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Bribery and export credits

Bribery and export credits

Members of the OECD Working Party on Export Credits and Credit Guarantees (ECG) are playing their part in the fight against bribery in international business transactions. With the adoption of a new Recommendation of the Council on Bribery and Officially Supported Export Credits (OECD/LEGAL/0447) in 2019, OECD Members and other non-Members that have adhered to the Recommendation (hereafter, the “Adherents”) are demonstrating their continued commitment to take appropriate measures to deter bribery in the export transactions that they support. While OECD Recommendations are not legally binding, practice accords them great moral force as representing the political will of Adherents. There is, therefore, an expectation that the Adherents will do their utmost to fully implement the new Recommendation.

Implementation of the revised Recommendation will be monitored via a Survey of the measures that Export Credit Agencies have put in place to combat bribery and will be supported by regular workshops to consider best practices, relevant international developments and evolving business practices.

Brief History of the Recommendation

In parallel with the development of the 1997 Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials in International Business Transactions (the "OECD Anti-Bribery Convention"), the ECG investigated how bribery was being addressed under Members' national export credit systems and, as a result, agreed, in 2000, to an Action Statement on Bribery and Officially Supported Export Credits that included appropriate measures to deter bribery in officially supported export credits. In May 2006, this Action Statement was reviewed and enhanced in light of experience, and, in December 2006, it was embodied in the first Recommendation of the Council on Bribery and Officially Supported Export Credits (OECD/LEGAL/0348).

In 2015, the Adherents agreed to conduct a review of the 2006 Recommendation, looking in particular at the concrete measures that ECAs had put in place to deter bribery and at how the international framework for combatting bribery had evolved during the almost 10 years since the Recommendation’s adoption. The review process involved detailed discussions with Adherents and their ECAs concerning their current practices and policy objectives, consultations with external experts (lawyers, private sector companies and non-governmental organisations), and examination of various policy options and drafting proposals. The result is the aforementioned Recommendation, which was adopted by the OECD Council in March 2019 and which replaced the 2006 Recommendation.

Adherents to the Recommendation

OECD Members, Brazil, Peru, Romania and Russian Federation.

Operational guidance

Debarment Lists: Adherents are required to verify or obtain a declaration that exporters and, where appropriate, other relevant parties involved in a transaction, and any natural or legal person acting on their behalf, such as agents, are not listed on the publicly available debarment lists of the Multilateral Financial Institutions, such as:

Other Anti-Bribery Initiatives

The ECG liaises closely with the OECD Working Group on Bribery in the context of country peer reviews concerning the implementation of the OECD Anti-Bribery Convention.

Survey of measures taken to combat bribery in export credits

Following the adoption of the 2006 Recommendation, ECG Members agreed on a Survey to provide for the on-going monitoring and review of anti-bribery measures in official export credits systems. In 2008, the ECG agreed to make publicly available the Survey responses and, subsequently, the Secretariat’s annual Reviews of Adherents’ Survey responses.

In 2019, following the adoption of the replacement Recommendation, ECG Members agreed on a revised Survey concerning its implementation.

Stakeholders are invited to provide comments on the measures taken to combat bribery in their provision of officially supported export credits: such comments are included within the Secretariat’s annual Review of Adherents’ Survey responses. These Reviews are part of the ongoing monitoring of the implementation of the Recommendation and are also made publicly available.

Only the Members’ first or updated responses are available in the zip files for any given year.

Survey and Responses pursuant to the 2019 Recommendation

Bribery Survey to monitor the 2019 Recommendation

Survey and Responses pursuant to the 2006 Recommendation

Bribery Survey to monitor the 2006 Recommendation

 

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