A government agency that was formed to promote transparency and accountability in the extractive industry on Tuesday reported that it has reconciled the mining sector’s revenue streams at P52.7 billion, a culmination of 18 months of data gathering from various government agencies.
Called the Philippine Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (PH-EITI), it reported that the unreconciled amount was only P58.2 million, or less than 1 percent of the total revenue.
This information, among many others, are contained in two books that the agency launched at the Sofitel Hotel during a daylong affair. The books contained a report of its reconciliation of payments and collections from mining and other agencies using declared figures from 2012.
EITI is a global standard of transparency that requires extractive industries to publish what they pay to the government. In return, the government publishes what they collect in a process called reconciliation.
EITI’s aim is to promote transparency and accountability in the extractive industries, and publish a comprehensive report to shed light on how much the government earns from extractive industries, how much the industry actually pays the government and how the citizens benefit from the earnings of the extractive industries, according to Finance Assistant Secretary Ma. Teresa Habitan.
Habitan said the two-volume report by the PH-EITI is the result of collaboration and pooling of resources and ideas from many sectors to promote transparency and good governance.
“All that we have worked for is for the sake of the Filipino people to help us advance toward creating systems of transparency and accountability, to help ensure that the people’s money goes to the aid and development of the people,” she said.
Habitan said the PH-EITI objective is to strengthen the business environment and increase investments in the country, through transparency and accountability.
“Countries that followed the EITI formula, such as Nigeria, were able to recover $400 million of missing payments, based on calculation of what has been paid to their government over a three-year period versus what they should have been paid,” she said.
She said 25 percent of Indonesia’s revenue comes from extractive industries, and it has expanded its coverage from 129 companies to 263 during its second year of reporting.
The first PH-EITI report covers 52 companies, seven national agencies and 32 local government units. This is comprised of 40 large-scale mining, 11 oil and gas and one coal-mining operation, collectively called companies.
The national agencies include the Bureau of Internal Revenue, Mines and Geosciences Bureau, Department of Energy, Philippine Ports Authority, Bureau of Customs and National Commission of Indigenous Peoples.
The local government units are limited to the provinces and municipalities that host large-scale companies.
In 2010 the country’s total metallic mineral reserves were assessed at 14.5 billion metric tons, while non-metallic reserves were estimated to be 67.66 billion metric tons.
The country’s mineral reserves are estimated to reach $1.387 billion, with gold, nickel and copper contributing 75 percent of the total value. Most of these reserves are located in Mindanao and Luzon.
Of the top three minerals, Mindanao has 70 percent of gold reserves, and 62 percent of copper. Palawan, as part of Luzon, has 53 percent of the country’s reserves in nickel. Luzon also has the bulk of zinc and chromite reserves.