Swiss Federal Data Science Strategy (DSStB)

December 2022

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Strategies and Action Plans

The Federal Data Science Strategy (DSStB) aims to enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of public policy through data science. Key points of the strategy include:

  1. Relevance:
    • Addressing complex, unstructured, data-rich, and fast-paced issues with data science.
    • Supporting political decision-making and operational challenges with data-driven insights.
  2. Purpose:
    • Laying the foundation for using data science across federal administrative units.
    • Promoting coordinated use, avoiding duplication, and establishing common principles.
  3. Approach:
    • Establishing a coordinated value creation system with five enablers: culture, talent, cooperation, tools, and infrastructure.
    • Allowing for development paths tailored to individual administrative units’ needs and opportunities.
  4. Vision Statement:
    • ‘Human-centric and trustworthy data science for public good and public policy.’
  5. Core Principles:
    • Information security, data protection, data security, data governance, non-discrimination, explainability, traceability, transparency, reproducibility, neutrality, objectivity, and ethical handling of data and results.
  6. Strategic Directions:
    • Creating trust in data-driven decision support.
    • Building awareness and competence in data science.
    • Increasing technical accessibility and availability.
    • Exploiting potential for synergies and tackling challenges together.
  7. Implementation Measures:
    • Promoting core principles through a code of practice.
    • Establishing governance for the data science strategy.
    • Identifying application cases across the policy-making process.
    • Developing a transversal data science ecosystem to support innovation and application.
  8. Data Science Ecosystem:
    • Cultivating a data science culture.
    • Developing talent and promoting personnel development.
    • Facilitating transversal cooperation within the administration, with science and research, the economy, and internationally.
    • Providing access to data science tools and platforms.
    • Ensuring robust data stewardship and infrastructure for optimal data science application.

The strategy emphasises human-centric and trustworthy data science applications to support public good and public policy, enhancing decision-making processes across federal administrative units.