The United Kingdom has achieved a very good score in implementing the 2023 EITI Standard

Board decision

The United Kingdom has achieved a score of 87.5 points (Very good) in implementing the 2023 EITI Standard. The overall score reflects an average of the three component scores on Stakeholder engagement, Transparency, and Outcomes and impact. A score of 1.5 is added for effectiveness and sustainability of EITI implementation. 

The Board recognises the progress that the UK has made in aligning its EITI implementation with the 2023 EITI Standard and in demonstrating leadership among EITI countries globally. It commends the country’s strong performance in Outcomes and Impact, Stakeholder Engagement and on technical requirements including licensing, beneficial ownership, and revenue collection. Progress on these requirements align with the government’s broader national initiatives to implement the critical minerals strategy which entail understanding the domestic capabilities of the country for energy transition and to mitigate risks in the extractive sector. 

Under the Outcomes and impact component (Very good), the Board commends how UK EITI has played a key role in making information accessible and more comprehensible with its timely production of revenue data through EITI Reports and non-revenue data through the UK EITI website. The MSG’s approach on following up recommendations from EITI Reports and Validation is considered best practice. The Board encourages the MSG to continue efforts to strengthen the EITI’s contribution to public debate including on the critical minerals strategy and the potential economic impact of the energy transition. 

Under the Stakeholder engagement (Very good), Validation noted a well-functioning MSG and recognised that government commitment across the whole of the UK has been consistent despite political transitions. The industry has a high participation rate in terms of submitting data for EITI Reports. 

The Board underscores the government’s responsibility in maintaining an enabling environment for civil society participation in the EITI process. Amidst deterioration of broader civic space, and in accordance with Requirement 1.3.f., the MSG is required to monitor civic space and discuss the possible impact of broader constraints on civil society’s engagement in extractive industry governance. While civil society participates actively on the MSG and shapes the agenda, it should strengthen the representation of wider civil society views within the MSG.

Under the Transparency component (Very good), the Board commends the UK’s consistent publication of revenue and non-revenue data and the MSG’s efforts for pioneering disclosure of its project cost regime to adhere to the 2023 EITI Standard.  The Board further recognises the UK’s continued global leadership in disclosing beneficial ownership data through its PSC Register. The government is encouraged to strengthen disclosure of license information for mining which is currently dispersed across several licensing authorities. While the Board acknowledges the government’s inter-agency efforts to understand legal barriers on contract disclosure, it notes that contracts in the mining sector remain undisclosed and encourages the MSG to continue work to address corrective actions on this requirement. 

The Board has determined that the UK will have until a next Validation commencing on 1 January 2030 to carry out seven corrective actions: 

Requirement 7.1 (Public debate), Requirement 1.3 (civil society engagement), Requirement 3.3 (Exports), Requirement 2.3 (Register of licenses), Requirement 2.4 (Contracts), Requirement 4.10 (Project costs), Requirement 5.1 (Distribution of revenues).

The United Kingdom is encouraged to consider the strategic recommendations with a view to prioritising those it deems most urgent and relevant. In accordance with the EITI Standard, the UK may request an extension of this timeframe or request that Validation commences earlier than scheduled. 

Corrective actions and strategic recommendations

Corrective actions

The EITI Board agreed the following corrective actions to be undertaken by the United Kingdom. Progress in addressing these corrective actions will be assessed in the next Validation commencing on 1 January 2030:

1. In accordance with Requirement 7.1, UK EITI should:

• Ensure that the EITI process and data disclosed through EITI contribute to public debate on issues of national interest.
• Ensure that engagement with stakeholders and outreach events are undertaken to spread awareness of, and facilitate dialogue about, governance of extractive resources.

2. In accordance with Requirement 1.3, the MSG is required to monitor adherence to the Protocol: Participation of Civil Society and document its discussions related to any shortcomings identified, as well as any actions undertaken to address them. The MSG should ensure that civil society substantively engaged in the EITI process is able to freely express their views on natural resource governance, as well as to safeguard their freedom to engage, associate, operate and participate in decision-making. The government is required to ensure that there is an enabling environment for civil society participation with regard to relevant laws, regulations and administrative rules as well as actual practice in implementation of the EITI. The fundamental rights of civil society substantively engaged in the EITI, including but not limited to members of the multi-stakeholder group, must be respected.
3. In accordance with Requirement 3.3, UK EITI should:

• Disclose export volumes and values by exporting company. The MSG is expected to consider disaggregating export data by transaction.

4. In accordance with Requirement 2.3, UK EITI should:

• Disclose information on metal mining and quarrying licenses under the purview of the Crown Estate Scotland including a publicly available list of licenses, license holder, coordinates or size and locations, date of application, date of award and duration of the license, and commodity.
• Perform an assessment to analyse how comprehensive and reliable the license data is, and if it contains the most up-to-date information.

5. In accordance with Requirement 2.4, UK EITI should:

• Publish an overview, including a list, of all active oil and gas production and exploration licenses, indicating which documents are publicly available and adding links to the relevant disclosures.
• Publish a plan for addressing barriers on contract transparency in the mining and quarrying sector, with a clear time frame for implementation.
• Comprehensively publish all contracts in the extractive sector entered into or amended from 1 January 2021.
• Publish annexes, addenda, riders and amendments as part of the contracts/ licensing documents.

6. In accordance with Requirement 4.10, UK EITI should disclose actual practices for monitoring oil, gas and mining project costs and managing revenue loss risks. Building on its progress in addressing this requirement, UK EITI is expected to disclose final cost and tax audit reports, or summaries of those reports, including costs deemed as non-recoverable and costs deemed non-deductible and any additional revenues to be collected as a result.
7. In accordance with Requirement 5.1, UK EITI is required to clarify how extractive industry revenues are recorded in the UK’s national’ and devolved budgets. Where revenues are not recorded in the UK’s budget, the allocation of each revenue stream must be explained, with links provided to relevant financial reports.

Strategic recommendations

The UK is encouraged to consider the following recommendations to strengthen EITI implementation:

Outcomes and impact

1. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 1.5, the UK EITI is encouraged to:

• Strengthen the annual progress review: Provide a structured account of progress and challenges, note any changes to objectives and planned adaptations, describe the stakeholder feedback mechanism and any views received, explicitly record gender and inclusiveness considerations, and include a budgeted vs actual expenditure comparison in the annual progress report.
• Enhance the work plan by providing clearer activity-level costings (including which departments fund specific activities) and by making the prioritisation rationale explicit–briefly documenting why activities were prioritised or de-prioritised and linking decisions to objectives and national priorities.
• Document and communicate lessons learned from implementation, evaluate the contribution of EITI activities to governance improvements, and continue to keep priorities under review as sector dynamics (e.g. energy transition, critical minerals) evolve.

2. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 7.1 and foster more inclusive, evidence-based public debate, the UK EITI is encouraged to:

• Proactively track national debates as they arise and expand disclosures to cover issues of national relevance beyond the minimum requirements, with accessible summaries for non-technical audiences.
• Strengthen outreach events to promote awareness and use of EITI data among diverse group – including civil society, grassroots and subnational actors – and raise UK EITI’s profile by engaging through existing UK hubs and partner forums.

3. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 7.2, UK EITI is encouraged to:

• Enhance data interoperability by tagging datasets with standard identifiers, such as Companies House numbers for companies, so that payment data can be automatically linked with other publicly available data to facilitate analysis.
• Publish datasets by default in machine-readable formats with open-license notices.

4. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 7.3, UK EITI is encouraged to:

Use findings and recommendations from EITI Reports, Validation and subgroup analyses more systematically to inform policy engagement and MSG planning.

Stakeholder engagement

5. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 1.1., the government is encouraged to restate its support to the EITI with a new public statement, noting how EITI is aligned with national priorities.
6. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 1.2, companies are encouraged to explain how they engage in due diligence processes in accordance with Requirement 1.2.b.
7. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 1.3., the MSG is encouraged to consider how the EITI could contribute to fact-based and data-driven discussions in the event there is a need to counter alleged disinformation on issues related to natural resource governance within the scope of the EITI Standard.
8. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 1.4, UK EITI is encouraged to revisit their current methods of coordinating with the broader constituency outside of the MSG. The MSG is encouraged to revisit their membership composition and term limits to ensure wider representation of views as extractive sector issues evolve. UK EITI is encouraged to play a more visible role in improving natural resource governance in the UK, such as for example with ongoing national debates around license allocations for extractive companies. The MSG and National Coordinator could play a more active part in broader national initiatives such as the UK’s Critical Minerals Strategy. All constituencies could strengthen their approach in liaising with stakeholders outside of the MSG to ensure there is wider consultation on EITI reports, strategic priorities, work plans and impact evaluation for EITI.
9. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 2.1, UK EITI is encouraged to:

Transparency 

• Provide a consolidated, comprehensive and updated overview of the legal framework for the mining and quarrying sector.
• Provide a publicly accessible overview of legislation relevant to preventing corruption in the extractive sector.
• Publish a summary of the relevance of carbon pricing disclosures in the extractives sector.

10. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 3.1, UK EITI is encouraged to summarise exploration information that is available through systematic disclosures and provide relevant references on the UK EITI portal. The MSG could clarify which of these exploration projects are significant to increase public understanding.
11. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 3.2, UK EITI is encouraged to:

• Disclose production volumes for the metal mining and quarrying sectors by project.
• Disclose production values disaggregated by project for all extractive sectors where available.
• Further assess the reliability and comprehensiveness of production data.
• Disclose production volumes and values by commodity through UK EITI to ensure a one-stop shop for all the information.
• Promote company disclosures of sales volumes and values per project.

12. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 3.3, UK EITI is encouraged to:

• Promote company and commodity traders’ disclosures of export volumes and values by project.
• Perform an assessment of accuracy of export data, including an analysis on potential deviations between export values, market prices or import values from destination.
• Present export data by region, destination and buyer. Exporting companies and implementing countries are encouraged to disclose whether the buyer is a related party.

13. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 6.3, UK EITI is encouraged to summarise information available through different sources and describe methodology applied to calculate contribution of the extractive sector to the UK economy on the UK EITI website.
14. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 2.2, UK EITI is encouraged to:

• Actively use beneficial ownership data for due diligence in license allocations.
• Analyse the efficiency and effectiveness of licensing procedures and systematically publish changes in majority ownership of license holding companies.
• Continue to monitor the lack of disclosure of license applicants or deviations to ensure these gaps do not constitute a governance issue.

15. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 2.3, UK EITI is encouraged to:

• Link the licensing and PSC registers
• Consolidate all information on licenses in one single portal, to ensure disclosures are done systematically, contributing towards the Requirement’s objective of public accessibility of comprehensive information to extractive projects’ property rights.

16. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 2.4, UK EITI is encouraged to:

• Ensure that all oil and gas licenses and contracts granted, entered into before 1 January 2021 are published.
• Ensure that contract disclosure is contributing to stakeholders’ ability to monitor compliance with contractual obligations.

17. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 2.5, UK EITI is encouraged to:

• Ensure company reporting complies with the MSG’s 10% threshold.
• Assess the reliability of beneficial ownership information and data in stock exchange filings.
• Ensure non-material companies file beneficial ownership data including PEP-related information.
• Promote reporting on information on company structures by all companies.
• Promote documentation and analysis of beneficial ownership data.

18. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 4.1, UK EITI is encouraged to move towards systematic disclosure of revenue data in government platforms.
19. To strengthen implementation of Requirements 4.7, EITI UK is encouraged to conduct data analysis of revenue project-level data to inform policy discussions.
20. The MSG is encouraged to regularly review the timeliness of non-revenue information referred to in the UK EITI website.
21. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 4.9, the MSG is encouraged to agree an approach to data reliability for the disclosure of non-revenue information in accordance with EITI Requirements 2, 3, 5 and 6 to complement the existing quality assurance mechanisms adopted by the government.
22. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 4.10, UK EITI is encouraged to disclose declared costs disaggregated by project, and costs related to operating and capital expenditures as well as to disclose costs incurred since the commencement of the project.
23. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 4.6, UK EITI is encouraged to confirm if direct subnational payments are applicable and material for each reporting year. Where material, the MSG is required to disclose relevant information in accordance with provisions of Requirement 4.6. The MSG is also suggested to provide further information on the nature of this payment.
24. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 5.1, UK EITI could consider summarising information on national revenue classification systems and international standards in the EITI reporting or through the UK EITI website.
25. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 5.2, UK EITI is encouraged to provide further information on any discrepancies between expected and actual subnational transfers. The MSG is encouraged to provide information on how subnational transfers are managed.
26. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 5.3, UK EITI is encouraged to disclose forecasts for all sectors, where they exist, and explain how energy transition and climate risk considerations have been considered in revenue forecasting. The MSG could consider requesting extractive companies to disclose projected project production levels and estimated timelines related to cost recovery.
27. To strengthen implementation of Requirements 3.4, UK EITI is encouraged to:

• Consolidate information on greenhouse gas emissions by company and scope through the UK EITI website for the oil, gas and mining sectors.
• Request disaggregated disclosures by emissions’ scope and company in the GHG emissions dashboard.
• Assess the materiality of GHG emissions by onshore oil and gas projects in England, Scotland and Wales, and, if relevant, request disclosure of GHG emissions of those projects.
• Promote discussions on company progress with regards to GHG emissions, including carbon capture and storage.

28. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 6.1, UK EITI is encouraged to:

• Disclose environmental payments, even when they encompass the companies’ full value chain (upstream, midstream, and downstream). Assess the feasibility of providing disaggregated reporting for mandatory environmental payments and disclosure of related agreements.
• Ensure comprehensive and reliable disclosures of discretionary social expenditures and environmental payments including related agreements.

29. To strengthen implementation of Requirement 6.4, UK EITI is encouraged to:

• Promote company disclosure of social monitoring activities.
• Systematically disclose social, gender and environmental impact reports published by extractive companies.
• Systematically disclose sanctions applied to non-compliant companies.
• Monitor new practices on emissions reporting in EIAs

The government and all stakeholders are encouraged to consider these corrective actions and recommendations, and to document the UK’s responses to these recommendations in the next annual review of outcomes and impact of EITI implementation.

Background

The United Kingdom has been an EITI member since 2014. This is its third Validation. Information on the UK’s EITI implementation can be found at https://eiti.org/countries/united-kingdom. 

Period under review

This Validation covers the period from November 2021 to June 2025 and was conducted in accordance with the 2023 EITI Standard.  It assesses the UK’s progress in meeting the EITI Requirements, drawing on publicly available information, stakeholder consultations and Validation templates completed by the EITI International Secretariat and the MSG.

Methodology 

The assessment follows the Validation procedure  approved by the EITI Board in 2023 and applies the three-component framework: Outcomes and impact, Stakeholder engagement and Transparency. It also considers effectiveness and sustainability indicators as part of the overall scoring system. Up to three additional points may be awarded where EITI implementation demonstrates tangible contributions to the EITI’s strategic priorities: addressing corruption risks, strengthening domestic revenue mobilisation, informing the energy transition, as well as enabling inclusive governance, open data and learning. 

The International Secretariat’s country implementation support team included Mark Burnett, Regional Director - Europe, and Hannah Sophie Kaase, Country Officer, Europe. The Validation team comprised Gay Alessandra Ordenes, Technical Director, Olesia Tolochko, Disclosure Manager, Alice Perepyolkina, Digital Communications Officer, and Lucia Cirimello, consultant. 

The Validation of the UK commenced on 1 July 2025. A public call for stakeholder views was issued on 1 April 2025. Stakeholder consultations were conducted virtually in August 2025. The draft Validation report was finalised on 19 September 2025. Following comments from the MSG (received on 21 October 2025), the report was finalised and presented to the EITI Board.