World Bank implements nVisionIT`s SA-developed solution

The World Bank has implemented a South African developed business intelligence query and analysis solution that will help Southern African Development Community (SADC) countries get a better understanding of key regional and national social and economic indicators.

The development, based on iAnalysis, a BI solution designed by Microsoft Gold partner nVisionIT, of Johannesburg, now forms part of the World Bank`s Live Data Base (LDB) programme for Strengthening Statistical Capacity and Improving Monitoring and Evaluation in SADC Countries, and could be deployed globally.

When the LDB, a datawarehouse solution developed by the World Bank over the past 10 years, was piloted at six SADC countries and the SADC Secretariat at Gabarone, Botswana, the Development Bank of Southern Africa, acting as agents for the World Bank, realised the solution`s Web-based query tool was not fully meeting reporting needs.

"The Web query tool was initially designed to query the LDB datawarehouse. We realised we needed a reporting tool that could address the (data) cube rather than the database. It gives users far more flexibility to do dynamic queries and analysis," says Frans Jacobs, Information Analyst, DBSA.

"We were very impressed when we first saw what iAnalysis could do. It gave users freedom to link into data from any other database and not just the one funded and created by the World Bank."

The latest iteration of the LDB comprises a multidimensional cube based on a Microsoft SQL Server 2000 Database, Analysis Services, ProClarity, Excel 2000, custom built reporting and uploading tools, a data administration tool, and other web tools that now includes iAnalysis.

`We were able to customise iAnalysis to address the requirements the World Bank had. BI analysis products is costly and not all the functionality is always required. iAnalysis is an affordable BI tool that can be customized to address specific requirements in analysing data available in Microsoft`s Analysis Server cubes and producing professional looking Word documents based on the information generated. We saw it as ideal for SADC`s needs around the LDB, so the DBSA commissioned us to continue customising it for them," says Willem Viljoen, Strategic Services, nVisionIT.

In addition to the SADC Secretariat the LDB has been deployed at the national statistical offices of Angola, Botswana, Lesotho, Mozambique, South Africa and Zambia on the basis that for the SADC Secretariat and SADC member states to function efficiently and effectively as a regional entity, national statistical systems have to be strengthened and information made accessible to policy makers and analysts.

The LDB addresses their data management needs by focusing on the problems of storage, administration, access, documentation, quality control, analysis, and dissemination of economic data. It is populated with data, such as census, inflation, trade, CPI, industrial and health statistics going back to 1970, with model-based data supplied if actual data is not available.

While the standardisation of data based on 1800 indicators enables SADC to get a better understanding of what is happening at regional and individual country level, the use of nVision`s iAnalysis as part of the LDB`s reporting solution, now enables the individual SADC countries to plot their own indicators.

"While regional statistical monitoring and evaluation is critical, individual countries have their own needs and priorities. Botswana, for example, might want to track its CPI, while another country, such as Mozambique, might want to focus on social economic data - population growth, fatalities and the like. Others are using it to track the impact of AIDS," says Jacobs.

"iAnalysis gives them this flexibility. It is very user friendly thereby facilitating reporting so that now they can develop their own reports. Also, where other BI reporting solutions were fairly expensive, this gives us real-time data access at a relatively low cost."

System scalability and an ability to handle spatial data were also critical as the next version of the LDB will incorporate data from Geographical Information Systems (GIS).

"iAnalysis is capable of allowing GIS data to be incorporated into the cube so we don`t envisage any problems. If the GIS roll-out is successfully, we might roll it out not only throughout SADC, but also Latin America, where the World Bank has also implemented its LDB," he says.