We are very happy to announce the release of our latest set of Open Repair Data. The Open Repair Alliance dataset now contains over 62,000 repair attempts logged at community repair events around the world.
This latest update contains data from events that were held up to the end of April 2022, and is published in the Open Repair Data Standard v0.3 format. Read on to find out more about the data and how it is used.
62,000 records of repair data
The combined data of all data providers now contains 62,095 repair attempts – an increase of 7,693 records since the release of the last dataset. This is an increase of 14% in just six months of events – it is exciting to see community repair happening around the world again following the lessening of the pandemic.
Repair is everywhere
The theme for this year’s International Repair Day is ‘Repair is Everywhere’. In the open repair data, we have repairs logged by 433 groups around the world in 23 countries on 6 continents.
The repair data is best represented in those countries where the current data partners to the Open Repair Alliance are based: Repair Cafe International in the Netherlands, The Restart Project and Repair Cafe Wales in the United Kingdom, anstiftung in Germany, and Repair Together in Belgium.
We would love to expand the number of countries in the data – let us know if you can share data from a country that is currently underrepresented!
Providing insights into repair
The Restart Project has used the Open Repair Alliance data in another citizen science investigation, this time focusing on the faults in the vacuum cleaners we see at community repair events. Data from ORA partners shows clearly the wide range of faults that people are keen to get fixed participating in repair events. We submitted results of this data analysis as part of an EU consultation on future regulation on vacuum cleaners, making the case that a wide range of spare parts need to be made available to everyone by manufacturers in order to extend the lifetime of these products.
Find out more on our insights page on vacuum cleaners. And you can view an overview of all the data, as well as further insights into key product categories, on our overall Insights page.
What’s next?
Some dates for the repair calendar: Fixfest 2022 is coming soon to Brussels – September 30th – 1st October. And International Repair Day is coming soon too – on Saturday 15th October.
We’ll be producing another dataset soon. Repair is everywhere, so we are always keen to find more contributors to the dataset – please contact us if your network has been collecting community repair data and you’re happy to share it publicly.