Today the commitments of countries participating in the Open Government Partnership (OGP) initiative were released on the newly launched website.

The UK has set an important precedent in committing to publish aid information ‘from all government departments who spend overseas development assistance (ODA) in line with the International Aid Transparency Initiative (IATI) standards, extending coverage to other departments in addition to the Department for International Development (DFID). Within 12 months, we will have agreed a clear timetable for publication of aid information with relevant departments.’

(From section: ‘Overseas development aid: transparency and accountability’)

The UK have been leading on aid transparency in signing the International Aid Transparency Initiative (IATI) and being the first aid donor to publish aid information to the IATI registry in February 2011. They are now continuing their leadership, showing that for true transparency to be achieved all aid flows should be published to the common international standard. Only when we have a big picture of what all aid donors are doing can we begin to ensure aid is spent to best effect.

Read the UK’s OGP commitments.