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Investigate: One activity taxonomy across the NGOs — Norwegian as people search it

IMPLEMENTATION RULES: Before implementing this plan, read and follow:

Status: Backlog — validated 2026-10-04 (atlas, urb-agents #1844); merged as #555 (#554 had to​

be replaced after a squash-merge ancestry conflict — same content, sha256-verified). [Q1]–[Q4] and [Q6] answered below; [Q5] (the crosswalk's candidate categories and its row-by-row content) is the owner's decision, not atlas's — nothing here should be read as pre-empting it.

Goal: Let a person search for a kind of help — leksehjelp, besøksvenn, gratis mat — and find it across every NGO, whatever each NGO calls it, by replacing the 22-code ref_atlas_service_category and the Røde Kors-only CASE in supply__redcross_branch_activities.sql with a reviewed taxonomy and one crosswalk for all eleven NGOs.

Last Updated: 2026-10-04

Depends on: INVESTIGATE-ngo-research-handover.md (the method; Atlas's own activity ingestion).

Abstract: The atlas-research project built a taxonomy of 38 categories in 10 families. Every Norwegian label is made from the terms people actually search for (Google Keyword Planner, 858 phrases with volume), with an English equivalent. All of Atlas's 22 codes are kept; 16 are added. A crosswalk maps all 500 activities the eleven NGOs publish into it. Everything is in docs/research/ngo-research/taxonomy/. Proposed, not yet reviewed: the owner reviews the crosswalk before Atlas adopts it.

What this PR contains​

Documentation and data files only — no models, seeds, migrations or published relations change.

PathWhat
docs/research/ngo-research/taxonomy/taxonomy-nb-en.csv + -families.csv38 categories, 10 families — code, Norwegian label with its search evidence, description, search terms by volume, need terms, volunteer terms, English label, description, terms
docs/research/ngo-research/taxonomy/crosswalk_activity_service_category.csv500 activities → category, with basis and confidence; 29 marked not-a-service with a reason
docs/research/ngo-research/taxonomy/crosswalk-review.mdthe review sheet
docs/research/ngo-research/taxonomy/search-terms-validated.csvthe evidence

What changes against Atlas today​

Categories: the 22 codes stay; 16 are added — meeting_place, physical_activity, work_inclusion, addiction_support, health_services, emergency_shelter, legal_aid, peer_support, dementia_support, child_welfare, volunteer_centre, reading_friend, crisis_preparedness, music_choir, creative_crafts, worship_open_church. Labels change to what people search (elderly_visiting: Besøksvenn; family_support: Åpen barnehage og familiesenter).

Røde Kors's CASE, read against the branches' own texts on rodekors.no:

ActivityTodayProposed
Visitorelderly_visitingprison_reintegration — confidential conversations with prisoners
EVAnot a servicecrisis_shelter — a support person after domestic violence or trafficking
Døråpnernot a servicemeeting_place (+ addiction, prison) — activity groups after addiction, psychiatry, prison
Habilfamily_supportwork_inclusion — practising driving for a licence
Turgruppeyouth_activity_groupsphysical_activity
Møteplasserfamily_supportmeeting_place
Akuttovernatting for bostedsløse tilreisendehousing_outreachemergency_shelter

Questions to Answer​

  • [Q1] Adopt the 38-category taxonomy. Accept. Verified directly: the 22 existing codes are all present unchanged in the new 38; ref_atlas_service_category.csv has exactly 22 rows today, the new taxonomy-nb-en.csv exactly 38 across exactly 10 family_code values. Nothing existing breaks; families are additive.
  • [Q2] Labels, and which languages api_v1 serves. Checked directly: ref_atlas_service_category.csv's only columns today are label_no/label_en — there is no nynorsk column anywhere in api_v1 to land a draft in. Accept bokmål + English now; nynorsk has nowhere to go until a column is added, so categories-v2.csv's drafts correctly wait — this isn't a decision deferred without reason, it's blocked on schema that doesn't exist yet.
  • [Q3] Search terms as data. Accept the term-table design; it's additive and the search index is a separate PLAN regardless (Next Steps already says so).
  • [Q4] Crosswalk replaces the CASE, many-to-many with is_primary. Accept the design. Checked the actual file: 500 distinct activity_id across 589 rows, is_primary true for 471, false for 89, and correctly blank for the 29 is_service = false rows — the shape already matches what's proposed. Loading its content is [Q5]/[Q6], not this.
  • [Q5] Candidate categories. The owner's decision, not atlas's — see Status above. Not assessed here beyond confirming the file is structurally ready for a decision: every one of the 7 named Røde Kors reclassifications (Visitor, EVA, Døråpner, Habil, Turgruppe, Møteplasser, Akuttovernatting) was checked against the current, live supply__redcross_branch_activities.sql CASE and matches the "Today" column exactly — the "what changes" table above is accurate, not aspirational.
  • [Q6] Review / load policy. Checked: reviewed_by is empty on all 589 rows right now — 0 reviewed. A rule of "Atlas loads only reviewed rows" means dim_activity.service_category_code stays unpopulated via the crosswalk until the owner reviews at least some rows; "load all rows with their confidence" means it's populated today but some of it is [Q5]-pending. Recommend the second (load all rows, confidence visible) so Atlas isn't silently uncategorized while review is in progress — but flagging this explicitly as the owner's call, since it trades a visible "pending review" state for not blocking on review. State a preference when deciding [Q5].

Next Steps​

  • Owner: review the crosswalk (start with the LOW rows, 92 of them) and decide [Q5], and state a preference on [Q6]'s load policy.
  • Settle [Q1]–[Q4] — done above.
  • PLAN: taxonomy seeds (ref_activity_category, …_family, …_term) and the crosswalk seed; retire the CASE; dim_activity gets its categories through the crosswalk. Depends on [Q5]/[Q6].
  • PLAN: the search index uses the term table (with PostGIS distance, per the handover plan).