The Board of Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) has given Guyana a “fairly low” score of 52 points for implementing its 2019 EITI Standard which calls for disclosure of disaggregated revenue receipts and contracts in the oil, gas, and minerals industries.
The Board said Guyana’s score reflects an average of its performance in three components: Outcomes and Impact, Transparency, and Stakeholder engagement.
With respect to the Outcomes and Impact category, Guyana received 42 points. The Board explained that this score reflects an ad hoc approach to outreach and dissemination, weaknesses in follow-up on EITI recommendations to deliver reforms, and insufficient attention to the annual review of outcomes and impact, with a view of informing the annual EITI work plan.
On the Transparency component, the Board said Guyana attained “a fairly low” score of 53.5 points. Expounding further, the EITI Board said Guyana has made commendable efforts to use EITI implementation to ensure disclosures on areas of public interest, including contract transparency, commodity sales and environmental aspects of the extractive industries, reflecting priorities of civil society in particular.
It said too that Guyana’s EITI reporting has shed some light on the government’s revenues from the extractive industries for the first time. Be that as it may, it said weaknesses in company reporting and taxpayer confidentiality constraints mean that only a minority of the government’s revenues have been disclosed to date to the levels of disaggregation and reliability required under the EITI. The Board therefore urged Guyana to ensure complete and reliable revenue disclosures as a basis to support the government’s public finance management reforms.
On the Stakeholder Engagement component, the EITI Board said Guyana achieved 60 points. While civil society has been a driving force in implementation, the Board expressed concern over weaknesses in government and industry engagement in the EITI process, including in disclosures of required data. It said too that weaknesses in the multi-stakeholder oversight of EITI implementation have led to challenges both in reporting and in ensuring that the EITI provides a meaningful forum for multi-stakeholder consensus-building.
Furthermore, the EITI Board said ensuring a balance of views in developing objectives for EITI implementation could contribute to strengthening government and industry engagement. The Board therefore urged the government to implement legal provisions for public participation in policy-making for extractive sector governance, including in the implementation of legal provisions related to free, prior and informed consent in the extractive licensing process, with a view to ensuring full adherence to national policies and laws. It also encouraged Guyana EITI to closely monitor the implementation of these legal provisions.
Guyana will have until April 1, 2024, to carry out corrective actions as recommended by the EITI Board. If it is found that Guyana has made no progress at the next Validation Exercise it may face temporary suspension, the EITI Board cautioned.
The Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) is a 55-member body that implements global standards for good governance of oil, gas and mineral resources. It seeks to address key governance issues in the extractive sectors.
Guyana was accepted as an EITI implementing country on October 24, 2017.
