§ Lord Aveburyasked Her Majesty's Government:
What progress has been made with the Publish What You Pay initiative in Angola; and whether they will propose to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development that a web page he established where members of the public in Angola and other countries would be able to see which multinational companies were complying with the initiative and how much they had paid to the host governments. [HL1710]
§ Baroness AmosThe Publish What You Pay initiative is an NGO campaign to disclose payments made by extractive companies to each host country. Further information on the Publish What You Pay campaign may he obtained from their website; www.publishwhatyoupay.org.
The Prime Minister launched the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) at the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg in September 2002. The EITI is separate from but complementary to Publish What You Pay. The EITI aims to make transparent both payments from companies to government and revenues received by governments (as company payments can make up less then 50 per cent of government revenues from the sector). The data disclosed will be made publicly available.
An international multi-stakeholder workshop on the EITI was hosted by DfID in London on 11 and 12 February and was attended by some 70 participants. Representatives from the Government of Angola and from the state-owned oil company Sonangol were present and we envisage their further involvement in moving the initiative forward.
Further information about the EITI is available from DfID's website www.dfid.gov.uk.