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Republic of the Congo has made meaningful progress with considerable improvements in implementing the 2016 Standard.

Outcome of the Validation of the Republic of the Congo

Decision reference
2020-68 / BC-295
Decision basis
EITI Articles of Association 2019-2021, Article 12.1. ix)

Board decision

The EITI Board came to the following decision:

The EITI Board agrees that the Republic of Congo has fully addressed six of the 15 corrective actions from the country’s first Validation. Consequently, the Republic of Congo has made meaningful progress overall in implementing the 2016 EITI Standard, with considerable improvements across several individual requirements.

The Board congratulates the Government of the Republic of Congo and the Multi-Stakeholder Group (Comité national ITIE) on the progress achieved in improving transparency in license information, crude oil sales, transactions related to state-owned enterprises and the extractive industries’ contribution to the national economy. The Board commends the Republic of Congo on its publication of contracts in the mining, oil and gas sectors. The Republic of Congo’s efforts to expand EITI implementation to the forestry sector are welcome. The Board acknowledges the expansion of transparency through EITI reporting to areas of relevance to public debate and policy-making, including disclosures of all companies’ oil sales, costs of oil production and the routine publication of the national oil company SNPC’s (Société nationale des pétroles du Congo) audited financial statements, albeit at a non-consolidated group level. The Board encourages stakeholders in the Republic of Congo to ensure that their proactive engagement in all aspects of EITI implementation is consistent and sustainable over time.

The Board takes note of the Republic of Congo’s plans to transition to systematic disclosures of EITI data through government and company systems. The Board encourages the government and the MSG to explore opportunities to accelerate the transition to mainstreamed implementation by adapting future cycles of EITI reporting to build on the emerging systematic disclosures, including through the Ministry of Finance’s SYSCORE online reporting platform and further development of key websites such as that of the Ministry of Petroleum and SNPC.

The Board recognises that gaps remain in disclosures related to state-owned enterprises, including analysis of the rules and practice related to the intra-SNPC group financial relations. The Board welcomes the government and MSG’s commitment to disclose additional information on debt and pre-financing agreements, the Centrale Eléctrique du Congo power project and the transfers to the domestic CORAF refinery. In accordance with commitments to the IMF, the Board takes note of the recording of deductions from oil revenues in the government’s fiscal reports (TOFE) from mid-2018 onwards and encourages the government to fully integrate the related expenditures into the budget-making process. Further efforts are also required to ensure transparency in license allocations, the management of extractive revenues and social expenditures. Despite improvements in the formalisation of MSG nomination procedures, the Board notes that further efforts are required to strengthen multi-stakeholder oversight for EITI implementation. The Board encourages the government and MSG to pursue efforts to ensure comprehensive transparency of extractive contracts and beneficial ownership of extractive license-holders and applicants.

The Government of the Republic of Congo is urged to continue to ensure that there are no legal, regulatory, administrative or practical constraints for civil society to fully, actively and effectively engage in all aspects of EITI implementation. The Board noted evidence that the civil society protocol has been used several times in the Republic of Congo to cover stakeholders not engaged in EITI implementation. The Board noted improvements in the environment for civil society’s participation in EITI implementation since the first Validation, even if administrative and practical constraints appear to constrain some aspects of civil society’s engagement in EITI-related outreach and dissemination activities.

The Board has determined that the Republic of Congo will have 18 months before a third Validation, i.e. until 11 March 2022, to carry out corrective actions regarding civil society engagement (Requirement 1.3), MSG oversight (Requirement 1.4), license allocations (Requirement 2.2), state participation (Requirement 2.6), barter agreements (Requirement 4.3), distribution of revenues (Requirement 5.1), social expenditures (Requirement 6.1), quasi-fiscal expenditures (Requirement 6.2), and public debate (Requirement 7.1). Failure to achieve satisfactory progress in the third Validation will result in suspension in accordance with the EITI Standard. In accordance with the EITI Standard, the Republic of Congo’s Multi-Stakeholder Group (MSG) may request an extension of this timeframe or request that Validation commences earlier than scheduled.

Corrective actions and strategic recommendations

The EITI Board agreed the following corrective actions to be undertaken by Republic of Congo. Progress in addressing these corrective actions will be assessed in a thirdValidation commencing on 11 March 2022:

  1. In accordance with Requirement 1.3, the Government of Congo should ensure that there is an enabling environment for civil society participation in the EITI process, and ensure that the rights of civil society and media substantively engaged in the EITI, including but not restricted to members of the multi-stakeholder group, are respected. The Government of Congo should ensure that there are no de facto administrative or practical barriers from any tier of government on civil society’s ability to freely organise public EITI-related dissemination and outreach activities. The government is encouraged to consider the extent to which capacity-building and outreach activities to local government officials could ensure that civil society is consistently able to hold dissemination and outreach events without the presence of security forces and without prior approval, in accordance with provisions of the Constitution and the 1901 Law on associations. To strengthen implementation, civil society may wish to consider more consistently documenting dissemination activities undertaken by CSOs in communities affected by extractive activities, as well as their use of EITI data. The civil society constituency is encouraged to explore alternative channels, including from development partners and international civil society, for developing its technical and financial capacities to fully engage in all aspects of EITI implementation, including use and analysis of EITI data.

  2. In accordance with Requirement 1.4.a, the Republic of Congo should ensure that every constituency is adequately represented on the MSG pursuant to open and transparent nomination procedures that ensure MSG members from civil society, industry and government are independent of each other in both policy and operational terms. In accordance with Requirement 1.4.b, the Republic of Congo should ensure that any non-trivial deviations from its ToR, including both the Decree institutionalising the EITI and the MSG’s own Internal Rules, are properly codified and do not weaken the MSG’s effective oversight of all aspects of EITI implementation. The status of arrears and future payments of per diems should be clarified, with levels of payments to MSG members regularly published in accordance with Requirement 1.4.b.vii, to allay any concerns of conflict of interest in MSG membership. To strengthen implementation, the Republic of Congo is encouraged to consider the extent to which it could replicate the model of tripartite consultations of the MSG in other channels of government and company transparency and accountability mechanisms, while ensuring alignment between the work of different multi-stakeholder channels such as the newly established (multi-stakeholder) Transparency and Accountability Committees established by the March 2017 Transparency Code and under the IMF’s extended credit facility respectively.

  3. In accordance with Requirement 2.2.a, the Republic of Congo should ensure public disclosure of a description of the technical and financial criteria assessed in license transfers in the mining and oil and gas sectors, as well as an assessment by the MSG of any material deviations from the applicable legal and regulatory framework governing license awards and transfers for all contract and license awards and transfers during the accounting period covered by the most recent EITI disclosures, including for companies whose payments fall below the agreed materiality threshold. The Republic of Congo may wish to use EITI reporting to disclose commentary on the efficiency and effectiveness of licensing procedures. The Republic of Congo is invited to consider the extent to which information on the process for awarding and transferring mining, oil and gas licenses in practice could be systematically disclosed as a means of complying with Article 14 of the March 2017 Transparency Code (Law 10-2017).

  4. In accordance with Requirement 2.6, the Republic of Congo should ensure public disclosure of the prevailing rules and practices regarding the financial relationship between the government and SOEs, including disclosures of transfers, retained earnings, reinvestment and third-party financing related to SOE joint ventures and subsidiaries. The Republic of Congo should disclose details regarding the terms attached to SNPC’s equity stakes in extractives companies and projects, including their level of responsibility for covering expenses at various phases of the project cycle, e.g. full-paid equity, free equity or carried interest. Where there have been changes in the level of government and SNPC ownership during the EITI reporting period, the government and SNPC are expected to disclose the terms of the transaction, including details regarding valuation and revenues. To strengthen implementation as encouraged under Requirement 2.6.c, the Republic of Congo is encouraged to describe the rules and practices related to SNPC’s operating and capital expenditures, procurement, subcontracting and corporate governance, e.g. composition and appointment of the Board of Directors, Board’s mandate and code of conduct. The Republic of Congo is invited to consider the extent to which information on the rules and practices related to the financial relations between extractives SOEs (SNPC in particular) and the state could be systematically disclosed as a means of complying with Articles 15, 48 and 66 of the March 2017 Transparency Code (Law 10-2017).

  5. In accordance with Requirement 4.3, the Republic of Congo is required to consider whether there are any agreements, or sets of agreements involving the provision of goods and services (including loans, grants and infrastructure works), in full or partial exchange for oil, gas or mining exploration or production concessions or physical delivery of such commodities. This could include arrangements in which there is physical delivery of crude oil to specific buyers in reimbursement of loans or the provision of infrastructure works. To be able to do so, the multi-stakeholder group and the Independent Administrator need to gain a full understanding of: the terms of the relevant agreements and contracts, the parties involved, the resources which have been pledged by the state, the value of the balancing benefit stream (e.g. infrastructure works), and the materiality of these agreements relative to conventional contracts. Where the multi-stakeholder group concludes that these agreements are material, the multi-stakeholder group is required to ensure that EITI implementation addresses these agreements and disclosures provide a level of detail and disaggregation commensurate with the other payments and revenue streams. The multi-stakeholder group is required to agree a procedure to address data quality and assurance of the information set out above, in accordance with Requirement 4.9. The Republic of Congo is invited to consider the extent to which information on barter and infrastructure arrangements could be systematically disclosed as a means of complying with Article 66 of the March 2017 Transparency Code (Law 10-2017).

  6. In accordance with Requirement 5.1, the Republic of Congo should ensure that an explanation of the allocation of extractives revenues, whether cash or in kind, that are not recorded in the national budget is publicly disclosed, with links provided to relevant financial reports as applicable. The Republic of Congo is invited to consider the extent to which information on the allocation of extractives revenues not recorded in the national budget could be systematically disclosed as a means of complying with Articles 12 and 46 of the March 2017 Transparency Code (Law 10-2017).

  7. In accordance with Requirement 6.1, the Republic of Congo should ensure that the legal or contractual basis for mandatory social expenditures is publicly disclosed. The Republic of Congo should ensure that public disclosures of mandatory social expenditures include descriptions of the payments and the identity and functions of any non-government beneficiaries. These disclosures should be comprehensive of all material mandatory social expenditures undertaken by all companies included in the scope of reporting.

  8. In accordance with Requirement 6.2, the Republic of Congo should undertake a comprehensive review of all expenditures funded by extractives revenues that are not transferred to the Treasury that could be considered quasi-fiscal or otherwise. The MSG should develop a reporting process with a view to achieving a level of transparency commensurate with other payments and revenue streams, and should include SOE subsidiaries and joint ventures. The Government is encouraged to explain the statutory framework for the annual transfer of crude oil to CORAF, setting out clearly whether this represents a form of subsidy, and the annual value of the subsidy if applicable. The Republic of Congo is invited to consider the extent to which information on quasi-fiscal expenditures could be systematically disclosed as a means of complying with Articles 6, 31, 32 and 33 of the March 2017 Transparency Code (Law 10-2017).

  9. In accordance with Requirement 7.1, the Republic of Congo must ensure that government and company disclosures comprehensible, actively promoted, publicly accessible and contributes to public debate. The Republic of Congo should ensure that the information is widely accessible and distributed, that outreach events, whether organised by government, civil society or companies, are undertaken to spread awareness of and facilitate dialogue about governance of extractive resources, building on EITI disclosures across the country in a socially inclusive manner.

Background

The Republic of Congo joined the EITI in 2004. On 29 June 2018, the Republic of Congo was found to have made meaningful progress in implementing the 2016 EITI Standard. The Republic of Congo’s second Validation against 2016 EITI Standard commenced on 29 December 2019. The EITI International Secretariat has assessed the progress made in addressing the 15 corrective actions established by the EITI Board following the Republic of Congo’s first Validation. The corrective actions are related to:

  1. Civil society engagement (Requirement 1.3)
  2. MSG oversight (Requirement 1.4)
  3. License allocations (Requirement 2.2)
  4. License registers (Requirement 2.3)
  5. State participation (Requirement 2.6)
  6. Production data (Requirement 3.2)
  7. In-kind revenues (Requirement 4.2)
  8. Barter and infrastructure provisions (Requirement 4.3)
  9. Transactions related to state-owned enterprises (Requirement 4.5)
  10. Data quality (Requirement 4.9)
  11. Distribution of extractive industry revenues (Requirement 5.1)
  12. Social expenditures (Requirement 6.1)
  13. Quasi-fiscal expenditures (Requirement 6.2)
  14. Economic contribution (Requirement 6.3)
  15. Public debate (Requirement 7.1).

The Board asked the Republic of Congo to address these corrective actions to be assessed in the second Validation. The Republic of Congo has undertaken a number of activities to address the corrective actions:

  • The MSG met three times in 2017, once in 2018 and four times in 2019, based on MSG meeting minutes published on the EITI Congo website.
  • On 12 June 2018, the MSG discussed the Ministry of Finance and Budget’s development of a new extractive revenues reconciliation system (SYSCORE), that would function as an e-reporting system for extractives payments and revenues.
  • On 22 June 2018, Minister of Interior, Decentralisation and Territorial Administration Charles Nganfouomo chaired a meeting of the MSG to discuss the recommendations of the Republic of Congo’s first Validation under the EITI Standard.
  • On 25 October 2018, the civil society constituency agreed Terms of Reference for procedures to nominate and replace the constituency’s MSG members.
  • On 19 December 2018, the MSG approved and published the 2017 annual progress report.
  • On 7 January 2019, the MSG approved the inception report for its 2016 and 2017 EITI Reports.
  • On 19 February 2019, the Republic of Congo published its 2016 EITI Report.
  • In mid-2019, the Ministry of Hydrocarbons launched the country’s first online oil and gas cadastral portal, developed by the Revenue Development Foundation (RDF).
  • On 5-11 October 2019, the EITI International Secretariat undertook a pre-Validation and implementation support mission to Brazzaville and Pointe Noire.
  • On 15 November 2019, the MSG approved Terms of Reference for dissemination workshops for the 2016 and 2017 EITI Reports.
  • On 18 December 2019, the MSG updated and adopted its 2020 EITI work plan, published on the EITI Congo website.
  • On 18 December 2019, the MSG approved and published the 2018 annual progress report.
  • On 23 December 2019, the Republic of Congo published its 2017 EITI Report.
  • On 23 December 2019, the MSG approved the inception report for its 2018 EITI Report.
  • On 27-28 December 2019, the government issued three new Government Decrees institutionalising the EITI and MSG, appointing the MSG Chair and Vice-Chairs and nominating the Permanent Secretary of EITI Congo.

The Republic of Congo’s second Validation commenced on 29 December 2019. The Secretariat assessed the progress made in addressing the 15 corrective actions established by the EITI Board. The draft assessment was sent to the MSG on 14 April 2020. Following MSG comments received on 10 June 2020, the assessment was finalised for consideration by the EITI Board.

Scorecard for Republic of the Congo: 2020

Assessment of EITI requirements

  • Not met
  • Partly met
  • Mostly met
  • Fully met
  • Exceeded
Scorecard by requirement View more Assessment View more

Overall Progress

MSG oversight

1.1Government engagement

The government is committed to the EITI and relevant government representatives are part of the MSG. Participation in MSG meetings is relatively low, but meetings are usually quorate.

1.2Company engagement

Companies are actively engaged in the design and implementation of the EITI, including MSG deliberations.

1.3Civil society engagement

Civil society is actively engaged in the EITI process, but the application of the civil society protocol, particularly as it relates to freedom of operation, is limited to civil society members on the MSG. This controlled space for civil society is narrowly defined to MSG members and excludes important actors substantially engaged in the EITI process who face operational administrative or practical constraints in some aspects of their engagement, particularly in public EITI dissemination and outreach events.

1.4MSG governance

The MSG includes relevant actors with adequate representation of key stakeholders. The new MSG members and revised MSG TOR were agreed after the start of Validation, in 2020. The MSG met infrequently in an ad hoc manner in the 2017-2019 period, with gaps in attendance and record keeping. The MSG's policy on per diems has been formalised, even if the actual practice remains unclear. Adherence to the MSG’s new TOR, which is in line with Requirement 1.4.b, will be assessed in the third Validation, including internal governance and the per diem practice.

1.5Work plan

EITI Congo work plans include objectives that reflect national priorities, such as the extension of the scope of EITI reporting to the forestry sector and the drafting of a transparency law. Work plan activities are measurable and time-bound, structured to achieve the agreed objective. The work plans also include activities aimed at addressing capacity constraints and activities aimed at embedding EITI reporting in government system through the Transparency Code.

Licenses and contracts

2.2License allocations

The 2017 EITI Report provides information on mining, oil and gas licenses awarded in 2017 and confirms the lack of transfers. The report provides an overview of the process for awarding and transferring licenses, including the statutory technical and financial criteria for oil and gas license awards, but only the technical and financial criteria assessed in practice in the mining license awards in 2017. The existence and nature of criteria assessed for license transfers is unclear. The report lists the companies that received licenses in 2017, but only provides an assessment of non-trivial deviations from statutory procedures for licenses in mining, not in oil and gas.

2.3License register

The 2017 EITI Report provides copies of the license registers for mining and oil and gas, which provide most of the information listed under Requirement 2.3.b. The online oil and gas cadastre provides all information listed under Requirement 2.3.b for all active licenses. While the 2017 EITI Report does not provide coordinates for mining licenses, the Decree numbers provided allow users to locate the coordinates of specific licenses from the Decrees awarding them, accessible on the official gazette website.

2.4Policy on contract disclosure

The government’s policy requires that all contracts signed by the state with mining, oil and gas companies, including PSCs to be published in the Journal Officiel and are therefore public documents. A new Transparency Law has expanded the scope to include forestry contracts. In practice, contracts are published in the Journal Officiel with a link to the website of the Secretary General of the Government and some contracts are available on the EITI Congo website.

2.1Legal framework

The 2014 EITI Report provides an overview of the legal framework and fiscal environment in the mining, oil and gas sectors. However, it does not clearly detail the functions of the different government entities in the sectors. The description of revenue flows shows which government entity collects which revenue stream and most government agencies’ role is limited to collecting taxes and revenue, except DGH, which also plays a regulatory role.

2.5Beneficial ownership

Not assessed

EITI Congo has agreed a three-year beneficial ownership roadmap and the March 2017 Transparency Law codifies government beneficial ownership policy, although the 2014 EITI Report does not explicitly address beneficial ownership.

2.6State participation

The 2017 EITI Report demonstrates the materiality of the oil and gas SOE’s (SNPC) revenues and payments to government, and provides a description of the statutory financial relations between SNPC and the state. The report’s description of the practice of SNPC’s financial relations covers the SOE’s lack of dividends, retained earnings and third-party financing by oil and gas operators, although the report does not describe in sufficient detail the statutory financial relations between SNPC and the government nor provide analysis of the change in SNPC’s statutes in November 2017. The EITI Report does not comprehensively describe SNPC’s reinvestments in 2017. The report describes SNPC’s interests in upstream oil and gas companies, subsidiaries and projects, but does not consistently provide the terms associated with SNPC’s equity. The state’s lending to SNPC and to CORAF is described, including key terms for loans to SNPC but not to CORAF. However, the comprehensiveness of the report’s description of loans and guarantees is unclear.

Monitoring production

3.1Exploration data

The 2014 EITI Report provides an overview of the mining, oil and gas sectors, but does not provide a clear description of significant exploration activities undertaken in 2014.

3.2Production data

The 2017 EITI Report provides production volumes and values for each extractives commodity it produced in 2017 aside from production values for certain quarrying products such as sandstone and limestone. However, these quarrying products were not within the scope of operations of material mining companies in the 2017 EITI Report.

3.3Export data

The 2014 EITI Report provides export volumes and values for crude oil and diamonds, but not for gold from artisanal mining.

Revenue collection

4.3Barter agreements

The 2017 EITI Report describes a barter-type infrastructure arrangement involving ENI’s development and management of the CEC integrated power project, including the terms of the relevant agreements and contracts, the parties involved, the resources which have been pledged by the state, and the value of the balancing benefit stream. The report describes two other types of arrangements that it does not categorise as barter-type arrangements, related to the reimbursement of the cost of infrastructure projects funded under the framework government-to-government agreement with China and the repayment of pre-financing agreements with commodity traders. There is insufficient information in the report to assess whether the financing agreements constitute a form of barter-type arrangement.

4.6Direct subnational payments

Not applicable

While the 2014 EITI Report could be clearer in stating that direct subnational payments from extractives companies do not exist, the International Secretariat’s understanding is that this is not applicable in the period under review.

4.7Disaggregation

The 2014 EITI Report presents reconciled financial data disaggregated by receiving government entity, by company and by revenue stream.

4.9Data quality

The MSG approved ToR for the IA in line with the Board-approved template as well as the recruitment of the IA. There were no significant deviations from the IA’s ToR in practice, and the MSG approved the reporting templates. The 2017 EITI Report provides a review of statutory audit and assurance procedures. It describes quality assurance procedures and provides an assessment of compliance with these procedures in practice. The report includes the IA’s assessment that the reconciled financial data is comprehensive and reliable, as well as a review of follow-up on past EITI recommendations and new recommendations. The MSG has prepared summary data for the 2017 EITI Report.

4.1Comprehensiveness

The MSG has agreed materiality thresholds for selecting companies and revenue streams, although the setting of a qualitative threshold for selecting companies means that companies that had ceased activities in 2014 were nevertheless included in the scope of reporting. The 2014 EITI Report lists and describes all material companies and revenue streams. The materiality of revenues from non-reporting companies is assessed, although the netting out of discrepancies tends to underestimate their cumulative value. Full government disclosure is provided.

4.2In-kind revenues

The 2017 EITI Report provides the volumes of the state’s in-kind revenues that were collected, the volumes actually sold and the proceeds of the sales, disaggregated (but not reconciled) by buyer and y cargo. This includes sales of the state’s in-kind revenues handled by SNPC as well as those under the alternative marketing arrangement with Total EP Congo on the Nkossa/Nsoko field. The disclosures include in-kind payments that are part of the reimbursement of pre-financing arrangements with traders. The MSG included unilateral government disclosures of cargo-level disclosures of all oil and gas companies’ sales of their equity oil.

4.4Transportation revenues

Not applicable

While there is evidence of the MSG’s assessment of the materiality of the Maritime Tax (see Requirement 4.1), the Maritime Tax is a payment from oil and gas companies to a private company.

4.5SOE transactions

The 2017 EITI Report comprehensively addresses the role of SOEs, including comprehensive and reliable disclosures of material company payments to SNPC and SNPC transfers to the Treasury. The lack of government transfers to SNPC in 2017 is confirmed. The report provides the volumes of the state’s crude oil that were transferred to SNPC’s subsidiary CORAF in 2017 and confirms the lack of payment for these deliveries. While the report only provides SNPC’s unilateral disclosures of transfers of a share of the proceeds from the sale of the state’s in-kind revenues in reimbursement of China-funded infrastructure loans and of pre-financing agreements with commodity traders, these accounts do not represent government accounts.

4.8Data timeliness

Although the timeliness of the ROC’s EITI reporting has slipped since 2014, data in the ROC’s EITI Reports has always been published within two years of the end of the fiscal period under review.

Revenue allocation

5.1Distribution of revenues

The 2017 EITI Report confirms that all mining revenues are recorded in the national budget and lists specific oil and gas revenues accounting for 58.17% of 2017 oil and gas revenues that are not recorded in the national budget. However, the report does not categorise the two types of in-kind deductions from the state’s Profit Oil as off-budget revenues, even though it clearly describes the nature and volumes of these deductions. There is no evidence of these oil and gas revenues in the 2017 budget execution report or the government’s 2017 balance sheet (TOFE), although they have been reflected in the government’s TOFE from mid-2018. While the report provides a general description of the allocation of most off-budget oil and gas revenues, it highlights that the IA was not provided access to the details of the agreements related to these deductions from transfers to the Treasury.

5.2Subnational transfers

Not applicable

The 2014 EITI Report describes the general system of subnational transfers of oil and gas royalties to host local governments. However, the International Secretariat understands that the statutory subnational transfers were not effective in 2014 due to the lack of implementing regulations. The report does not refer to any ad-hoc subnational transfers.

5.3Revenue management and expenditures

Not assessed

EITI Congo has made modest efforts to include additional information on earmarks of extractives revenues for off-budget infrastructure projects (see Requirements 4.3 and 5.1) and the budget-making and audit processes.

Socio-economic contribution

6.1Mandatory social expenditures

While the 2017 EITI Report provides a cursory and general description of social expenditures mandated by law or the contract with the government that governs the extractive investment, the legal or contractual basis for mandatory social expenditures reported is unclear from the report. the report presents oil and gas companies’ unilateral disclosures of social expenditures categorised as mandatory, although it is unclear whether these disclosures are comprehensive. The report confirms that all mandatory social expenditures were made in cash, but provides descriptions of the expenditures and the identity of the beneficiary for only some, not all, of the mandatory social expenditures reported.

6.2Quasi-fiscal expenditures

This requirement is not applicable in the mining sector, but has appeared to be applicable in the oil and gas sector in recent years. The 2017 EITI Report lists three quasi-fiscal expenditures by the SNPC foundation that have been mis-categorised. The report describes the allocation of oil and gas revenues not transferred to the Treasury, at least three of which appear to be forms of off-budget repayment of sovereign debt and infrastructure works. However, the lack of sufficient information on these arrangements constrains the ability to properly categorise these arrangements. Since mid-2018, the deductions from the state’s petroleum revenues for reimbursements of some ‘special agreements’ have been reflected in the government budget and TOFE, albeit without sufficient details. The detail of the agreements underpinning these deductions from government revenues have not yet been clarified to date.

6.3Economic contribution

The 2017 EITI Report provides, in relative and absolute terms, the extractive industries’ 2017 contribution to GDP, government revenues, exports, employment and the location of extractive activities. There is some coverage of artisanal mining production.

Outcomes and impact

7.2Data accessibility

Not assessed

EITI-Congo does not yet provide EITI data in open data formats, despite some effort to develop an online portal with SAP. However, mainstreaming transparency in government systems through the transparency law has been a major achievement for the MSG.

7.4Outcomes and impact of implementation

EITI-Congo has produced annual progress reports for 2014 and 2015 that thoroughly document progress and outcomes of implementation.

7.1Public debate

While the 2016 and 2017 EITI Reports have been published since the first Validation, there has been little concerted effort towards outreach and dissemination by the MSG or national secretariat beyond a press conference to launch the annual EITI Report. Terms of Reference for dissemination of the 2016 and 2017 EITI Reports in Brazzaville have been agreed, but partly implemented at the start of Validation.

7.3Follow up on recommendations

The MSG has been thorough in taking steps to act upon lessons learned and monitoring progress with the implementation of recommendations in EITI Reports. Together with the IA, significant efforts have been made to identify, investigate and address the causes of discrepancies in EITI reporting.