On November 14, 2021, the Institute for Development of Freedom of Information (IDFI) conducted training on effective oversight, data extraction methods and the data visualization for participants of the Certification Program in Fighting Corruption.

Over the past years, journalists and watchdogs have played a crucial role in detecting the corruption chains and the prevention of elite corruption. The urgency of the issue has grown due to outstanding interest from journalists and activists themselves.

The training held in the framework of the project “Empowered Civil Society and Enhanced Beneficial Ownership Transparency Standards for Good Governance“ aimed to build capacity for effective oversight by journalists, civil rights activists, and civil society representatives. Regarding the certificate course, the Institute for Development of Freedom of Information (IDFI) started implementing of the Certification Program in 2019 aimed at harnessing the power of participants against corruption, and developing tools to reduce corruption effectively.

The participants had the opportunity to obtain comprehensive information on vital issues in the context of the transparency of Beneficial ownership, as well as familiarize themselves with international platforms for investigative/data journalists and watchdogs. Furthermore, the training included practical tips and recommendations – detection of public procurement fraud, budget spending and oversight, extraction of knowledge from open government data, and more.

The training was conducted by the Local Government/Internet and Innovations Directions Head of IDFI, Teona Turashvili, and, IDFI analysts Mariam Gogiashvili and Gvantsa Nikuradze; the training was held with the financial support of the Visegrad Fund.