Transparency Initiative (EITI)

12 Executive summary
COOPERATION
5. Seek integration or complementarity and interoperability:
Cooperation centering on the principles of
the EITI should be fostered, in order to proliferate the
norms rather than the organizational structure or process
steps.
6. Transcend the ‘transparency club’ of the International
Board, national-level MSGs and Secretariats: Reaching
out to stakeholders and target groups should build on
the resources of entities that are not directly involved in
administering or governing the EITI. Otherwise it will
be too costly to set up those structures and finance activities
that have realistic prospects to lead to results on
outcome and impact level and that have the ability to
measure those results just for the EITI.
MANAGEMENT
of international EITI institutions and budgets creates
an obligation to establish a global standardized M&E
system. There is no reason for EITI International to
not be able to measure impact through reliable independent
approaches. Based on the existing methodology
a supra-national validation could serve as a tool,
if national-level Validations are able to provide M&E
data of sufficient quality.
8. Strengthen the “I” for Initiative: Greater incentives need
to be introduced at national level to look for synergies
with reform initiatives, and at the international level
with other global initiatives and organizations. After
all, EITI bears an “I” for Initiative in its name, which is
not just a letter but a philosophy to pursue cooperation.
Interests and stakeholders in the EITI are too diverse,
too ambitious and too dynamic, whereas funding is too
short to form a large, stand-alone Extractive Industries
Transparency Organization (“EITO”), or national subsidiaries
of an EITO.
7. Introduce a comprehensive M&E system:
• National level: National M&E systems are only recently
emerging as a consequence of the 2013 Standard
at the country level (locally and nationally). It is
also evident that not much can be said about their
methodological quality in practice. The case studies
showed weak M&E systems that focus on EITI process
steps. Systematic M&E that reaches above the output
level and thus covers outcomes and impacts is, however,
mandated for countries by the Standard (Requirement
7). Validation is designed to check a countries’
compliance against the Standard, but the 2016
Validation methodology is soft in respect of Requirement
7. Validations would need to have a consistent
evaluatory component in order to be in the position
to assess impacts. In case that the forthcoming Validations
running between now and the end of 2017
come to the conclusion that impacts at national and
local levels have not been sufficiently evaluated, M&E
aspects should be strengthened at the occasion of the
next modification of the Standard, guidance notes
and model Terms of Reference for the Validator. In
the meantime, the Standard allows sufficient scope to
improve guidance notes for national M&E.
• International level: Wherever possible, global M&E
data should be used to legitimize and to guide decisions
on the overall course of the Initiative. The size