[okfn-discuss] New Resource: “Where Does Europe’s Money Go? A Guide to EU Budget Data Sources”

Thu Jul 2 12:41:43 UTC 2015

[Apologies for cross-posting!]

Hi all,

We've just released a new resource: *"Where Does Europe's Money Go? A Guide
to EU Budget Data Sources"*.

Any help in forwarding this on to relevant civil society organisations,
journalists or others who are interested in this topic would be very much
appreciated:

   - Blog post: http://blog.okfn.org/2015/07/02/where-does-europes-money-go/
   - Tweet: https://twitter.com/OKFN/status/616577063278014464

The PDF version is here
<http://community.openspending.org/resources/eu/pdf/WhereDoesEuropesMoneyGo.pdf>,
web version here <http://community.openspending.org/resources/eu/>,
spreadsheet of EU funds here
<https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/u/1/d/1tkKxRlkW60-ylxdvxGkMlMq8BS4SRPR4QoEd72qgFwQ/pubhtml>,
and text from the blog post is inline below.

As it says in the blog post, we hope this will become a living resource
that we can continue to expand and update. If anyone has any comments or
suggestions for things to add, we’d love to hear from you
<https://discuss.okfn.org/t/new-resource-where-does-europes-money-go-a-guide-to-eu-budget-data-sources/454>
!

All the best,

Jonathan

####
JUST RELEASED: “WHERE DOES EUROPE’S MONEY GO? A GUIDE TO EU BUDGET DATA
SOURCES”

The EU has committed to spending *€959,988 billion* between 2014 and 2020.
This money is disbursed through over *80 funds and programmes* that are
managed by over *100 different authorities*. Where does this money come
from? How is it allocated? And how is it spent?

Today we are delighted to announce the release of *“Where Does Europe’s
Money Go? A Guide to EU Budget Data Sources”
<http://community.openspending.org/resources/eu/>*, which aims to help
civil society groups, journalists and others to navigate the vast landscape
of documents and datasets in order to “follow the money” in the EU. The
guide also suggests steps that institutions should take in order to enable
greater democratic oversight of EU public finances. It was undertaken by
Open Knowledge with support from the Adessium Foundation
<http://www.adessium.org/mission/>.
[image: Where Does Europe's Money Go?]
<http://community.openspending.org/resources/eu/pdf/WhereDoesEuropesMoneyGo.pdf>

   - Download the PDF
   <http://community.openspending.org/resources/eu/pdf/WhereDoesEuropesMoneyGo.pdf>
    version.
   - <http://community.openspending.org/resources/eu/>Read online
   <http://community.openspending.org/resources/eu/> on the OpenSpending
   website.
   - Explore our spreadsheet
   <https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/u/1/d/1tkKxRlkW60-ylxdvxGkMlMq8BS4SRPR4QoEd72qgFwQ/pubhtml>
of
   different EU funds.

As we have seen from projects like Farm Subsidy
<http://datajournalismhandbook.org/1.0/en/getting_data_2.html> and journalistic
collaborations around the EU Structural Funds
<http://datajournalismhandbook.org/1.0/en/case_studies_1.html> it can be
very difficult and time-consuming to put together all of the different
pieces needed to understand flows of EU money.

Groups of journalists on these projects have spent many months requesting,
scraping, cleaning and assembling data to get an overview of just a handful
of the many different funds and programmes through which EU money is spent.
The analysis of this data has led to many dozens of news stories
<http://farmsubsidy.openspending.org/news/media/>, and in some cases
even criminal
investigations <http://eutransparency.org/a-family-affair/>.

Better data, documentation, advocacy and journalism around EU public money
is vital to addressing the “democratic deficit” in EU fiscal policy. To
this end, we make the following recommendations to EU institutions and
civil society organisations:

   1. *Establish a single central point of reference* for data and
   documents about EU revenue, budgeting and expenditure and ensure all the
   information is up to date at this domain (e.g. at a website such as
   ec.europa.eu/budget). At the same time, ensure all EU budget data are
   available from the EU open data portal as open data.
   2. *Create an open dataset with key details about each EU fund*,
   including name of the fund, heading, policy, type of management,
   implementing authorities, link to information on beneficiaries, link to
   legal basis in Eur-Lex and link to regulation in Eur-Lex.
   3. *Extend the Financial Transparency System to all EU funds* by
   integrating or federating detailed data expenditures from Members States,
   non-EU Members and international organisations. Data on beneficiaries
   should include, when relevant, a unique European identifier of company, and
   when the project is co-financed, the exact amount of EU funding received
   and the total amount of the project.
   4. *Clarify and harmonise the legal framework regarding transparency
   rules* for the beneficiaries of EU funds.
   5. *Support and strengthen funding for civil society groups and
   journalists* working on EU public finances.
   6. *Conduct a more detailed assessment of beneficiary data availability* for
   all EU funds and for all implementing authorities – e.g., through a
   dedicated “open data audit”.
   7. *Build a stronger central base of evidence about the uses and users
   of EU fiscal data* – including data projects, investigative journalism
   projects and data users in the media and civil society.

Our intention is that the material in this report will become a living
resource that we can continue to expand and update. If you have any
comments or suggestions, we’d love to hear from you
<https://discuss.okfn.org/c/openspending>.

If you are interested in learning more about Open Knowledge’s other
initiatives around open data and financial transparency you can
explore the Where
Does My Money Go? <http://wheredoesmymoneygo.org/> project, the OpenSpending
<https://openspending.org/> project, read our other previous guides and
reports <http://community.openspending.org/resources/> or join the Follow
the Money <http://followthemoney.net/> network.

-- 

Jonathan Gray

Director of Policy and Research | *@jwyg <https://twitter.com/jwyg>*

Open Knowledge <http://okfn.org/>

*okfn.org <http://okfn.org/> | @okfn <http://twitter.com/OKFN>*
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