The Mayor, Claudia López, presented this Monday the data analytics agency of Bogotá, Ágata, the first of its kind in the country and one of the few in the world that integrates its public functions with a self-sustainability model. This analytics agency, will change the way in which the data of the city and its inhabitants are analyzed, interpreted and used, for the benefit of citizens to make the capital an increasingly transparent and intelligent place.
“This new reality with more digitization, more connection, more virtuality is here to stay. Without connectivity there is no inclusion in the 21st century and that is why we want to make Bogotá a smart, safer and more transparent city for all its citizens. Bogotá needs to transform information into data so that citizens can make better decisions and that is what analytics are for, ”said Mayor Claudia López.
In one year, Ágata will allow informal traders to have access to microcredits from the financial system with the best conditions, to avoid being subjected to traditional interest rate charging methods. Likewise, the Agency will be able to connect data from the city's security cameras with information on fellonies so that, based on analytics, we can attack crime in a predictive way and, it will also be an articulating vehicle that will allow the adoption of new emerging technologies to fight corruption, with the promotion of technologies such as blockchain to secure procurement data and information, and public spending.
Additionally, the analytics will help provide, among other things, services such as management of social services with a 360 view of citizens, automatic response to requests through social networks, reduction of energy consumption in public lighting with the use of smart sensors, collection of on-street parking or income generation using photo analytics and risk analysis such as floods, landslides or forest fires.
The Mayor's Office of Bogotá in conjunction with Ágata's partners: the Bogotá Telecommunications Company - ETB (51%); the Bogotá Energy Group (40%); the Administrative Unit of Registry (7%); the Aqueduct and Sewerage Company of Bogotá (1%) and the District Planning Secretariat (1%) presented this new agency, which is part of the Public Management Sector of the Mayor's Office of Bogotá, and will allow the city to make use of articulated information for the decision-making process in a transparent way while benefitting the quality of life of citizens.
“The Agency and its partners established a commitment to take care of the personal data of citizens and guarantee the security of information, under a premise of ethics in its handling, in compliance with Colombian regulations and taking a step further, seeking to achieve the standards of the European Unit on the matter ”, stated Sergio González, president of ETB.
The creation of this agency is the result of the mandate of article 145 of the district development plan that entered into force in June 16, 2020. Although the Mayor's Office already makes decisions guided by data, with the arrival of Ágata this process will be deepened and accelerated, because, until today, the city did not have sufficient capacity to process, verify and validate the consistency and quality of the information in an articulated manner.
Precisely, the potential for articulating the public policy interventions opened by the agency is enormous, since data will be the key to make city decisions in a predictive way with more effective results, optimizing the allocation of public resources and developing solutions to problems with the support, both from national and international allies, thus improving services to citizens.
In addition, Ágata will strengthen the open data policy by creating opportunities for the Bogota entrepreneurial ecosystem and for companies to take advantage of the fourth industrial revolution.
For this to materialize, Ágata will not commercialize data, will carry out privacy impact evaluations (even a priori), will have an external audit and will already have published the first versions of the policies, manuals and related processes, which can be consulted on the website of the Agency www.agata.gov.co
The name Ágata is inspired by the precious and powerful stone that represents wisdom and its logo is born with a friendly and futuristic look, with geometric and lowercase letters that are warmer and more welcoming, by highlighting the human element of data and analysis; the circles represent the individuals, the community and the data that, together, form a stellar configuration that allude to the symbol of Bogotá. The variety of colors expresses the multiplicity of entities and information of a diverse city.
Thanks to this new institution, Bogotá becomes the first city in the country to take inter-sectorial management of information in its hands for the benefit of its inhabitants. On an international scale, it will also allow the capital to position itself as one of the cities in the world that bets on the use of advanced analytics and an ecosystem of smart cities, under an innovative scheme.
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