Normally you might go and visit the GovNews Suppliers page to get a brief overview of how much money state and local governments across Australia spend annually.
But if you want a detailed focus on the procurement data in New South Wales alone, a mobile app called NSWSpend will be your best bet, as it has recently been recognised by the state government in its Apps4NSW competition.
The app created by Bathurst-based tech company Appiwork, is unique in that it tracks government spending and provides a platform for accessing NSW government spend data.
This data is then presented in graphs which the user can modify to gain a better understanding of state procurement.
Usually, if someone is interested in search for dollar figures representing total government spending on an annual basis, they’ll have to trawl through seemingly endless amounts of data and tables at the Australian Bureau of Statistics website, which doesn’t always present these figures in everyday language that’s easy to understand.
NSW Minister for Innovation and Better Regulation Victor Dominello said NSWSpend is an excellent example of how the government’s commitment to transparency and open data is benefiting business in NSW.
Appiwork spokesperson Zoe Hida said NSWSpend will make it easier for businesses to view trends in NSW government procurement and identify business development opportunies.
The top gong for Appiworks is part of the state government’s apps4nsw program of events, which to encourage the use of NSW Government data to create innovative web and mobile apps.
Under the competition, Appiworks was given access to collected spend data dating back to July 2011 since the first annual Budget by the Coalition government.
According to the government, this was approximately $25 billion worth of procurement spend data, covering over 150 different government entities and around 300,000 suppliers across “millions and millions” of transactions.
