[ddj] Launch SubsidyStories.eu

[Anna Alberts]

--- apologies for cross-posting ----

Dear All,

Six months ago we started the project to gather EU subsidy data here on
these mailing lists and we received many enthusiastic and supportive
responses and a ton of help from this community.

Now we can proudly present to you: subsidystories.eu

Here you can query, search, analyse all recipients and projects for the
European Structural and Investment Funds (ERDF, ESF and CF) from 2007 to
now for all EU Member States (except for Romania due to lack of data).

Below you will find the Press Release.

Do spread the word and check out the website: subsidystories.eu


Best wishes

Anna, Michael, Bela, Diana, Adam, Levko



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*“New site SubsidyStories.eu shows where nearly 300bn of EU subsidies go
across Europe”*

*Berlin, 06 March 2017 *- Today, Open Knowledge Germany and Open Knowledge
International launched *SubsidyStories.eu* <http://subsidystories.eu/>: a
database containing all recipients of EU Structural Funds, accounting
for *292,9
Billion Euros* of EU Subsidies.

The European Union allocates 44 % of its total 7-year budget through the
European Structural Funds. Who received these funds - accounting for 347
Billion Euro from 2007 - 2013 and 477 Billion from 2014 - 2020 - could only
be traced through regional and local websites. Subsidystories.eu changes
this by integrating all regional datasets into one database with all
recipients of the European Structural and Investment Funds from 2007
onwards.

*"SubsidyStories is a major leap forward in bringing transparency to the
spending of EU funds,"* said Dr. Ronny Patz, a researcher focused on
budgeting in the European Union and in the United Nations system at the
Ludwig-Maximilans-Universität (LMU) in Munich. *"For years, advocates have
asked the EU Commission and EU member state governments to create a single
website for all EU Structural and Investment Funds, but where they have
failed, civil society now steps in."*

Subsidystories.eu makes the recipients of the largest EU subsidies program
visible across Europe. Recent and future debates on EU spending will
benefit from the factual basis offered by the project, as spending on the
member state, regional and local level can be traced. Subsidystories.eu
makes it possible to check which projects and organisations are receiving
money and how it is spent across Europe. For example, the amounts given per
project are vastly different per country; in Poland the average sum per
project is 381 664 E whereas in Italy this is only 63 539.

The data can be compared throughout the EU enabling thorough analysis of EU
spending patterns. Subsidystories.eu gives scientists, journalists and
interested citizens the direct possibility of visualizing data and running
data analytics using SQL. The data can be directly downloaded to CSV for
the entire European Union or for specific countries.

Beneficiary data, which was previously scattered across the EU in different
languages and formats, had to be opened, scraped, cleaned and standardised
to allow for cross-country comparisons and detailed searches. That we are
now able to run detailed searches, aggregate projects per beneficiary and
across countries, is a big step for financial transparency in Europe.

Subsidystories.eu is a joined cooperation between Open Knowledge Germany
and Open Knowledge International, funded by Addessium and OpenBudgets.eu -
an H2020 EU research and innovation programme under grant agreement No
645833.

More information: www.subsidystories.eu

Press contact: Anna Alberts | Open Knowledge Foundation Germany
anna.alberts at okfn.de | Office: +49 30 57703666 0

-- 
Anna Alberts, Project Manager OpenBudgets.eu
Open Knowledge Foundation Germany
www.okfn.de | info at okfn.de | @okfde
anna.alberts at okfn.de <info at okfn.de> | @Anna_Alberts
Office: +49 30 57703666 0
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