The resources below are places where data for various countries, regions, continents, and other parts of the world can be found. Some resources listed are websites with free data and others are subscription-based databases through the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
| Name & Link | Description | Location | Data Type | Time |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| World Climate Data and Monitoring Programme | Through this site the World Meteorological Organization provides access to World Weather Records data on pressure, temperature, and precipitation from the early 1800s to 2000; global surface temperature data from 1850 to the present; world records on weather and climate extremes; and datasets of the World Data Centre system on greenhouse gases, radiation, aerosols, glaciology, paleoclimatology, oceanography, and other topics. | World | Climate Observations and Networks, Climate Assessment, Climate Data Management, Climate Watch System, Global Climate Data Sets | 1800s-2000 |
| Data | The World Bank | The World Bank provides free and open access to a comprehensive set of country-level data about economic and social development, together with other datasets cited in the data catalog. | Various countries around the world | Agriculture & Rural Development, Aid Effectiveness, Climate Change, Economy & Growth, Education, Energy & Mining, Environment, External Debt, Financial Sector, Gender, Health, Infrastructure, Poverty, Private Sector, Public Sector, Science & Technology, Social Development, Social Protection & Labor, Trade, Urban Development |
1960-current |
| Terra Populus | The goal of Terra Populus is to integrate population and environmental data for the world. Currently census data for six countries is available, but this resource is still in beta and being actively developed. Terra Populus also includes land use, land cover, and climate data. | Various nations around the world | Population censuses and surveys, Land cover information from remote sensing, Climate records from weather stations, Land use records from statistical agencies | 1960-2014 |
| Global Integrity | Innovations for Transparency & Accountability | Global Integrity champions transparent and accountable government around the world by producing innovative research and technologies that inform, connect, and empower civic, private, and public reformers seeking more open societies. | A select list of countries from Africa, North America, South America, Asia, and Europe. A full list of GI-ACE Resources can be found here. | Global Integrity Report, Africa Integrity Indicators, Money, Politics and Transparency, Local Integrity Initiatives | Global Integrity Report since 2004 |
| data.gov | Includes more than 90 thousand open access datasets issued by the U.S. government--as well as many state and local governments--on topics such as agriculture, business, crime, education, energy, the environment, health, and science and research. Users may search within the datasets on a selected topic and also narrow their search results by subtopic, data format, data source, and other criteria. While the primary focus is the U.S., this resource also provides access to vast amounts of data concerning other countries and the world as a whole. | Primarily USA, Certain data pertains to world matters | Agriculture, Business, Climate, Consumer, Ecosystems, Education, Energy, Finance, Health, Local Government, Manufacturing, Ocean, Public Safety, Science & Research | Current up to 2015 |
| NCDC Dataset Documentation Page | Through this page, the National Climate Data Center provides information concerning each of its weather-related datasets. This resource enables users to retrieve documentation and metadata about particular datasets and to either download the corresponding data itself or contact the NCDC in order to request access to it. Most of this data pertains to the U.S. | USA, Japan, World Weather, Africa, Canada | Weather Data, Climate Monitoring, Satellite Data, Model Data | 1970-current |
| Open Data @ CTIC » Public Dataset Catalogs Faceted Browser | A map browser of publicly accessible datasets worldwide. | Various locations around the world | Public data | 2006-2015 |
| IPUMS International | Harmonized microdata on 614 million people in 82 countries. Data is drawn from 277 censuses carried out since 1960. | 82 countries around the world | Census Data | 1960-2011 |
| UNdata | Provides a common interface to 34 major databases of the most important intergovernmental organizations, with the exceptions of the European Union and World Trade Organization. The data has a high degree of comparability across national borders, and its reliability is widely recognized. | Various countries around the world, including comparable data across national borders | Social Topics, Information and Communication Technologies, Industry and Agriculture, Climate and the Environment, Finance, Trade, Energy, Population | |
| DataFirst | DataFirst is a unit at the University of Cape Town, South Africa devoted to survey research in Africa. The unit operates a Research Data Centre and provides basic and advanced training in microdata analysis. DataFirst is also an international web portal for South African census and survey data, as well as survey metadata and all research output based on this data. | African Nations, International | Survey Data, Country, Census, Demographic, etc. | 1960-2015 |
| CESSDA PORTAL - Council of European Social Science Data Services | Provides a seamless interface to datasets from social science data archives across Europe. | Europe | Demography & Population, Economics, Education, Health, Housing & Land Use Planning, Information & Communication, Labour & Employment, Law, Crime & Legal Systems, Natural Environment, Politics, Reference & Instructional Resources, Science & Technology, Social Stratification & Groupings, Social Welfare Policy & Systems, Society & Culture, Trade, Industry & Markets | |
| Latinobarometro | Latinobarometro is an annual public opinion survey that involves some 19,000 interviews in 18 Latin American countries, representing more than 400 million inhabitants. Older data is free for download. | Latin American Countries | Survey Data | 1995-2013 |
