1 / 19

The Open Government Partnership and Resource Governance:

The Open Government Partnership and Resource Governance: Commitments for greater transparency in extractive industries. Revenue Watch Institute I December, 2011. Revenue Watch Institute. We promote transparent and accountable management of oil, gas and mineral resources

rosie
Download Presentation

The Open Government Partnership and Resource Governance:

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. The Open Government Partnership and Resource Governance: Commitments for greater transparency in extractive industries Revenue Watch Institute I December, 2011

  2. Revenue Watch Institute • We promote transparent and accountable management of oil, gas and mineral resources • Working in over 30 countries worldwide, with regional offices in Latin America, Africa, Eurasia, Southeast Asia, and MENA • Focused on whole “value chain” of development:

  3. OGP: An International Initiative 8 FOUNDING GOVERNMENTS (7 resource-rich) 9 INTL. CIVIL SOCIETY ADVISORS (incl. RWI) 40+ NEW COUNTRIES PARTICIPATING

  4. Joining OGP - Eligibility Criteria • Fiscal transparency • > are budgets published? • Access to information: • > are FOI laws in place? • > is essential public data published? • Disclosures related to elected/senior officials • > are incomes and assets of officials public? • Citizen Engagement • > are civil liberties protected?

  5. Open Government Principles • Availability of public information • Civic participation • Professional integrity in government • Access to technologies for openness and accountability

  6. The Role for Civil Society in OGP “Open government is the most apt response to the democratic human impulse to be involved, to count, to matter… creating open societies, where citizens can freely access and share data and ideas, and choose their leaders and hold them accountable, creates a sense of belonging and gives people a stake in public affairs.” - Rakesh Rajani, OGP civil society Steering Committee member • OGP requires participating countries to consult civil • society as National Action Plans (NAPs) are developed • Civil society can and should monitor government • commitments and progress toward NAP goals, both • independently and via the Independent Review Mechanism

  7. OGP and Improved Extractive Industry Governance • > 50 countries depend on oil, gas and hard minerals as • the most important source of government revenues • In most countries, subsoil resources = public assets • Public resources should carry a public benefit

  8. Benefits of improved EI-sector governance • Clear transparency and accountability requirements can: • reduce space for resource-sector corruption • improve policy efficiency • raise public trust and lower the risk of social conflict • help ensure public resources deliver a public benefit • To be effective, new OGP EI commitments should: • be additive - i.e. go ‘over and above’ existing domestic practices and standards • innovate, and seek to lead by example

  9. Resource-rich OGP Countries First OGP commitments for improved EI governance: United States: Implementing EITI Indonesia: Developing EITI, publishing digital forestry and concession map Mexico: Publishing “geological and geophysical” information related to fossil fuels Key new OGP countries with natural resource assets: Australia Azerbaijan Canada Chile Ghana Liberia Mongolia Peru S. Africa Tanzania

  10. OGP Extractive Industry Commitments What steps can OGP countries take?

  11. Open up concession process and publish information on resource revenues INITIAL Steps/Commitments Initial • Make all rules and regs. on licenses and concessions available in a public database, with clear explanations • Make contracts/concession terms between the state and natural resource companies public • Best practice: Colombia, Liberia, Peru, Timor-Leste and US all publish mineral contracts/licenses in full • Issue regular and detailed reports of resource revenues in the public domain – e.g. through national law or EITI participation

  12. SUBSTANTIAL Steps/Commitments • Extend transparency and accountability rules to state institutions • Offer detailed, public information on resource management • Publish all environ. and econ. impact studies • Report on contribution of resource sectors to budget • Publish transfers to subnational governments • Best practice: Ghana and Indonesia include resource- related subnational transfers in EITI • Publish data on sovereign wealth/stablisation funds, and audited accounts of all state-owned companies • Best practice: Statoil (Nor.) and Petrobras (Br.) do both • List all state-owned companies on a stock exchange • Ensure regular and free participation of parliament, civil society and media in oversight of resource sectors

  13. AMBITIOUS Steps/Commitments • Create a national web registry of all resource concessions • Create policy and performance benchmarks and monitoring • Capital providers and home country regulators can require high standards of openness • Allow public monitoring of development projects at all levels • Require all listed companies to disclose payments to governments country-by-country and per project • Best Practice: US Dodd-Frank Act requires mandatory country and project-level reporting • Apply IFC transparency requirements to export credit, political risk guarantees and other support to EI projects • Report in detail on all foreign aid funding for EI projects

  14. How Can Civil Society Engage with OGP? Work with: Countries that have already announced OGP action plans (a group that at this stage includes only Steering Committee governments) Countries developing action plans (i.e. those new participating governments in the ‘class’ announcing commitments at 2012’s Brazil meeting) Countries that are eligible for OGP but have not yet signed up to its Declaration of Principles.

  15. (i) Countries w/OGP Action Plans Goal: Monitor commitments How to achieve: via independent oversight from CSOs, use of Independent Review Mechanism Are national action plans concrete? Do they contain timetables/benchmarks? Is civil society consulted during implementation? How does government progress match up to commitments?

  16. (ii) New OGP Countries Goal: Turn advocacy asks into official commitments How to achieve: via participation in MSG outreach; OGP requires “broad public consultation” Identify gaps in governance, develop materials to evidence case to government, media Engage with government via OGP to suggest concrete commitments Encourage broad national support for asks

  17. (iii) Encourage Sign-up to OGP Goal: Lobby priority countries to join OGP How to achieve: Send letters to Heads of State, build public demand Publicize how OGP commitments can advance governance Discuss OGP with high-level officials in appropriate ministries

  18. Turning Gaps into Advances • OGP encourages leaders to innovate, and meet the • challenges of transparent, participatory and accountable • governance. • Buttime to act is now: new OGP countries will unveil • National Action Plans in April 2012 • Revenue Watch can help with: • (i) technical advice to governments and civil society as • NAPs are developed, • (ii) training and other in-kind support • (iii) facilitating relationships across countries where civil • society is working to improve EI governance via OGP

  19. More Information www.revenuewatch.org www.opengovpartnership.org

More Related