Savania Chinamaringa
Data Exploitation Lead
Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
United Kingdom

Biography
Savania plays a lead role in strategic development and implementation of data initiatives for the UK’s Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra); the INSPIRE lead agency for the UK. He is responsible for the INPSIRE benefits realisation strategy. Savania studied geography at undergraduate and then went on to study Development Management (MSc) and Business (MBA) in graduate school. He has over 10 years’ experience working in IT, business and data-related posts in the private sector, non-profit sector and the public sector. He also have keen interest in the ‘business’ and economics of data; especially spatial data.

Abstract
Assessing the Value, Impacts and Benefits of INSPIRE: The UK Framework & Approach

The INSPIRE directive's broad aim was to create a European Union spatial data infrastructure to enable the sharing of environmental data among public sector organisations and enable better public access to the same data. Implied in the directive's broad aim and common principles was the idea that enabling data sharing and access had real benefits to the public sector bodies, their respective governments and the general public. The 2003 INSPIRE Impact Assessment concluded that the benefits of INSPIRE would outweigh the costs. It estimated that an investment of €200-€300 million per annum for the EU Member States and accession countries would yield returns of at least €1.2-€1.8 billion annual net benefits once INSPIRE is fully implemented. From the beginning it was widely acknowledged that the early years of INSPIRE would be characterised by heavy investment, with very little/no tangible returns. It was projected that 2014 would be the year that tangible benefits of INSPIRE would begin to materialise. By 2018 the Cumulative Net Present Value would be expected to turn positive (i.e. total benefits outweighing total costs) and full benefits would be realised around 10 years after implementation. Like many geospatial initiatives, the INSPIRE directive, and related impact assessments, did not provide clear direction on how EU member states would assess and measure the benefits. As INSPIRE moves into the operational phase this has become an apparent challenge for all member states that are expected to report on benefits as part of their triennial reports. This presentation introduces the approach being developed for assessing INSPIRE benefits to the United Kingdom. The approach provides pragmatic advice on how member states and individuals organisations could assess and ascribe value to various INPSIRE benefits that include, but are not limited to: 1) Improving efficiency and service delivery
- Improving skills and capabilities; 2) Wider societal, economic and environmental benefits. The approach involve, in large part, carrying out case studies. The presentation provides examples of such case studies, with emphasis on the Land Registry - publishers of one of UK's most popular INSPIRE datasets.