Accounting standards

The report by Publish What You Pay (PWYP), a pressure group campaigning for greater tax transparency, criticises the likes of BP and Glencore for deliberately using opaque subsidiaries “to facilitate illicit financial flows…

The global Publish What You Pay (PWYP) campaign focuses on disclosure of company payments and government revenues from extractive industry. It aims to support citizens of resource-rich developing countries in holding their governments accountable for management of revenues from oil, gas and mining – with the objective of breaking the “resource curse”, so that extractive industry contributes to social development, rather than being a source of corruption and conflict.

This year has seen two internationally-important policy developments in the area of revenue transparency relating to PWYP.

Twenty besuited men and women shuffle and blink around a large conference table at 9 am in the heart of the City of London, with almost panoramic views from their fourth floor room. To the unknowing eye this might seem like the start of yet another corporate board meeting. Yet these people hold power not only over the future of a company, but the lives of literally hundreds of millions of people living in poverty around the world.

This is the International Accounting Standards Board’s (IASB) October meeting, and the first item on the agenda is its ‘extractive activities’ project. The IASB discussed the comments received on a discussion paper it commissioned, which explored the possibility of a new international financial reporting standard for the extractives industry.

Many mining, oil and gas companies operate in poverty stricken and unstable developing countries. It has long been suggested that the lack of transparency around these industries facilitates massive corruption – companies are not required to declare the payments they make to governments, so these governments cannot be held accountable for the revenue they receive.

Christian Aid and the Publish What You Pay coalition are calling for a country by country financial reporting standard, which encouragingly was included in the IASB’s discussion paper. This would require companies to declare, for every country in which they operate, the profits they make and the payments made to governments. Although a seemingly innocuous and technical adjustment, a country by country reporting standard would empower governments, civil society and ultimately poor people across the developing world.

Pushing for a new International Financial Reporting Standard for the oil, gas and mining industries

A new global standard for extractive company reporting is under development right now. It has the potential to make companies publish what they pay for oil, gas and minerals and provide information which is essential to fighting tax evasion and corruption.

ACT NOW!

Please click here to download the summary of the IASB campaign action pack.

Please click here to download the “Background Briefing”, which is part of the IASB campaign pack.

To download the “Guidance for Engagement”, which is part of the IASB campaign pack, please click here

Download the resolution here.