The European Commission will adopt on the 29 November an Open Data Strategy which means a set of measures aimed at increasing government transparency and creating a €32 billion a year market for public data. The measures include a modification of the existing Directive on the re-use of public sector information and the deployment measures such as a creation of open data portals at European level.

The Open Data Strategy will be adopt by the European Commission on 29 November. The strategy proposed by the Commission will consist in a package of measures including regulatory measures, such as a modification of the existing Directive on the re-use of public sector information and the deployment measures such as a creation of open data portals at European level. The Strategy was already proposed in November 2010.

The information published by government organisations across Europe has a significant – currently untapped – potential for re-use in new products and services, for example mobile applications adapting and linking geographical, legal or statistical data. This reason have led the Commission to revise and strengthen its public data strategy. Additionally, in 2010 the market for products and services based on public sector information was estimated to be worth around €32 billion across the EU, according to a recent study. The same study indicated that further opening up of public sector information by allowing easier access would generate overall economic gains of around €40 billion a year for the EU. The 2003 Directive (2003/98/EC) on the re-use of public sector information has led to a minimum harmonisation and progress across the EU, but significant differences in national rules, for example on licensing and pricing, as well as different practices still exist. According to the Commission, it results in a fragmentation in the Single Market for data based products and services. Moreover, the lack of interoperability between the information resources, and insufficient availability of the information in a machine readable format make it impossible to reap the full benefits from the new opportunities of government data in the digital age.

The Communication, which will be the form chosen by the Commission to present the Open Data Strategy, will be accompanied by a proposal for modifying the Directive on the re-use of public sector information (the main element of the regulatory framework for re-use) and a revised Commission decision on the re-use of the Commission's information.