economy.

The Forum brought together about 500 guests: representatives of central and local governments, public administration professionals, Ukrainian and international experts, civic activists and the startup community. The participants of the event discussed how the state policy of open data in Ukraine is being shaped, what has already been done by the central authorities and municipal councils in this area, as well as the prospects of the data economy in Ukraine, the potential of artificial intelligence and Big Data.

Besides, the Forum hosted the annual Open Data Awards ceremony to award leaders in Big Data development in Ukraine and the Ukrainian startups that had competed in the Open Data Challenge for a $ 2.5 million prize to implement and support open data projects.

Mykhailo Fedorov, Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of Digital Transformation of Ukraine opened the event. He noted: "The Ministry of Digital Transformation will exert every effort to get as many people as possible to know the Open Data Challenge and to increase the number of open data business projects in Ukraine. Anti-corruption projects created due to opening data are of particular value to Ukrainian society and to the process of renewal of power. Our task is to open up even more data, and all involved authorities must comply conscientiously with CMU Resolution # 835."

The Open Data Challenge is an international competition format for the development of open data innovative projects that has grown to become the largest national competition in this sector. The purpose of the competition is to attract activists, researchers, designers and developers in the development of innovative services, as well as open data and big data products that will contribute to solving problems of Ukrainian society and have significant business potential.

The third annual competition in Ukraine was organized by the Ministry of Digital Transformation in partnership with USAID/UK AID Transparency and Accountability in Government and Services/TAPAS, the East Europe Foundation and the 1991 Open Data Incubator.

The judges selected 5 winners, among which:

Nazar CityBot is a municipal chatbot that informs about the operation of the municipal utility services, warns of breakdown and blackout, collects metering devices data and notifies about tariffs and changes in them, etc.

Inspect.in.ua is a web service that, based on the results of conducted audits in companies, generates a list of common violations, generates personalized recommendations for the elimination of deficiencies and performs recruitment of external specialists.

Open Government is an analytical web service for monitoring the work and detection of corrupt relations among politicians, officials, state and communal enterprises and organizations.

Renovation Map - an interactive map that provides information on the status of abandoned buildings and environments in a city, related with them enforcement proceedings; designated purpose of land plots, current activities of activists and developers.

Know Your Official (Zaparkanom) is a web service that provides analytical information to evaluate an official based on declared assets, relationships with companies or individuals, and generates an overall ranking of officials by risk factors.

As a result of the annual Open Data Awards, selecting leaders in open data development in Ukraine, the judges have determined winners in five nominations: Open Data Government Award – Ministry of Infrastructure of Ukraine, Open Data City Award – Ternopil, Open Data Business Award – Better Regulation Delivery Office (BRDO), Open Data Social Impact Award – CoST Ukraine, Open Data Leader Award – Pavlo Tkachenko and Iryna Chernysh (SaveEcoBot).

The Forum was held under the support by the USAID/UK AID Transparency and Accountability in Government and Services/TAPAS project, funded by the US and UK Governments.