Researcher and consultant in the domains of geospatial data, data infrastructures and digital transformation

The role of the Spatial Data Infrastructure in the Digital Transformation of Public Administration (2018-2019)

This is a summary of the report ‘European Commission: Joint Research Centre, Barbero, M., Lopez Potes M., Vancauwenberghe G., & Vandenbroucke D. (2019). The role of Spatial Data Infrastructures in the Digital Government Transformation of Public Administrations. Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union’. The full report can be found here.

Spatial Data Infrastructures (SDIs) play a pivotal role in Digital Government Transformation (DGT) of countries. They constitute one of the main building blocks for effective data sharing and their development in the past years has taught some important lessons to public authorities in terms of collaboration across sectors, centricity of users’ needs as well as usefulness of platforms and Application Programming Interfaces (APIs). However, the specific analysis of the role that SDIs play in Digital Government Transformation had not been the object of many studies. With practitioners and academics acknowledging more and more the links between these two concepts, there was a need to provide an initial picture of how SDIs have contributed to Digital Government Transformation until now and what could be their role in the future.

This study was a first attempt to examine this relation and develop a methodology for apprehending the role of SDIs in the Digital Transformation of the public sector. It first developed an analytical framework for examining different aspects that can provide an explanation of the relationship between SDIs and DGT and notably institutional aspects, technical aspects and impact aspects. It then tested this framework on twenty-nine countries (all European Member States plus Norway) in order to assess the validity of this instrument for the collection of data as well as for the wider understanding of this topic. From these analytical and data collection efforts, it emerged the strength of the relationship that SDIs and Digital Government Transformation entertained and the variety of ways in which countries understood and cultivated it. The study also provided an attempt to link the OECD Recommendation on Digital Governments with the SDIs and Digital Transformation experience of the countries in scope. This also helped understanding that SDIs already significantly support Digital Government Transformation, even from the OECD perspective, and that this relationship would only be stronger in the future.

Throughout the data collection and analysis processes, seventeen relevant indicators for understanding the role of SDIS in Digital Transformation were identified, which were structured around three main categories:

  • Institutional setting: which gathered indicators related to the governance, strategy and (national) legal framework underpinning the relationship between SDI and Digital Government Transformation;
  • Technical infrastructure: which included all technical aspects related to the SDI for instance in terms of breadth of the SDI infrastructure, magnitude of the interoperability efforts done as well as innovativeness of the approach;
  • Impact: which gathered the indicators concerning both the width of the usage of the SDI as well as the benefits derived from it, also from a cross-border perspective.

Within each of these three categories, sub-groups of related indicators were also identified. The analytical framework was then tested on all the countries in scope of the assignment and notably all the EU Member States plus Norway. The data collection consisted mainly in desk research and literature review on the different countries but a few interviews were organised for some specific countries and at an early phase (i.e. Slovakia, France) and additional interviews took place for the four countries which were selected for in-depth analysis and notably: Spain, Poland, Belgium and the Netherlands. The testing of the analytical framework on these countries had a twofold objective: on the one hand, it aimed at confirming/rejecting the validity of the framework for apprehending the links between the SDIs and DGT phenomena. On the other, it served to compile some key facts, figures and lessons learnt on the experiences of the countries in scope in terms of SDIs conception and implementation in the context of Digital Government Transformation.


Country factsheets were prepared to present key insights on the role of SDI in Digital Government Transformation for the four countries analysed in depth. The country factsheet for Spain shows some selected insights with regard to the institutional setting, technical infrastructure and impact of SDIs in the context of Digital Government Transformation.