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Changes to guidance on Sectors

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Bill Anderson
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While the standard has not changed regarding Sectors we plan to modify the guidance in a number of ways:

Vocabularies

Three different classification systems of classification are in widespread use:

  • The OECD Development Assistance Committee’s Creditor Reporting System Purpose Codes (CRS)
  • The UN Classifications of the Functions of Government (COFOG)
  • The US National Taxonomy of Exempt Entities (NTEE)

IATI recommends the usage of CRS Codes, but allows for COFOG and NTEE classifications and will in future provide a service that cross-references these systems.

Using your own Coding

If you have your own classifications IATI recommends that you publish your own codes in addition to the CRS sectors.

This maintains both the accuracy of your own system and compatibility with other publishers. You do this by specifying the vocabulary “RO: Reporting Organisation” .

eg.
 
<sector vocabulary="RO" code="E5">Basic education for all</sector>
<sector code="11220">Primary education</sector>
 
(NB. If no vocabulary is specified, DAC CRS is assumed.)

Reporting Multiple Sectors

IATI allows for the reporting of multiple sectors to best describe an activity. This requires that you provide a percentage split between reported sectors (ensuring that these add up to 100$). This split should provide an estimate of how the costs of the activity are divided up.

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1 Comments

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    Tim Davies

    Minor point: I'm guessing the brackets in 'Reporting Multiple Sectors' should read 100% rather than 100$

    More significant point: 

    It would help clarity to say 'IATI allows for the reporting of multiple sectors from a vocabulary in order to best describe an activity'. I.e. The percentage split between sectors in each vocabulary should add up to 100%, (rather than allowing the 100% to mix-and-match span vocabularies). 

    Can you also clarify the following points:

    • If you provide multiple sectors from the same vocabulary is a percentage mandatory? 
      Or should consuming tools assume that, in the absence of a percentage, the project is apportioned equally across the sectors. 
    • Some guidance for consuming applications on dealing with multiple sectors - in order to indicate the sorts of semantics that sector means
      For example, we might say that: "Applications consuming IATI data may use the 'sector split' (the percentage of the project allocated to each sector) within a given vocabulary in order to calculate the total commitments or spending in a given sector. For example, if an activity record indicates commitments of $100, and indicates a sector classification of 'Basic Education' with a percentage of 30%, a consuming application would add $30 to it's total commitments to 'Basic Education'. " 
       
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