PH mining cited for best practices by EITI

Published June 7, 2017, 10:01 PM

http://business.mb.com.ph/2017/06/07/ph-mining-cited-for-best-practices-by-eiti/

The Philippines has earned several citations for best practices in the implementation of global standards on the management of mining resources during the recently concluded 37th board meeting of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) in Oslo, Norway.

In a statement, Finance Assistant Secretary Paola Alvarez said the Philippine delegation reported that “our country was repeatedly cited for best practices and recognized for exemplary performance in the implementation of the EITI.”’

Alvarez, who is DOF spokesperson, said that Finance Assistant Secretary Maria Teresa Habitan, the head of the Philippine delegation, was also appointed co-chair of the EITI Implementation Committee during the Oslo meeting.

Habitan as EITI board member represents the implementing country constituency in Southeast Asia and the Pacific.

“The Philippines is currently undergoing validation under the EITI, a process that started in January 2017 this year. Our country has received good feedback from the mission team, and is poised to possibly become the first country to be found compliant under the 2016 EITI Standard,” said Alvarez.

The EITI website states that “every country that joins the EITI as a member is assessed against the EITI Standard in a process called validation.”

An EITI validation process “reviews the country’s progress against the EITI requirements, analyzes the impact, and makes recommendations for strengthening the process and improving the governance of the sector,” the website said.

The EITI secretariat has so far completed the validation process for 13 country-members.  The Philippines’ validation is listed as “underway” and commenced on January 1, 2017.

Alvarez said that in the Oslo conference, “the Philippines-EITI secretariat participated in 10 pre-Board meetings with the international secretariat and counterparts, covering topics such as beneficial ownership, project-level reporting, communication strategies,” among others.

The Philippine delegation likewise met with the EITI International Chair, former  Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt and held other meetings with its foreign counterparts interested to learn from the Philippines’ implementation of the EITI.

The 38th EITI board meeting will be held in  Manila on October 25-26 this year.