Italian administrations continue to improve the process of publishing open data on the national portal dati.gov.it, especially in terms of descriptive information about the data made available (known as metadata).
Open data quality is essential to promote transparency and innovation. Metadata represent the first point of contact between data users and the data itself, as they provide information on availability, content and context. This enables users to determine whether the data is relevant to their needs and whether to proceed with access and use.
The more complete and accurate the metadata, the easier it is to search for datasets, reducing costs (especially in terms of time) and uncertainty about potential use.
In recent days, during daily monitoring of metadata quality carried out on the European portal data.europa.eu, the Italian catalogue has emerged as the leading national portal for quality among EU Member States and among major portals with a significant number of datasets, with an overall “excellent” classification (achieved with a score between 351 and 405).
Out of a total of 57,437 datasets made available on the European portal by dati.gov.it, around 60% (34,416) are rated as “excellent” and about 40% (22,966) as “good”. Only 55 datasets (less than 0.1%) are marked as “sufficient”.
It is also worth noting that, based on these figures, more than 65% of all datasets published on the European portal and classified as “excellent” (52,286) come from the Italian portal.
The assessment of metadata quality (MQA – Metadata Quality Assessment) on the European portal is based on a series of indicators grouped into five dimensions derived from the FAIR principles: findability, accessibility, interoperability, reusability and contextuality.
Italy’s position represents a significant achievement for the entire national digital ecosystem and is the result of the daily commitment of all stakeholders involved in the process of opening up data and reusing public sector information - primarily public administrations, but also businesses, professionals and thematic user communities.
AgID coordinates and guides the development and application of the regulatory framework, supporting public administrations at all levels and other interested parties, as well as managing the data portals (dati.gov.it and geodati.gov.it), which serve as national references for their European counterparts.
To learn more, explore the datasets available at dati.gov.it.
