dataunderlag

Dataunderlag is a Swedish term for the data foundation used to support analyses, decisions, and reporting. It includes datasets, their metadata, and the documentation describing how the data were collected, processed, and organized. A dataunderlag should be fit for purpose, accurate, timely, and sufficiently complete to support the intended analysis.

Core elements are data sources (primary data collected for a purpose and secondary data reused from existing sources), collection methods, data cleaning and transformation, integration from multiple sources, storage and versioning, and data models and lineage showing how data elements relate and change over time. Metadata and data dictionaries are essential for understanding context, quality, and limitations.

Quality and governance focus on validity, reliability, completeness, and timeliness, as well as provenance. Privacy, security, and ethics considerations are important, often requiring minimization, anonymization, access controls, and regulatory compliance. Data stewardship defines ownership, responsibilities, and procedures for usage and maintenance.

Uses include informing research, policy making, performance evaluation, risk assessment, and forecasting. It supports model calibration, benchmarking, and transparent reporting, and enables reproducibility and auditability when well documented.

Challenges include fragmented sources, inconsistent formats, missing values, biases, and balancing openness with privacy. Best practices include clear data requirements, data quality checks, documented lineage, version control, standardized formats, and regular reviews.

Examples vary by sector. A municipal dataunderlag might comprise census figures, land use data, transport counts, and environmental measurements; an environmental monitoring underlag might combine sensor readings, weather data, and satellite metadata.

The dataunderlag lifecycle covers collection, validation, storage, sharing, reuse, archiving, and disposal, with ongoing maintenance to keep it fit for purpose.