Nigeria’s efforts to improve natural resource governance through the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) Standard were recognised earlier this month by the international EITI board.

The EITI Standard is a global standard to promote open and accountable management of natural resources.

The recognition followed the recently published Nigeria EITI validation report, as a result of which the EITI board decided to extend Nigeria’s EITI membership. Validation is the EITI’s independent evaluation mechanism.

The first country in Africa to implement the EITI, Nigeria has helped shape the EITI Standard and developed one of the most extensive EITI reporting processes globally.

The EITI notes that over more than a decade of implementation, Nigeria’s EITI (NEITI) has gone well beyond the initial requirements of the EITI by including assessments of physical and process flows alongside the reconciliation of financial payments. Nigeria was also the first country to enact legislation institutionalising the EITI in the country and the NEITI has been repeatedly recognised for its efforts to put into effect recommendations from EITI reports.

As a result of these efforts, the NEITI is said to have led to the recovery of more than $2.4-billion for the federal government, while increasing multistakeholder collaboration. It has led improved governance in the extractive sector.

The EITI board agrees that Nigeria has made “meaningful progress” by implementing the EITI Standard and has made efforts to go beyond the basic requirements in areas including disclosures of the sales of the State’s in-kind revenues and the EITI’s contribution to public debate.

The EITI board also decided on a set of corrective actions that Nigeria would need to address to make a full transition to the EITI Standard.

Referring to Nigeria’s progress, former Swedish Prime Minister and current EITI board chairperson Fredrik Reinfeldt says that Nigeria has repeatedly demonstrated how the EITI process can be used to achieve important, tangible results for its citizens.

“Swiftly addressing the corrective actions identified through validation should help Nigeria continue to demonstrate regional leadership and make a full transition to the EITI Standard,” he states.

Reinfeldt remarks that Nigeria’s first validation under the EITI Standard shows that, although Nigeria’s government has taken steps to address all the requirements of the EITI Standard, there is still room for improvement.

He highlights that areas where further work is needed include data quality assurance and improving the comprehensiveness of reporting by both government and industry, as well as State-owned enterprises. The EITI board also raised questions as to whether industry and civil society were sufficiently engaged in EITI implementation, highlighting gaps in effective oversight by the National Stakeholders Working Group.

Having been compliant with the EITI rules since 2011, Nigeria was tested against the EITI Standard for the first time in July 2016. Nigeria is one of the first 15 countries to undergo validation against the EITI Standard. In accordance with the board’s decision, Nigeria has until July 11, 2018, to implement corrective actions addressing the EITI board’s concerns, when a second validation is scheduled to start.