What is EITI?
The Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) is an international standard designed to promote open and accountable management of extractive resources for good governance of oil, gas, and minerals.
This initiative currently includes around 56 countries around the world. EITI mandates the disclosure of information along the entire extractive industry value chain, from licensing to extraction, to how revenues reach the government, to how they contribute to the economy and society at large. In doing so, it strengthens public and corporate governance, promotes transparent and accountable management of natural resources, and provides data that shapes debate and reforms in the extractive sector.
EITI in Colombia
In 2014, Colombia became part of a global initiative intended to strengthen informed dialogue between companies in the extractive sector, the national government, and civil society: EITI.
Goals
This initiative is led by the Ministry of Mines and Energy and representatives of the three sectors mentioned above, who make up the National Tripartite Committee (CTN).
This governance mechanism is responsible for directing, controlling, and monitoring the actions necessary to comply with EITI requirements.
Thus, the representatives concerned have contributed to the drafting of the National Action Plan that establishes the standard’s roadmap, annual progress reports, and various thematic studies on transparency in different areas of the extractive sector.
The latest version of the National Action Plan (2020-2023) was prepared on the basis of these contributions and advances, and is designed to:
• Position itself as a benchmark for impact assessment in the extractive sector and the meeting point for various stakeholders, by assisting in the design and scope of sector policies, enabling decision making by public and private stakeholders. The EITI is, therefore, a mechanism that supports trust building and dialogue among these stakeholders and serves as a technological platform that provides information with use value. It estimates and promotes an understanding of the benefits and orientation of sector resources, providing user-friendly access to accurate, pertinent information in technologically coherent manner.
This plan contemplates 4 axes that will provide the country with accurate, timely, contextualised, and socially useful information to strengthen transparency in the extractive sector’s value chain to benefit local and national sustainable development:
In the framework of this implementation, Colombia has historically followed the process embodied in EITI Internacional, as follows:
This provides a glimpse of the progress in the validation processes that the country implemented in 2018 and in 2022. Civil society participation in EITI, which occurs through the Roundtable, is therefore fundamental.
Colombia
Last updated: February 2022
The Roundtable in EITI
Promoting citizen participation is a way to advocate for transparency in all links of the extractive sector’s value chain; a responsibility that should interest civil society and citizens in general. This is why several organisations came together to form the EITI Colombia Driving Group, which led to the creation of the Civil Society Roundtable for Transparency in the Extractive Industries, in 2013.
Some of the representatives’ responsibilities include the following:
Represent the interests of the Roundtable's member organisations before the CTN.
Opportunely inform the other Roundtable organisations of the goals, progress, proposals, and results of the Technical Support Groups (TSGs) and TNCs.
Lead and actively participate in everything related to National and Subnational EITI.
Inform the Roundtable about the discussions and topics that are addressed during the meetings with the EITI International Secretariat.
Both the representatives to the CTN and the Technical Secretariat of the Roundtable and member organisations are involved in the actions related to the EITI validation processes in order to ensure the full, active, and effective involvement of civil society.
To fulfil our mission of creating a consolidated and strong civil society movement with broad influence in public and private sector extractive industries in Colombia, the Roundtable also has an EITI Subcommittee. Composed of some of the members, this subcommittee follows up on central themes of the reports (subnational EITI, real beneficiaries, environmental issues, Artisanal and Small-Scale Mining, among others) and EITI validation processes in Colombia, promoting educational efforts for its better understanding and dissemination at territorial level.
