Northern Ireland’s Department of Finance (DoF) has opened a £30,000 Innovation and Outreach Fund to encourage the use of open data.
It said that awards of between £300 and up to £5,000 are available to fund the development of apps or other interactive visualisations that make innovative use of data on the Open Data NI portal.
Organisations and individuals hosting engagement activities including hackathons, workshops, seminars or events that will raise awareness of open data will also be eligible to apply to the fund.
Sue Gray, permanent secretary at the DoF, said: “Opening up public sector data has the potential to provide commercial opportunities and drive economic growth and innovation.
“This fund will encourage creative re-use of the growing number of public sector datasets available on the Open Data NI Portal and help us deliver on the ambitious targets set out in the Open Data Strategy.”
The deadline for applications is Friday 7 February 2020.
The DoF has previously run competitions encouraging young people to do something new with datasets from the Open Data NI portal and for the use of open data in schools.
Image: Colm Burns, chair of The Northern Ireland Open Government Network and Sue Gray, Department of Finance permanent secretary
