The Sustainable Mobility for All Initiative (SuM4All), World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD), and the International Road Federation (IRF) have launched a new report that draws attention to the need for policy guidance for data sharing between public and private sector stakeholders in the transportation sector.   

The report, Sustainable Mobility:  Policy Making for Data Sharing, which was released today as part of the new GRA in Action series, outlines a comprehensive policy framework with actionable guidance to support the adoption of data sharing to achieve sustainable urban mobility. 

The increasing digitalization of mobility presents an opportunity to accelerate the transition toward sustainable urban mobility. Governments and businesses alike are using mobility data for innovative uses. Many disruptive mobility businesses, including those modeled on the shared economy, telematics, and autonomous driving capabilities, are all built on the backbone of static and dynamic data collection and processing abilities. Similarly, governments use data to understand and monitor transportation systems and plan infrastructure to meet future needs. While raw data alone are not enough, data sharing can help generate actionable insights, which are necessary to achieve sustainable mobility goals, generate economic value, and improve transportation experiences.   

“Sharing of data across multiple sources is essential for decarbonizing our transportation systems and making mobility safer, more efficient, and accessible. Policy making for data sharing will help create harmonized, secure, privacy-centric, and ethical data-sharing ecosystems,” said  Thomas Deloison, Director, Mobility,  WBCSD. 

An analysis of practices around the world shows that there is an urgent need for greater policy coherence in data sharing ecosystems, and governments need to adopt a harmonized and collaborative approach toward policy making for data sharing. “This report addresses the existing policy gap around mobility data-sharing,” said  Susanna Zammataro, Director General,  IRF. “A sound global policy framework is vital to harness technological advances and to avoid siloed approaches that could hamper rather than support the development of a mobility that is sustainable for all.” 

“For Sustainable Mobility for All (SuM4All), data and evidence are essential to diagnose mobility issues and prioritize policy action. Until recently, much of the conversation on transport has been driven by anecdotes or ad hoc assessments. With the vast amount of data newly generated by the private sector, the right policy framework in place to enable data-sharing between public and private actors, and artificial intelligence to process that information, we can now bring a higher level of objectivity and precision in diagnosing issues in countries and guiding policy choices” said  Dr. Nancy Vandycke, Program Manager, SuM4All. 

Adding, “As a coalition of more than 50 organizations from the public and the private sectors, SuM4All will continue to harness technical expertise from its Members to think beyond existing paradigms, offer new insights, and support countries in their efforts to achieve sustainable mobility, including their climate targets.” 

The  policy framework presented in the report  is built on exemplary practices from existing policies and data-sharing initiatives. It embodies the principles presented in the foundational WBCSD report  Emerging Data Principles. The framework offers 33 policy suggestions that can be tailored and adapted by policymakers to suit their local mobility system and priority use cases. Ten global case studies annexed to the report illustrate how the policy framework can be applied practically and how the policy suggestions complement each other regardless of economic development level. 

As part of the next plan of action, WBCSD and IRF, in collaboration with the SuM4All initiative, will be working on a series of demonstration projects on data sharing applications in different geographies. Champions in governments and the private sector are invited to support this effort to collaborate on these demonstration projects to scale data sharing for sustainable mobility globally. 

NOTE TO EDITORS: 

“The Sustainable Mobility: Policy Making for Data Sharing” contains actionable policy guidelines, and builds on World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) Transforming Urban Mobility Project’s work on Enabling Data Sharing: Emerging Principles for Transforming Urban Mobility and unpacks the GRA’s policy measures on data-sharing platforms. This report offers 6 key recommendations as a call to action for policy makers and categorizes the 33 policy suggestions into 5 areas of policy interventions based on 10 global case studies. 

The report authorship is led by the World Business Council for Sustainable Development’s (WBCSD) Transforming Urban Mobility Project and the International Road Federation (IRF), under the umbrella of the Sustainable Mobility For All initiative (SuM4All). 

 The report is accessible on SuM4All website: https://www.sum4all.org/publications/gra-action-series 

Our experts are available for interviews. For more information, please contact: 

Julia Mitic

Jennifer Okaima Piette

ABOUT US 

Sustainable Mobility for All (SuM4All) is the premier advocacy platform for international cooperation on transport and mobility issues. It brings together 55 public organizations and private companies, including bilateral partners, multilateral development banks, U.N. organizations, intergovernmental organizations, and civil society with a shared ambition to transform the future of mobility. It is an innovative model for action in transport that leverages the knowledge, expertise, and influence of its Member organizations to assist countries worldwide in their ambition to attain universal access, efficiency, safety and green mobility.
www.sum4all.org 

WBCSD is a global, CEO-led organization of over 200 leading businesses working together to accelerate the transition to a sustainable world. We help make our member companies more successful and sustainable by focusing on the maximum positive impact for shareholders, the environment and societies.  Our member companies come from all business sectors and all major economies, representing a combined revenue of more than USD $8.5 trillion and 19 million employees. Our global network of almost 70 national business councils gives our members unparalleled reach across the globe. Since 1995, WBCSD has been uniquely positioned to work with member companies along and across value chains to deliver impactful business solutions to the most challenging sustainability issues. Together, we are the leading voice of business for sustainability: united by our vision of a world where more than 9 billion people are all living well and within the boundaries of our planet, by 2050.
www.wbcsd.org 

The International Road Federation (IRF) is a global, independent, not-for-profit organisation with headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland. Active since 1948, IRF is a membership-based organisation, representing leading corporate and institutional players drawn from the road and mobility sectors worldwide. Its mission is to promote the development of roads and road networks that enable access and sustainable mobility for all. Its approach is centred on key strategic components of knowledge transfer & information sharing, connecting people, businesses and organisations, and working on policy & advocacy.
www.irfnet.ch