Saint Lucia has joined a new open data project aimed at increasing the transparency of the government and attracting more investment to the island economy. Supported by the UK Department of International Development (DFID) and the World Bank, the project focuses on improving public access to non-sensitive government data. Saint Lucia is the first country in the Caribbean to join the project, and plans to open its data sets soon. The government is currently taking World Bank’s open data readiness assessment, which is designed to examine what actions the government should consider to establish an open data initiative. 

“It is about making data available to the general public so that they can come up with their own conclusions on whether government agencies are performing in a way we should be performing,” James Fletcher, Saint Lucia's Minister of Public Service, Sustainable Development, Energy, Science and Technology said after the project was announced.

After DFID provided a grant to support the project, Hugh Walker, head of DFID Caribbean, said: “We are glad to support Caribbean countries in this important area of open data and open budget data, and look forward to fruitful results in two years of important data sets that have been made available online."

Local organisations such as the Caribbean Telecommunications Union will take part in the project.