Data & Monitoring

Open data

Data & Monitoring

Territorial indicators with official source traceability (SIGEP, DAFP, DANE). Data comes from the national open data platform (datos.gov.co) and is processed with R.

DI-1 · SC-EP 4% Empleo público (% del total) DI-2 · C-CA — Instrumento OCA (próximamente) DI-3 · E-DO — Reformas organizacionales (próximamente) ETI · PMA-IP — Innovación pública (próximamente)

DI-1 · SC-EP

Civil Service and Public Employment

Sociodemographic characterization of public servants in the Executive Branch (national and territorial levels) registered in SIGEP II.

290,288Registered public servants (SIGEP)

52.1%Women in civil service

$3.8MAverage monthly salary (COP)

4,150Entities in dataset

Source: Public Employment Characterization — Administrative Department of Public Function (DAFP)
SIGEP II · Updated: March 2025 · 4,150 records × 44 variables · Open license

Civil Service Charts

Gender distribution in the 10 sectors with most public servants

Executive Branch · SIGEP II, March 2025

Educational level of public servants

National distribution · SIGEP II

Age distribution: national vs. territorial

Age ranges by level of government

Age distribution comparing national and territorial levels

Average monthly salary by sector (top 15)

Weighted by number of servants · Sectors with ≥50 servants

Average monthly salary by administrative sector

Percentage of women by legal nature (top 20)

Green = above parity, gray = below parity · Entities with ≥1,000 servants

Percentage of women by legal nature of entity

Methodological note

Charts were generated with R (tidyverse + ggplot2) from the Public Employment Characterization dataset published by DAFP on the national open data platform. The dataset contains 4,150 records corresponding to Executive Branch entities (national and territorial levels), with 44 variables including gender, education level, age, work experience, and average salary per entity. Data corresponds to the March 2025 SIGEP II snapshot.

Data quality finding

Only 43.2% of public servants (125,350 of 290,288) have educational records in the SIGEP II open data extraction. Additionally, postgraduate education columns (specialization, master's, doctorate) show zero values across all 4,150 records, despite existing in the dataset schema. The "Professional" field likely aggregates all higher education (undergraduate and postgraduate) without distinguishing levels, which constitutes a relevant limitation for human capital analysis in the Colombian civil service.

Data backup

OBSAP maintains a local copy of the dataset in CSV format as a backup against potential changes or unavailability of the datos.gov.co API. Data is periodically downloaded via the national portal's Socrata API (SODA) and versioned alongside the observatory source code. The OBSAP open data repository is available on Open Science Framework (OSF).

Comparative

International Context

Colombia in comparative perspective: public employment indicators compared to Latin America and the OECD. Data consolidated from the four editions of Government at a Glance: Latin America and the Caribbean (OECD/IDB, 2014–2024).

4% Colombia (2022) Public employment as % of total employment

12% LAC Average Latin America and the Caribbean (2022)

21% OECD Average 38 member countries (2022)

1:38 Servants/pop. 1 public servant per 38 Colombians (SIE 2026 / DANE 2025)

Public employment trajectory in LAC: full series 2001–2022

Employment in the public sector as percentage of total employment or labor force (ILO/ILOSTAT).

Country	2001¹	2010¹	2014²	2018³	2022⁴	Trend
Argentina	—	14.8%¹	16.5%	17.2%	19%	↑ Sustained
Barbados	—	—	23.4%	—	—	—
Brazil	—	—	—	12.5%	12%	→ Stable
Mexico	—	—	—	11.8%	13.7%	↑ Growing
Dominican R.	—	—	18.1%	—	—	—
Chile	—	—	—	—	9%	—
Ecuador	—	—	—	—	7%	—
El Salvador	—	—	—	7.7%	—	—
Guatemala	—	—	—	6.4%	—	—
Honduras	—	—	—	6.0%	—	—
Colombia	—	3.7%¹	4.0%	3.7%	4%	→ Persistently low
LAC Average	10.7%¹	10.7%¹	12.0%	11.9%	12%	→ Stable (~12%)
OECD Average	16%¹	15.3%¹	21.4%	17.9%	21%	↑ Growing

¹ GaG LAC 2014: ILO LABORSTA. ² GaG LAC 2017. ³ GaG LAC 2020. ⁴ GaG LAC 2024. (—) = not available.

Women's participation in the public sector

Indicator	2014²	2018³	2022⁴
LAC Average — women in public sector	50.3%	51%	51.5%
Colombia — women in SIGEP II (Executive Branch)	—	47.3%*	52.1%
Brazil — regional leader	59.2%	—	56%
Chile	—	—	56%
OECD Average	59%	58%	—

* 2021 data (SIGEP/DANE). ² GaG LAC 2017. ³ GaG LAC 2020. ⁴ GaG LAC 2024.

OECD benchmarks: highest and lowest public employment (2018)

Country	Public employment (%)	Position
Norway	30.7%	Highest in OECD
Sweden	28.7%	2nd highest
Denmark	27.6%	3rd highest
South Korea	8.1%	3rd lowest
Japan	5.9%	2nd lowest
Colombia	3.7%	Lowest in OECD

Source: OECD (2021). Government at a Glance 2021. ILO/ILOSTAT data.

Public employment density: servants per 1,000 inhabitants

Country	Population (M)	Public emp. (%)	Est. servants (M)	Per 1,000 pop.
Norway	5.4	30.7%	~0.82	~152
Sweden	10.5	28.7%	~1.52	~145
Argentina	46.7	19%	~3.61	~77
Brazil	215.3	12%	~12.65	~59
Mexico	129.4	13.7%	~7.78	~60
Chile	19.8	9%	~0.93	~47
Colombia	53.1	4%	1.40	~26
Japan	125.1	5.9%	~3.55	~28

OBSAP estimate. Population: Worldometers/DANE (2022–2025). Colombia: SIE-DAFP = 1,398,483 / DANE = 53,110,609 pop.

Comparative analysis

The longitudinal series of four editions (2014–2024) confirms that Colombia is persistently the country with the lowest proportion of public employment both in LAC and the entire OECD: 3.7% in 2010, 4.0% in 2014, 3.7% in 2018, and 4% in 2022 — fluctuating between 3.7% and 4% for over a decade, while the LAC average remained stable at ~12% and the OECD grew from 15% to 21%. However, in gender parity, Colombia advanced from 47.3% (2021) to 52.1% of women in civil service (2025), placing itself above the LAC average (51.5%) and aligning with the regional trend of female majority in the public sector.

Open data repository on OSF Download source data, analysis scripts, and primary documents from OBSAP on the Open Science Framework.

DI-2 · C-CA

Culture and Administrative Behavior

OCA instrument results, administrative culture data, organizational behavior, and behavioral sciences applied to public management.

Dashboard under construction

Indicators for this dimension will be available once the OCA instrument database and R engine are connected.

OCA Instrument Behavioral Public Admin Behavioral Sciences

DI-3 · E-DO

Structure and Organizational Design

Mapping organizational reforms, comparative org charts, institutional capacities, and public entity transformations.

Dashboard under construction

Indicators for this dimension will be available once the database and R analysis engine for organizational reforms are connected.

Organizational reforms Institutional capacities Org charts

ETI · PMA-IP

Principles, Administrative Fads, and Public Innovation

Cross-cutting tracking of paradigms, administrative fads, open government, public innovation, and artificial intelligence in public management.

Dashboard under construction

Indicators for this cross-cutting axis will be available once the database and R engine are connected.

NPM / NPG / Governance Open government AI in public management

Data & Monitoring

Civil Service and Public Employment

Civil Service Charts

Gender distribution in the 10 sectors with most public servants

Educational level of public servants

Age distribution: national vs. territorial

Average monthly salary by sector (top 15)

Percentage of women by legal nature (top 20)

International Context

Public employment trajectory in LAC: full series 2001–2022

Women's participation in the public sector

OECD benchmarks: highest and lowest public employment (2018)

Public employment density: servants per 1,000 inhabitants

Culture and Administrative Behavior

Dashboard under construction

Structure and Organizational Design

Dashboard under construction

Principles, Administrative Fads, and Public Innovation

Dashboard under construction

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