DUSHANBE, November 20, 2009, Asia-Plus  -- Tajikistan intends to join the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI).

Presentation of the EITI was held in Dushanbe yesterday during a meeting of representatives from the EITI and Tajikistan’s State Committee for Investments and State-owned Property Management (GosKomInvest) and Main Geology Directorate (Tajik Geology).

Speaking the meeting the first deputy head of GosKomInvest, Abdugaffor Rahmonov, noted that Tajikistan’s joining the EITI would allow make incomes of mining companies operating in the territory of the country open and transparent that would allow increasing payments to the country’s budget.

The EITI representative, Ms. Tatiana Sedova, for her part, noted that Tajikistan’s joining the EITI would help the country reduce corruption and “the population will know what revenues the government has from mining companies and to what sectors these funds were directed.”

The Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) is a coalition of governments, companies, civil society groups, investors and international organizations.  This is reflected not only in the EITI processes in the countries implementing the EITI, but also on the international level: the EITI Board consists of members from governments, companies and civil society, and is appointed at the bi-annual EITI Global Conference.  EITI’s current governance structure was formalized at the latest EITI Global Conference in Doha, February 2009.

The EITI increases transparency over payments by companies to governments and to government-linked entities, as well as transparency over revenues by those host country governments.  It was announced by Tony Blair, the then-Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, at the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg, South Africa in September 2002.  Ghana, Nigeria and Azerbaijan  piloted the EITI approach.  As of June 2009, EITI was implemented in 30 resource rich countries around the world.  12 countries have produced EITI reports.  EITI has issued a set of reporting guidelines, a Statement of Principles, and six Criteria which represent the global minimum standard for EITI implementation.  The Head of the EITI is the Swedish former diplomat Jonas Moberg.