Geospatial data quality management improves 15.9% across government agencies, ministry says

The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport announced Friday that geospatial data quality management levels improved 15.9 percent compared with the same period last year, based on results of its 2026 Geospatial Data Quality Management Assessment conducted from April to October this year across central and local government agencies and public institutions.

The ministry has conducted the assessment annually since 2020 in conjunction with the Ministry of Interior and Safety's evaluation of public data provision operations, aiming to improve the quality of geospatial data — a key infrastructure component for emerging industries. The results are reflected in the quality section of the Ministry of Interior and Safety's 2026 Public Data Provision Operations Assessment and published accordingly.

This year's assessment covered 720 geospatial datasets held by 240 central and local government agencies and public institutions. Evaluators scored each dataset across four categories: data error rate (10 points), establishment of an improvement plan based on quality diagnostic results (4 points), implementation rate of the improvement plan (3 points), and degree of effort to correct errors (3 points), for a maximum total score of 20 points.

The average score across all assessed institutions was 10.2 points, up 15.9 percent — or 1.4 points — from 8.8 points in 2025. The data error rate category was particularly notable, rising 32.4 percent, or 1.2 points, from the previous year.

Twenty institutions received a perfect score of 20 points in this year's assessment, two more than in 2025, indicating a broad expansion of efforts to improve geospatial data quality management across agencies.

The ministry recognized Yongsan-gu in Seoul, Pocheon in Gyeonggi Province and Muju-gun in North Jeolla Province as outstanding institutions for their active efforts to improve geospatial data quality and management standards, presenting them with ministerial commendations at the 2026 K-Geo Festa.

Lee Dae-seop, the ministry's director general for land information policy, said geospatial data is growing in importance across emerging industries such as AI, autonomous driving and urban air mobility, and that the ministry plans to continuously raise both the quality of geospatial data and the standard of its quality management.