About IATI

IATI aims to make information about aid spending easier to access, use and understand.

Its purpose is to help implement the transparency commitments made at the Accra Agenda for Action in the most consistent and coherent ways. The Accra Agenda for Action arose from the March 2005 Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness.

The Busan Outcome Document, entitled ‘Busan Partnership for Effective Development Co-operation‘ was released on 1st December 2011, at the Fourth High Level Forum in Busan, South Korea. This document outlines the concepts and commitments agreed upon by those involved in the Busan process.

Get involved in the initiative

IATI is a voluntary, multi-stakeholder initiative that includes donors, partner countries and CSOs (civil society organisations). Together, they support the IATI Accra Statement.

IATI has developed and agreed a common, open, international standard – the IATI standard. This sets guidelines for publishing information about aid spending. IATI will not create a new database. It will not replace work already being done, by organisations such as the OECD-Development Assistance Committee (DAC), to produce statistics about past aid flows and aid activities. Instead, the IATI standard builds on – and goes beyond – the standards and definitions that have already been agreed.

IATI aims to add value by agreeing standards for sharing information. This is so that aid information will be useful to all stakeholders, particularly those in developing countries. It will also make that information simpler and easier to understand, to compare, and to use.

Recent research shows that developing countries and their citizens face huge challenges in accessing information about aid flows and activities. IATI aims to address these challenges.

Working to implement the Accra Agenda for Action commitments on transparency, IATI stakeholders want, beginning now:

  • Donors to publicly disclose regular, detailed and timely information on:
    • volume
    • allocation and
    • results of development expenditure, when available

This will enable more accurate budgeting, accounting and auditing by developing countries.

  • Donors and developing countries to make public all conditions linked to disbursements.
  • Donors to provide full and timely information on annual commitments and actual disbursements. This will mean that developing countries can accurately record all aid flows in their budget estimates and accounting systems.
  • Donors to provide developing countries with regular and timely information on their rolling three‐ to five‐year forward expenditure and/or implementation plans. This will include, at least, indicative resource allocations. This means developing countries can integrate them into their medium‐term planning and macroeconomic frameworks. Donors will address any constraints to providing such information.

For further information on what IATI is aiming to achieve, see the FAQ section of this website.

IATI contributes to Cluster C of the OECD Development Assistance Committee’s Working Party on Aid Effectiveness on Transparent and Responsible Aid. The standards agreed through IATI will be used to inform the reporting formats and definitions for sharing aid information about aid that will be agreed through the Cluster. The OECD-DAC’s Working Party on Statistics (WP-STAT) will also be contributing their expertise to this task.