The Papua New Guinea (PNG) Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI), the Treasury and JICA, will soon proceed into phase two of the boosting of data transparency in the Mining and Petroleum sectors following the signing of the “Record of Discussion” in Port Moresby this week.
The signing of the Record of Discussion is for the project for Improving Resource Related Revenue Management Phase Two between the three organisations and is aimed at improving resource related revenue management through enhanced EITI reporting to ensure transparency in how the funds are managed.
PNGEITI Head of National Secretariat, Mr. Lukas Alkan said the Record of Discussion between PNGEITI and its stakeholders and JICA was undertaken back in August and the signing on Wednesday 18th October, has now set things in motion for phase two to commence early next year.
The second project will be undertaken by JICA experts to continue building and improving capacity at the Department of Petroleum and Energy from work that was undertaken in phase one of the project and at the same time, focus on building capacity at the Auditor Generals Office to improve financial data quality, reliability and timely availability of recourses related to data and information for public used, said Mr. Alkan.
He further explained that the JICA technical cooperation program will focus on building and strengthening capacities at two key government organisations; the Department of Petroleum and Energy, and the Office of the Auditor General.
Mr. Alkan said addressing weakness in data reliability and quality in these two agencies is important to the work of the PNGEITI Secretariat in its endeavors to addressing the data and information gaps as highlighted through the EITI reporting process.
The three year program would basically pick up from where JICA had left off at the Department of Petroleum and Energy when phase one of the project ended a year ago.
The project is also intended to assist strengthen capacity at the Auditor Generals Office to ensure that the financial data that are used in the EITI annual report are audited and are reliable to improve the quality of these reports.
Mr. Alkan then thanked the Japan Government through JICA for its continued support in the Government of PNGs efforts to implement the EITI Global Standard to improve extractive sector governance. He also acknowledged JICA for coming on board for the second time to help improve extractive transparency, which is the core mandate of the EITI in the PNG Mining and Petroleum space.
The second phase of the project will commence in March, 2024.
Meanwhile, the signing of the Record of Discussion was done between the Acting Chairman of the PNGEITI Multi- Stakeholder Group Mr. John Uware and Mr. Matsuoka Hideaki, the JICA Chief Representative to PNG.