The Revenue Watch Institute is a non-profit policy institute and grantmaking organization that promotes the responsible management of oil, gas and mineral resources for the public good. With effective revenue management, citizen engagement and real government accountability, natural resource wealth can drive development and national growth. RWI provides the expertise, funding and technical assistance to help countries realize these benefits.

First launched in 2002 as the Revenue Watch Program of the Open Society Institute, and spun off into an independent organization in June 2006, the Revenue Watch Institute is the only organization dedicated exclusively to addressing the special problems of oil, gas and mining-dependent countries—countries where poverty, conflict and corruption too often converge.

Revenue Watch promotes transparent, accountable and effective management of natural resource wealth to help countries avoid the "resource curse." We take a comprehensive approach to improving governance and development across the entire value chain—from the organization of extractive production, revenue generation and revenue management, through the expenditure processes and development outcomes in resource rich countries.

We have played a central role in nurturing and building the capacity of the transparency and accountability movement in producing countries for the past five years.

• A mainstay of RWI's work is the development of civil society capacity. Revenue Watch provides financial and technical training and support in over twenty resource-rich countries. We produce guidebooks and organize study tours and exchanges. We also facilitate regional and international workshops on civil society oversight of the entire extractive resource value chain, from contracts and licensing to revenue and expenditure tracking. We are a founding member of the international Publish What You Pay Campaign, and help to fund a number of national PWYP coalitions, from the U.S. and Canada to Ghana and Indonesia.
• RWI is a leader in the ongoing development, implementation and internationalization of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI), and has been since the EITI's inception. We served on the International Advisory Group in 2006, and subsequently as a civil society representative on the EITI Governing Board.
• RWI is helping to spearhead the global campaign to change international policies and practices among all the major players in this sector-including extractive companies, investors, multilateral development institutions and bilateral donors.
• RWI-supported research is formalizing a body of literature on best practices in extractives revenue management, including contracting, oil fund laws, fiscal regimes for mining, effective parliamentary oversight and proper audits.
• Through pilot projects and partnerships with development economists, RWI is creating a set of concrete savings and expenditure strategies for natural resource windfalls. These strategies will help national and local governments achieve the greatest return on their development investments.
• While much of RWI's work focuses on building civil society capacity in producing countries, we have also undertaken joint monitoring initiatives with industry actors and provided both legal and economic technical assistance to governments. This multi-faceted approach has enabled RWI to serve as a trusted mediator who can bring diverse and often mistrustful stakeholders together for constructive forums and partnerships to enhance economic governance and accountability.

THE RWI APPROACH

The Revenue Watch Institute addresses the complex and diverse challenges of resource dependency according to four operating principles:

• Continuous independent civil society oversight and monitoring
• Timely research on the country's extractive industry and public finance management to ensure that current/proposed policies are in the public's best interest
• Well-informed advocacy promoting greater openness and accountability in government management and distribution of extractive revenues and public finances more broadly
• Independent technical assistance to provide governments with a genuine interest in becoming more accountable and transparent with the knowledge and tools to do so

Revenue Watch is concerned with both revenue and expenditure transparency and our partners engage in increasingly diverse forms of public finance monitoring, including service delivery, participatory budgeting, and aid and expenditure tracking. RWI partners have now begun to share skills and strategies among themselves, coalescing into an indigenous-led network of non-governmental organizations that is itself a growing force in the fight against corruption and abuse of the public interest in resource-dependent countries.

Revenue Watch brings a constructive multi-stakeholder approach to its work, based on a fundamental alliance with civil society. We identify the scholars, citizens, and activists in resource-dependent countries with an interest in promoting transparent and accountable governance, and work with them to monitor and raise public awareness about their countries' extractive industries and public finances.

We also work with journalists to build their capacity to understand, analyze and report on their countries' extractive industries and public finances. We work with companies to encourage and support an accountable and transparent presence in resource-rich countries and to highlight the shareholder risks that come along with investing in nations where good governance is lacking.

Finally, Revenue Watch works with policymakers to increase the effective and transparent management of natural resource revenues, and with international financial institutions. RWI acts as a clearinghouse of information, as a convener of multi-stakeholder dialogue and as a neutral and independent source of expertise and advice on highly contentious issues, such as stabilization agreements and petroleum fund development.

GEOGRAPHIC RANGE

The Revenue Watch Institute currently supports partners and affiliates in Angola, Azerbaijan, Brazil, Cameroon, Cambodia, Cote D'Ivoire, DRC, Ecuador, Georgia, Ghana, Guinea, Indonesia, Iraq, Kazakhstan, the Kyrgyz Republic, Liberia, Mauritania, Mexico, Mongolia, Niger, Nigeria, Peru, Sao Tome and Principe, Sierra Leone, Tanzania, Trinidad and Tobago, Uganda and Yemen. We are exploring possible engagement in Venezuela, Kuwait, Madagascar, Mozambique, Timor Leste and Papua New Guinea.

RWI is based in New York, with a satellite office in London and regional coordinators based in Azerbaijan, Ghana, Indonesia, Malaysia and Peru.