13 April 2010
The World Bank Access to Information Working Group and its seven subgroups will provide information about how the policy is being implemented, encouraging civil society to monitor and help.
The new Access to Information Policy, approved at the end of 2009, will be effective July 1st, 2010. To facilitate the transition to the new policy, the Bank embarked on the development of a detailed implementation plan upon the approval of the new policy. An Access to Information Working Group (AIWG) was established under the supervision of the External Affairs vice presidency of the Bank with the mandate to set all needed plans. The AIWG is composed of seven sub-groups, each in charge of a special task. The groups and their tasks are:
- The policy/handbook subgroup: writing the policy statement, guidelines and work follows (Handbook) to staff.
- The classification subgroup: set criteria for classification and de-classification of Bank’s documents.
- The information services subgroup (ISG): coordinate IT and other means of distributing information to different offices.
- The communication subgroup: set plans to ensure that both Bank’s staff and external stakeholders understand the policy and its requirements.
- The training subgroup: develop the needed training programs to ensure proper implementation of the policy.
- The translation subgroup: examine the existing Bank’s translation framework and determine the needed resources to ensure that certain Bank documents are accessible to citizens who are not necessarily fluent in English.
- The public information subgroup: set plans to strengthen public information services and access to information on the ground.
In addition, the communication, training, and public information subgroups will work as one unified group on common areas.
Recognizing civil society as an important beneficiary targeted by this disclosure of information policy, the Bank, in a historic move, invited civil society to sit at the table and provide inputs in setting the implementation plans for this new policy. A team of representatives of three organizations, Bank Information Center (BIC), International Budget Partnership (IBP), and Centro de Derechos Humanos y Ambiente (CEDHA) of Argentina, meets regularly with the Access to Information Working Group (AIWG) general secretariat as well as with individual subgroups as needed. The World Bank believes these three organizations, through their experiences on the ground, wide networks and outreach to civil society groups in many developing countries, can make substantive contributions in many areas, especially the translation and communications-training-public information sub-groups. The three organizations plan to seek inputs from their partners in the different regions of the world on different issues. They believe this will enable them to be better seated as representing a wider cross-section of civil society groups from developing countries when they provide advice to the Bank’s AIWG.
BIC also receives weekly updates from the AIWG that we will start sharing on our website. If you have any questions or comments on these updates or concerns or inputs that might be helpful for the AIWG please contact Amy Ekdawi at .
aiwg updates
- June 29, 2010
- June 18, 2010
- June 11, 2010
- June 4, 2010
- May 28, 2010
- May 21, 2010
- May 14, 2010
- April 30, 2010
- April 23, 2010
- April 5, 2010
- March 26, 2010