The local chapter of the Extractive Industries and Transparency Initiative (EITI) has hired Moore Stephens LLP, a UK firm, to put together the nation’s first report on payments made to the government from the oil, gold and forestry sectors.
This was confirmed a few moments ago with the head of G-EITI, Dr. Rudy Jadoopat.
The official said that Moore Stephens International Limited is a global accountancy and advisory firm with years of experience in this field. He said that they were hired at the end of August and will submit Guyana’s report to EITI by April 2019. Dr. Jadoopat said that the local chapter will be meeting with an auditing team from the firm in the first week of October.
Dr. Jadoopat said, “A fundamental element of the EITI is the disclosure of payments and revenues from oil, gas and mining. All implementing countries are required to disclose information about how much extractive companies pay in taxes, royalties and other payments and how much the government agencies have received. Therefore, Guyana’s report will see information on payments from oil, forestry, and gold.”
He added, “We have requested information from government agencies, like the Guyana Forestry Commission (GFC) and they have submitted all that we need. As for the Guyana Geology and Mines Commission and the Gold Board, they are still working on the information that we need. They had submitted aggregated information but we need it separated, we need a detailed breakdown of all payments from companies etc. With regard to oil, the report will reflect the signature bonus (US$18M) and all taxes remitted by the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA).”
The G-EITI head said that the UK firm has already submitted a template of what Guyana’s report would look like. He said, too, that the “no-nonsense” firm will be hosting a round of discussions with the companies in the extractive sector in October.
