Lotus Ruan, MAAPPS // March 30, 2015
Having gained sufficient knowledge of EITI national and subnational implementation in different countries, we’ve finally moved to subnational EITI reporting in Mongolia. While my knowledge of Mongolia is limited, a few weeks’ research has led to me to a better understanding of the overall Mongolia’s performance of EITI subnational reporting. I am starting to see the similarities and differences between Mongolia and the countries my team and I studied, which prompts me to come to the conclusion that what Mongolia needs the most for subnational reporting is not government or corporates’ involvement but theirs and the public’s better understandings of subnational EITI reports.
The status quo is that Mongolia is a leading EITI implementer. According to the EITI report in 2013, the number of companies participating in EITI in Mongolia is more than any other country in the world. However, Mongolia’s full potential as a supplier of relevant and useable extractives information is yet to be realized.
All Mongolians are affected directly directly and indirectly by the extractive sector, both positively and negatively. So citizens and corporates have a vested interest in knowing what taxes and royalties companies are paying to national, provincial and local government, who the beneficial owners are, what they are licensed to mine for. However, a weakness in subnational EITI in Mongolia is that concerned individuals and companies, especially in the rural area, lack sufficient knowledge to understand key terms and budgetary charts in these reports, not to mention to realize how such reports could affect social and economic benefits. To me, transparency in itself is not enough; publishing data, however transparent or large amount it is (the EITI Mongolia report in 2012 is over 1,000 pages), is not enough. If the public, especially the extractive communities, does not know how to read the report and what those financial sheets mean, then these EITI reports will be much less effective in stirring a public conversation and engaging local communicates in holding the country’s government and corporates accountable.
In other words, transparency lies in the understanding of the data. While EITI reporting assists and has been proven quite successful in strengthening accountability and good governance, helping individuals and corporates in local communities understand EITI reports can lead to public supervision and contribute to the prevention of corruption or conflicts based around the extractive sectors. Considering the fact Mongolia is playing a relatively leading role in both national and subnational reporting, what our team should focus on is not merely raising public awareness but utilizing existing local expertise to walk the public through these information-loaded EITI reports.