Over the last few years significant new oil and natural gas reserves have been discovered in East and West Africa, as well as in the Eastern Mediterranean, the Caribbean and the Asia-Pacific region. These recent discoveries have very quickly added several new countries to the ranks of the world’s oil- and gas-producing nations, and these emerging oil and gas producers have shown a strong interest in receiving advice on governance. They are keen to avoid the mistakes that have led to accountability failures in other more established producers, and which have prevented some producers from reaping the full economic benefits of their resources. While emerging oil and gas producers can learn from the experiences of leading national operators worldwide, capacity constraints often inhibit their ability to implement international best practice. New or emerging producers have limited experience of managing petroleum resources, and many must make petroleum policy decisions without a prior clear knowledge of the size of their resource base. Thus, instead of encouraging emerging producers to pursue best practice standards, it may be more helpful to advise them to aim for more appropriate practice, which acknowledges the realities of the national context, moreeffective practice, which seeks to bring about rapid results in a context of urgent need, or better practice, which aims at incremental improvement of governance processes through aspirational but achievable milestones. As capacity grows and greater revenues begin to flow, these producers will need to adjust their methods and institutions to promote evolving (and ever higher) standards of good governance.