The Philippine Government’s Policy on Data Management

Information and reports generated from the database are essentials to the Department’s basis in developing and implementing necessary and appropriate programs and projects for the LGUs.

The Philippine Government’s Policy on Data Management

In addition, to cater and address data issues that the department experienced in the past years in terms of data management and data security, the department being the authoritative source of data on Local Government, has to implement a data quality assurance standard. This policy applies to all application systems that will be developed for the concerned bureaus/OPR whether outsource or in-house development.

Moreover, in order to achieve the principles of quality information, reports, data security in terms of backup and recovery, and to eliminate the issues encountered in terms of data management, all bureaus, operating units and offices are hereby directed to abide the following guidelines, procedures and policies:

1. Adoption of the Data Quality Assurance Standard which includes Data Gathering,  Data Validation, Data Authentication, and Data Approval whether outsource or in-house development.

Data Collection/Data Gathering
The designation of data collector and data encoder must be included in the policies and guidelines of the specific application system of the concerned bureau / OPR.

·       The DILG Data Capture Form Standards should be adopted and must be strictly followed.

·       The adoption of the DILG Data Entry Guidelines must be strictly observed and followed.

All application systems must incorporate and strictly comply with the Data Quality Assurance Standards.

The Concerned bureau and Regional Offices must work hand-in-hand in identifying and designating person responsible in validation, authentication and approval of data for data accountability purposes and must strictly follow Data Validation Guidelines, Data Authentication Guidelines, and Data Approval Guidelines.

2. Backup and Recovery

All concerned bureaus/OPR shall keep and provide an updated backup copy of its databases to ISTMS. The ISTMS shall make sure that all back-up copies are secured and capable of data restoration.

3. Sharing, Distribution and Publication of Data

The DILG official website (http://dilg.gov.ph/) shall be the primary source of all data/information related to LGUs and Barangays. All LGU and Barangay data for sharing, distribution and publication online should be machine-readable, in open formats and released with open licenses.

The concerned bureaus or the OPR shall be responsible on the following:

• Integrity of data collected, published and posted on the DILG website;
• Management of data; and
• Mobilization of resources relative to the database build-up and monitoring.

4. Technical Support

The Regional Information Technology Officers (RITOs) shall be responsible in providing technical assistance to their respective regions on matters related to data management.

The ISTMS shall provide technical assistance to OPR on tools for data collection, organization, monitoring and management.

DATA QUALITY ASSURANCE STANDARDS

Data Capture Form (DCF) Standards

• Should contain a title, a brief explanation and instructions on how to fill-up the form. There should also be an information about what to do with the form once it has been completed.
• Should be simple and can easy to understand to get the essential and needed data.
• Should eliminate data redundancy or duplication.
• Should always have the signature of the data collector.

DCF Requirement Guidelines

All required fields should be filled up. If not, it should be filled with N/A, therefore unfinished DCF will be voided. In addition, all accomplished DCF must have the signature of data collector. Therefore, DCF without the signature of the data collector will not be honoured.

The DCF must be accomplished by the respective respondent with the assistance of the data collector. Any form of erasure, modification and/or superimpositions of data must have the initial of the data collector. Any uncertain data is the accountability of the data collector. All DCFs should be validated by the data collector.

Data Encoding Guidelines

All data encoders should undergo orientations / training regarding the data that will be entered into the application systems. The data encoder should accurately enter the data into the applications system and should validate the encoded data. Therefore, the data encoder will be liable in any data issues regarding data entry.

DCF with any uncertain data should not be entered into the system. A summary report regarding data uncertainty should be prepared to backtrack data issues.

Data Validation Guidelines

All data encoded in the application system should be checked for completeness, correctness, expected values, and malicious intent of the data before saving into the database. Hence, these guidelines must be followed.

• All fields marked as mandatory in the form must be completely filled up.
• All values entered should be correct across a specific data field.
• The numeric value, characters/date entered is within the specific range.
• Compare the data against the list of valid entry.
• Check if the correct input pattern/format is followed (e.g. telephone number, zip code, social insurance number).

Data Approval Guidelines

Before a certain data can be used for report generation, an authorized person must accept and agree that the data has already undergo and pass data validation and authentication. This is also the confirmation that the data are processed, organized and ready for information dissemination.

Check whether the data already conforms and pass the data validation and data authentication. The data should be certified true and correct. Data is now ready to use for report generation, sharing and publications.

ROLES AND RESPONSIBILITIES

Data Collector shall be responsible to gather the required data on the data collection form and can also act as data encoder, if applicable.

Data Encoder shall be responsible in data entry and must strictly follow the set of guidelines for data encoding. A data encoder can also be a data collector, if applicable.

Data Validator shall be responsible and must abide the data validation guidelines.

Data Authenticator is the one that shall be liable in data integrity and timeliness of the data.

Approver is the last authorized and liable person for the data that will be used in report generations and shall abide the data approval guidelines.

Here is the actual POLICY ON DATA MANAGEMENT document.