Newly-signed Transparency Law requires companies to disclose payments on a country-by-country, and project-by-project basis

President Barak Obama signed into law today the financial reform bill passed by Congress last week-–with a landmark provision on transparency, which requires all extractive industries companies that file with the Securities and Exchange Commission in the U.S. to disclose the payments they make to governments wherever they operate.

Notably, these companies must disclose the payments on a country-by-country, and project-by-project basis–a level of specificity that will improve the ability to monitor the level of resource wealth that returns back to communities where oil, gas, and minerals are extracted.

This law breaks new ground by providing a means for people in resource-rich communities to hold their governments to account for their payments to governments around the world.

Read more about the importance of transparency in extractive industries here.

Photo: Carolyn Kaster – AP