The Essex Centre for Data Analytics (ecda) launched on Wednesday 26 June, providing public services in the county with a data sharing platform, sustainable data infrastructure and the expertise to safely share and analyse data to better understand the challenges we face.

Essex County Council, Essex Police and the University of Essex have successfully driven the delivery of Essex Data over the past three years. This pilot programme paved the way for ecda by establishing collaboration between data experts, elected members, decision makers and communities to share data to create powerful insight on some of our most challenging issues, such as escalating domestic abuse, school readiness, gangs, violence and vulnerability.

The insight has provided compelling evidence enabling us to make decisions together with communities about how we plan, design and deliver services to achieve maximum impact and action.

With a focus on prevention, ECC, Essex Police and the University of Essex have agreed a series of shared projects for ecda for 19-20 that will deliver actionable insight on issues such as homelessness, mental health, avoidable A&E attendance and physical inactivity. The potential to integrate intelligence within policy decisions across a range of economic and social issues is significant and ecda is encouraging partners to get involved in existing and future projects by contacting ecda@essex.gov.uk