Philippines second in budget transparency in Southeast Asia

The Philippines slipped nine notches to place 19th out of 120* countries in the 2021 edition of the biennial Open Budget Survey by the nonprofit International Budget Partnership. The survey examines countries on their level of accountability in national budget processes based on public participation, budget oversight, and transparency (also known as Open Budget Index or OBI). With an OBI score of 68 out of 100, the Philippines was the second in budget transparency in Southeast Asia, trailing behind Indonesia (70 out of 100, 17th overall). It was also above the global average OBI score of 45.