• News
    • Latest news
    • News search
    • Health
    • Finance
    • Food
    • Career news
    • Content series
    • Try Devex Pro
  • Jobs
    • Job search
    • Post a job
    • Employer search
    • CV Writing
    • Upcoming career events
    • Try Career Account
  • Funding
    • Funding search
    • Funding news
  • Talent
    • Candidate search
    • Devex Talent Solutions
  • Events
    • Upcoming and past events
    • Partner on an event
  • Post a job
  • About
      • About us
      • Membership
      • Newsletters
      • Advertising partnerships
      • Devex Talent Solutions
      • Contact us
Join DevexSign in
Join DevexSign in

News

  • Latest news
  • News search
  • Health
  • Finance
  • Food
  • Career news
  • Content series
  • Try Devex Pro

Jobs

  • Job search
  • Post a job
  • Employer search
  • CV Writing
  • Upcoming career events
  • Try Career Account

Funding

  • Funding search
  • Funding news

Talent

  • Candidate search
  • Devex Talent Solutions

Events

  • Upcoming and past events
  • Partner on an event
Post a job

About

  • About us
  • Membership
  • Newsletters
  • Advertising partnerships
  • Devex Talent Solutions
  • Contact us
  • My Devex
  • Update my profile % complete
  • Account & privacy settings
  • My saved jobs
  • Manage newsletters
  • Support
  • Sign out
Latest newsNews searchHealthFinanceFoodCareer newsContent seriesTry Devex Pro
    • News
    • Transparency and accountability

    New project to investigate who benefits from corruption in extractive industries

    Nearly half of the $88.6 billion lost to illicit financial flows from Africa is associated with extractive industries.

    By William Worley // 16 February 2021
    Young men carry baskets of sulfur, mined in the crater of an active volcano in Indonesia. Photo by: Tatsiana Volskaya / The EITI / CC BY

    An ambitious new program to fight corruption by identifying who benefits from the proceeds of lucrative extractive industries is being launched by transparency campaigners.

    Opening Extractives is a collaboration between Open Ownership and the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, both organizations campaigning for more accessible knowledge about private finances.

    The campaigners hope that the project will ultimately reduce funds lost by countries to corruption and increase tax revenue, allowing more public finances to be spent on services such as health care and education.

    An estimated $88.6 billion is lost from Africa alone each year, according to the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development. Nearly half of this, $40 billion, is associated with extractives industries, particularly the mining of precious metals and stones, according to UNCTAD. The agency also highlighted that annual international aid to the continent amounts to $48 billion.

    Last year an investigation into hundreds of thousands of documents dubbed the Luanda Leaks found that shady contracts in Angola had funneled a fortune to billionaire Isabel dos Santos, the daughter of the country’s former president.

    “Anywhere you find political control over the distribution of public funds or public assets, the absence of understanding who ultimately benefits from them leads to a massive corruption risk,” said Thom Townsend, executive director of Open Ownership. He added: “Wherever there is a proximity of political power and the ability to distribute funds and control where they end up, the absence of beneficial ownership data produces a significant risk.”

    The project will focus on improving beneficial ownership information, bypassing “opaque structures” to identify who ultimately profits from a business, in extractive sectors such as oil and mining.

    “The reason for the [focus on] extractives is this is where so much money is made illegally, it's a major source of corruption… it’s often politically exposed persons who have close connections who benefit from lots of contracts and as a consequence there is money lost to the public exchequer,” Mark Robinson, executive director of EITI told Devex.

    “So this is particularly the case around major mining projects, significant oil contracts, that’s why it's so fundamental in this sector — scale,” he added. 

    Opening Extractives will provide long-term technical assistance to help governments of resource-rich nations enact reforms and use beneficial ownership data effectively. Lessons learned along the way will be communicated internationally to help other countries benefit from the process.

    “Anywhere you find political control over the distribution of public funds or public assets, the absence of understanding who ultimately benefits from them leads to a massive corruption risk.”

    — Thom Townsend, executive director, Open Ownership

    The problem it aims to fight is currently “rooted through contracts that benefit private individuals for self interest,” according to Robinson. “Ultimately by reducing the scope for corrupt practices you increase the resources available to the public exchequer, which in turn can be used to invest in health systems, or schools or clinics.”

    The project is in its early days — the 8-10 countries it will focus on have not yet been selected — but its backers are optimistic that international momentum towards greater financial transparency is in their favor.

    Robinson acknowledged there were likely to be obstacles to improving beneficial ownership transparency. “There’s resistance from those who don’t particularly want light thrown on these ownership structures, there’s resistance from in political office who themselves stand to benefit from these opaque structures,” he said.

    Opening Extractives therefore requires countries “which are serious rather than giving it lip service,” Robinson said.

    • Private Sector
    • Institutional Development
    • UNCTAD
    • Opening Extractives
    Printing articles to share with others is a breach of our terms and conditions and copyright policy. Please use the sharing options on the left side of the article. Devex Pro members may share up to 10 articles per month using the Pro share tool ( ).

    About the author

    • William Worley

      William Worley@willrworley

      Will Worley is the Climate Correspondent for Devex, covering the intersection of development and climate change. He previously worked as UK Correspondent, reporting on the FCDO and British aid policy during a time of seismic reforms. Will’s extensive reporting on the UK aid cuts saw him shortlisted for ‘Specialist Journalist of the Year’ in 2021 by the British Journalism Awards. He can be reached at william.worley@devex.com.

    Search for articles

    Related Jobs

    • Individual Consultant: National TA Coordinator
      Samarkand, Uzbekistan | Tashkent, Uzbekistan | Uzbekistan | Central Asia
    • Global Affairs Associate
      London, United Kingdom | United Kingdom | Western Europe
    • Human Resource Generalist
      Prague, Czech Republic | Czech Republic | Eastern Europe
    • See more

    Most Read

    • 1
      Opinion: Mobile credit, savings, and insurance can drive financial health
    • 2
      Strengthening health systems by measuring what really matters
    • 3
      Opinion: India’s bold leadership in turning the tide for TB
    • 4
      Opinion: Why vision is key to unlocking global development potential
    • 5
      How AI-powered citizen science can be a catalyst for the SDGs

    Trending

    Financing for Development Conference

    The Trump Effect

    Newsletters

    Related Stories

    Munich Security Conference 2025Munich diary: The latest from the jam-packed security conference

    Munich diary: The latest from the jam-packed security conference

    • News
    • Jobs
    • Funding
    • Talent
    • Events

    Devex is the media platform for the global development community.

    A social enterprise, we connect and inform over 1.3 million development, health, humanitarian, and sustainability professionals through news, business intelligence, and funding & career opportunities so you can do more good for more people. We invite you to join us.

    • About us
    • Membership
    • Newsletters
    • Advertising partnerships
    • Devex Talent Solutions
    • Post a job
    • Careers at Devex
    • Contact us
    © Copyright 2000 - 2025 Devex|User Agreement|Privacy Statement