The aim of the UN World Data Forum is to spur data innovation, nurture partnerships, mobilize high-level political and financial support for data, and build a pathway to better data for sustainable development. Since January 2017, the Forum’s community has grown from 2,000 people who attended the first and second Forum in Cape Town, South Africa and Dubai, United Arab Emirates to active list of over 20,000 interested stakeholders. This growth in interest was due to the more open and accessible Forums held virtually in 2020 and as a hybrid format in Bern, Switzerland in 2021 and in Hangzhou, China in 2023. The Forum has since returned to being fully in-person with over 3,000 persons attending the fifth Forum held in Medellín, Colombia at the end of 2024. The stakeholder community engaged in the Forum represents a diverse range of governments, civil society, the private sector, donor and philanthropic bodies, international and regional agencies, the geospatial community, the media, academia, and professional bodies.

Every UN World Data Forum has resulted in the release of an outcome document to chart the progress of discussions around data and statistics and express the ambitions of the stakeholder community. The Cape Town Global Action Plan (CTGAP) was launched at the first UN World Data Forum on where to focus statistical and data capacity development efforts to establish the full range of reporting and monitoring needed to measure progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030. The CTGAP was followed by the Dubai Declaration (2018) calling for an innovative funding mechanism to support the implementation of the CTGAP; and more recently the Global data community’s response to Covid-19 (2020) and Bern Data Compact for the Decade of Action on the Sustainable Development Goals (2021) on how official statistics and National Statistical Offices (NSOs) position themselves during Covid-19 and then in the wider data ecosystem generally. At the most recent Forums held as the fourth and fifth in April 2023 and November 2024, the Hangzhou Declaration was launched to recommit the global community to accelerating progress in the implementation of the Cape Town Global Action Plan for Sustainable Development (CTGAP) and provided the foundation for the launch of the Medellín Framework for Action on Data for Sustainable Development. The Framework represents a second-generation document founded on the original CTGAP, reflecting the aspirations of the wider stakeholder base fostered by the Forum over the past seven years and marking the milestone that the Forum has now been hosted in all regions of the World.

The next Forum is planned in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia to take place between 9 and 12 November 2026.