Publishing information on the real owners of companies, also known as beneficial owners, can help governments curb corruption and support a more transparent environment for business. A session at the 4th International Collective Action Conference in Basel discussed how the new ‘Opening Extractives’ programme seeks to create new momentum for beneficial ownership transparency in a sector that has been prone to corruption risks.
This position paper by the Global Coalition to Fight Financial Crime (GCFFC) outlines a set of features that GCFFC members recommend jurisdictions should include in beneficial ownership disclosure regimes.
In this short video, Gabriel Cifuentes, former Secretary of Transparency in the Office of the President in Colombia, talks about his experience in implementing the second High Level Reporting Mechanism (HLRM) to ensure a clean procurement process for the construction of the Bogotá Metro.
Publication
Corruption and Transparency in the Water Sector
This article sets out the experience of Transparency International (TI) in fighting corruption worldwide in the water sector. It focuses on identifying the sources of corruption in the sector and the available toolkits (best practice) for combating it.
Case studies from Cambodia, Japan, Colombia and Pakistan are used to illustrate some of the major points.
Initiative
Integrity Agreement within the Health System
Through this Pact, the signatories undertook to make their own contribution to building change for the better in the Romanian healthcare system. This involved focusing on integrity, accountability and transparency, as well as combating corruption and unethical behaviour in both the public and private health systems.
The goals were to:
CoST – the Infrastructure Transparency Initiative is the leading global initiative improving transparency and accountability in public infrastructure.
CoST works with government, industry and civil society to promote the disclosure of infrastructure project data. It validates and makes this data easy to understand through an assurance process and ensures this information reaches citizens. This helps to empower citizens to demand better infrastructure and hold decision makers to account.
Initiative
Corporate Governance Rating System (CGRS)
The Convention on Business Integrity (CBi), in partnership with the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) has established a Corporate Governance Rating System (CGRS) for listed companies in Nigeria. Membership is open to companies listed on the NSE. The current membership base spans:
- Financial institutions
- Multinational companies operating in Nigeria
- Local companies and business associations
The CGRS works towards the following objectives:
Initiative
Fisheries Transparency Initiative
The Fisheries Transparency Initiative (FiTI) is a global multi-stakeholder initiative. Its purpose is to increase transparency and participation in fisheries governance for the benefit of a more sustainable management of marine fisheries.
Initiative
Maritime Anti-Corruption Network Indonesia
In 2015, the Maritime Anti-Corruption Network (MACN) launched a Collective Action project in Indonesia with support from the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office and in partnership with the NGO Kemitraan.
Indonesia had been identified as a corruption hotspot among MACN member companies calling port in the country. The overall objective of the Collective Action was to increase the transparency of port operations, remove trade barriers such as facilitation payments, and increase the ease of doing business for British, international, and local businesses operating in Indonesia.
Initiative
Open Ownership
OpenOwnership's central goal is to build an open Global Beneficial Ownership Register which will serve as an authoritative source of data about who owns companies, for the benefit of all.
OpenOwnership will collect and link together beneficial ownership data sets from across the world as well as self-disclosed corporate data to enable companies and investors to more easily see who they are really doing business with. It will provide an opportunity for companies to distinguish themselves as leaders in transparency and openness by disclosing their own ownership on the platform.