How Chatham House made data on the trade of resources accessible to all

Before the launch of resourcetrade.earth there was nowhere to explore global resource trade in one place. Chatham House’s ambitious project visualised the trade of our planet’s natural resources on a world map, and made it accessible to everyone.

The world’s biggest challenges, including climate change, are directly connected to the trade of natural resources. But until 2017, this data was very hard to come by and understand. Chatham House, in an ambitious project, developed and curated a database of global trade in over 1,350 different types of natural resources and resource products – including agricultural, fishery and forestry products, fossil fuels, metals and other minerals, and pearls and gemstones – to show the significance of imports and exports of natural resources around the world.

The data is compiled by the United Nations Statistics Division (collected by national customs authorities) into a database known as UN Comtrade. This is arguably the most comprehensive source of merchandise trade statistics available, but challenging for non-experts to use.

“The only people using this data were specialists in places like mining companies, export agencies or universities. The data was impenetrable for the average user, and even the experts looked mainly at specific trade flows, not the bigger picture,” says Felix Preston, former Senior Research Fellow at Chatham House and now Head of Strategic Research at Climate Arc.

“The data was impenetrable for the average user, and even the experts looked mainly at specific trade flows, not the bigger picture”

Organisations who are focusing on solving these big real-world problems can now use this data, thanks to resourcetrade.earth. “People can trace the import and export of certain goods that impact deforestation, or see how major events like the COVID-19 pandemic or Russia’s invasion of Ukraine impact flows of oil and wheat resources around the world,” adds Felix.

Chatham House has always had a strong focus on looking at resource trade between countries, both as a result of policy decisions and in terms of the social and environmental ramifications of these trading relationships. “We initially set out to understand the flows and interdependencies of commodities and resources around the world to support our own work, working with design studio Applied Works to create the Resources Futures digital report in 2013. But we soon realised there was a lot of unmet demand for the data from across Chatham House and beyond” says Richard King, Senior Research Fellow at Chatham House. He adds, “We also needed a better way to visualise and understand the data for ourselves.”

Working with Applied Works, the team decided to go public. For the first time, resourcetrade.earth opened up complex patterns of resource trade for examination by non-experts as well as policy-makers, civil society groups, business analysts, and everyone with an interest in resource trade dynamics and their environmental impacts.

The tool had 100,000 visits from users in 200 countries in the first year. “I can’t imagine any other stats website getting as many users as that” says Felix. The tool has been cited in UN and OECD reports and nature journals, but Felix adds: “Where I get excited is when it’s used by a small organisation in the global south because it helps them deliver a message they wouldn’t be able to do otherwise.”

“I can’t imagine any other stats website getting as many users as that”

Accuracy and accessibility were the key challenges, ensuring the 40 million data points, including 1,350 different kinds of natural resources across 270 countries, present a truthful view of the world. Richard King says: “In terms of data, the main challenge was cleaning and processing it. Reporting of the same trade flow by exporters and importers are often inconsistent, so we developed a process for reconciling these reports, ensuring we retain as much high quality data as possible. We also needed to reorganise the data in a logical natural resource hierarchy, so users can easily query data at varying degrees of granularity and aggregation.”

Visualising so much data on a single map also presented some difficulties. A global view of all commodities between all countries results in over 22,000 individual trade flows, plus over a thousand other categories the user can request to see. This, coupled with the geographical density and spread of different countries, meant that the map needed to respond dynamically in order to remain legible. Each specific query the user requests presents quite different visualisations depending on the commodity or countries involved.

On keeping the design legible, Joe Sharpe, co-founder of Applied Works, says: “We knew it was going to be difficult to visualise. The user is able to configure the map in an almost limitless number of ways, resulting in a potentially overwhelming network of overlapping lines and labels. We employed various techniques to ensure the map remained legible and efficient to use, which we tested through rigorous prototyping. It’s deceptively simple when you look at the end result.”

“It’s deceptively simple when you look at the end result”

Felix enjoyed the process of figuring out how to do something new and impactful: “Combining the creative energy of two overlapping skill sets, substantive domain knowledge with creative and design expertise, leads to something that’s more than the sum of its parts.” But he adds that it wasn’t without its challenges: “These processes are hard. There has to be some creative tension between ambition and realism, or design principles and pragmatism, which can be quite uncomfortable for everybody. It’s hard work. But with Applied Works, we felt like it was a genuine partnership.”

“Combining the creative energy of two overlapping skill sets, substantive domain knowledge with creative and design expertise, leads to something that’s more than the sum of its parts.”

“Most people see design as just polishing something up, rather than for the true investment it is,” adds Felix. “Design is something quite fundamental rather than superficial. It’s right at the core of innovation and brand. Then there’s the disruptive power of having done the project. Building resourcetrade.earth laid the groundwork for future projects and data visualisation. We raised the bar.”

“There’s the disruptive power of having done the project. Building resourcetrade.earth laid the groundwork for future projects and data visualisation. We raised the bar.”

Asked if he has any tips for other organisations building data tools, Felix replies: “Start with design, this will help influence what data you collect and what you’ll visualise. It will shape the entire project. You don’t want to be beavering away for two years, and then realise there’s no way to communicate it.”

Resourcetrade.earth continues to be used by organisations of all sizes around the world.

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