Mineral Exploration is the official publication of the Association of Mineral Exploration British Columbia.
Issue link: http://digital.canadawide.com/i/468124
Photograph : Cour te sy of Joe Ringwald S P R I N G 2 0 1 5 39 Canada is home to more than 50 per cent of the world's mining companies and a third of global oil and gas compa- nies with operations in over 100 coun- tries. The Canadian mining industry has partnered with civil society in the support and development of ESTMA for mandatory payment disclosure that would improve resource governance and reduce corruption. The initiative is also supported by investors with almost $6 billion in assets who view this type of transparency as improving business cli- mates in resource-rich countries. The Act falls short in specifying the detailed content of the required annual report as defined in parallel legislation in other jurisdictions such as the European Union and the United States; however, the Government of Canada has commit- ted to country-by-country, project-level reporting. This and other crucial details will be decided by a multi-stakeholder administrative process in 2015. Background In 2010, the United States enacted Section 1504 of the Dodd-Frank Act, requiring all oil, gas and mining com- panies listed on a U.S. stock exchange to disclose payments they make to gov- ernments internationally, on a project- by-project basis. This law will be imple- mented through regulations developed by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The first version of the regulations was successfully challenged by a group of oil and gas companies; however, revised regulations are under development and expected to be ready by late 2015. In 2012, in response to growing inter- national and domestic demand for greater financial transparency in the global extractives sector, Canadian civil society and mining industry organiza- tions created the Resource Revenue Transparency Working Group. This group developed recommendations for a mandatory payment-reporting frame- work in Canada and presented its final recommendations to the Government of Canada in early 2014. Other actions took place in 2013, including: • The European Union finalized the Tr a n s p a re nc y a nd A c c ou nt i n g Directives, which require all publicly listed and large, private oil, gas, mining and forestry companies to disclose the payments they make to governments abroad on a project-by-project basis. EU member states are required to adopt the directives into their legisla- tion by mid-2015; • The Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, an international voluntary standard for improving transparency in the extractive sectors, adopted a stron- ger standard that included a require- ment for payments to be disclosed in a disaggregated format, including on a project-level basis; • Norway passed legislation requiring pub- lic, project-level payment reporting for the extractive and forestry sectors; and The Extractive Sector Transparency Measures Act (ESTMA) is now law in Canada, having received Royal Assent on December 16, 2014. Part of omnibus Bill C-34 (Economic Action Plan 2014 Act, No. 2), the Act requires publicly traded and large, private oil, gas and mining entities to publicly disclose payments to foreign and domestic governments. With the 2013 amendments to the Corruption of Foreign Public Officials Act (CFPOA) and the new Corporate Social Responsibility Strategy (November 2014), ESTMA complements Canada's strong commitment to transparency, accountability and anti-corruption. ESTMA explained NEW EXTRACTIVE SECTOR TRANSPARENCY MEASURES ACT LEGISLATES PAYMENT DISCLOSURE PRACTICES By Joe Ringwald >> CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY Joe Ringwald "The Act requires publicly traded and large, private oil, gas and mining entities to publicly disclose payments to foreign and domestic governments."