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Timor-Leste hosts regional EITI conference

Timor-Leste's President José Ramos-Horta called EITI “a cornerstone of our institutional framework to ensure transparency” in his opening speech to the EITI Asia-Pacific conference. He also expressed hope that Timor-Leste’s Transparency Portal would serve as a tool to further increase transparency and improve public service delivery.

Oil and gas revenues represents more than 95% of Timor-Leste’s state budget. Since 2005, all tax and royalties from petroleum projects are paid directly into a Petroleum Fund. Payments and revenues to the fund are included in the EITI reporting process, and the fund reached US$ 6.6 billion in 2010. Through the establishment of theTransparency Portal, Timor-Leste hopes to further increase transparency in expenditure and public procurement by enabling the public to review open government tenders and procurement awards. The government has also committed to public broadcasting of parliamentary budget debates and public dissemination of minutes and decisions from weekly Cabinet meetings.

The regional conference entitled “Beyond EITI: Timor-Leste’s Transparency Model” was held in Timor-Leste's capital city Dili on 25-27 August. Over 300 participants attended the conference, including high-level representatives from South East Asia and G7+ member countries. The purpose of the conference was to launch Timor-Leste’s Transparency Model, discuss the link between transparency and stability in fragile states, and to share experiences with EITI implementation in the Asia-Pacific. A report from the conference is available on the website of the Ministry of Finance.

Keynote speaker and Managing Director of the World Bank, Sri Mulyani, congratulated the government of Timor-Leste for having “developed a multi-pronged Transparency Model that is an inspiration for developing and developed countries alike”. Timor-Leste was the first country in Asia to obtain EITI Compliant status in July 2010.

For further information, please visit the Timor-Leste country page on the EITI website.

Countries
Timor-Leste