Seeding the African data initiative

The African Data Initiative (ADI) is a highly collaborative project that aims to transform statistics education and how people use and understand data, both in Africa and beyond. The first major activity of ADI has been the development of R-Instat, a front-end to R, tailored to African needs and developed largely in Africa. This paper describes the background, initial activities and the principles of ADI. The principles provide structure to guide and communicate thinking behind ADI decision making, for both existing and future activities. The ADI collaboration exists primarily through a common desire to contribute towards Africa’s data revolution alongside a collective principal based approach.