RDF specialists and the management team is working tirelessly in all our partner countries to support governments to progress on digitalization, despite the pandemic. In this month’s newsletter, we will focus on RDF’s work on EITI mainstreaming.
On 24 March, RDF organized a webinar on EITI mainstreaming. Over 100 participants registered and we were glad to have key stakeholders in 30 countries engaged. The webinar focused on the results from the first mainstreaming implementation in Senegal. EITI Senegal presented how all key government systems are now integrated using the RDF Fusion system, and companies are reporting online using GovIn. This has reduced the time it tasked to do EITI validation and increased the quality, even automated parts of the audit using the Fusion risk management functions. Guinea presented how they have started using Fusion and are recently introducing the GovIn platform. Participants were also introduced to the Working Group of Extractives Audits, under the INTOSAI network of Auditor-General Offices who explained the benefits of data integration and systems audit.
Instead of reporting EITI declarations in Word or Excel, the forms are now digitlized using GovIn and companies submit online. Government institutions no longer need to complete the forms, since their systems data has already been integrated into the system.
The advantages of integrating all government data into one place, is not only to facilitate better audits, but key data can also be made public on the Fusion online portal. Senegal has released all data for 2019 on their portal, showing production and export statistics.
- Senegal EITI data portal : itiesenegal.revenuedev.org/
Mining and petroleum authorities should however publish their license registry in much more detail, directly from their license management system. This should include license-related (non-tax) payments in order to fully be considered mainstreamed. Here are three examples of portals that we think does systematic disclosure at the level of ambition EITI mainstreaming represents:
- Sierra Leone Online Repository : http://sierraleone.revenuedev.org
- Liberia Mining Repository : http://liberia.revenuedev.org
- Afghanistan Transaprency Portal : http://afghanistan.revenuedev.org
Some other highlights
- In Senegal, RDF is implementing the petroleum cadastre system for the Ministry of Energy and Petroleum with funding from the World Bank. We have added 4 new geo-data modules to OGAS and are currently doing training of Ministry and PETROSEN staff. The project is progressing well and the systems will be ready by end of May.
- In Sierra Leone, the NMA Precious Minerals and Trade (PMT) department at the central bank have now processed over 100 valuations of gold and diamonds for export in the new MCAS module. Also, large-scale mining companies are just now starting to report their production online.
- In Cameroon, companies are submitting their DSF tax return through GovIn to the DGI Fusion system. This year, medium sized companies are also asked to submit and we are hoping to double to amount of companies submitting from 10,000 last year. At the time of writing, 15,000 companies have either submitted or are in the process of doing so. The project is implemented in collaboration with GIZ, who also are organizing an interesting webinar series on fiscal decentralization this month.
