Anti-corruption was part of the World Economic Forum’s Annual Meeting 2015 in Davos.
The Partnering Against Corruption Initiative (PACI) is to expand the work of its PACI Vanguard group of chief executive officers in 2015, to help on the action plan created by the B20 Working Group on Anti-Corruption. The plan includes beneficial ownership, public procurement reform, anti-corruption enforcement, harmonizing legal frameworks and more collective action. Developers of this plan include the OECD, UNODC, Transparency International, the Basel Institute on Governance and other leaders in the anti-corruption arena.
David Seaton, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Fluor Corporation and Chair of the PACI Vanguard, said: “Since 2011, members of the B20 working groups have consolidated the priorities of business leadership into a compelling and far-reaching anti-corruption agenda, but there is a need to move from recommendations to implementation. It is our hope that a global challenge initiative focused on the implementation of these recommendations creates the enabling environment for key stakeholders to drive action and impact on a much broader scale.”
The PACI Vanguard comprises a group of CEOs from more than 100 companies that are PACI members. Since its inception in 2014, the Vanguard has worked on a global anti-corruption agenda like the B20 and G20 anti-corruption dialogues.
Elaine Dezenski, Head of the Forum’s Partnering Against Corruption Initiative, said: “A key pillar of the action plan will be to leverage the convening platform of the Forum to create alignment and synchronization across global implementation efforts. We have deep expertise and connection points within our PACI community of companies, together with partners in government and civil society. Our goal is to help bring all of this expertise to bear to address some very challenging problems.”
In the past year the group has seen a report on collective action efforts already being made by business from the infrastructure, real estate, engineering and construction industries. The report identifies corruption risks and highlights an industry survey of 50 leading companies that led to a set of specific recommendations on how to level the playing field. Closer interaction between business and government, higher transparency in public procurement and permitting and licensing will be the focus in 2015, according to the group.
The project is the second of its kind from the World Economic Forum and PACI, which last year gathered business leaders from the aviation and travel industry to address the same issue.
Co-Chairs of the Annual Meeting 2015 were: Hari S. Bhartia, Co-Chairman and Founder, Jubilant Bhartia Group, India; Winnie Byanyima, Executive Director, Oxfam International, United Kingdom; Katherine Garrett-Cox, Chief Executive Officer and Chief Investment Officer, Alliance Trust, United Kingdom; Young Global Leader Alumnus; Jim Yong Kim, President, The World Bank, Washington DC; Eric Schmidt, Executive Chairman, Google, USA; and Roberto Egydio Setubal, Chief Executive Officer and Vice-Chairman of the Board of Directors, Itaú Unibanco, Brazil.
