Marcus Colchester
Forest Peoples Programme

Based on the teleconference held on 9 November 2000, the Focus Group appears to have agreed to propose the inclusion of the following safeguard elements in the new Forest Policy:

• The safeguard policy applies to all members of the World Bank Group
• The policy also applies to structural adjustment lending, ESW and CAS
• Extend the proscription on Bank financing of logging to all old growth forests (boreal temperate, tropical dry and tropical wet) unless acceptable country-level exercises have been carried out to zone High Conservation Value Forests (HCVF).
• Include an outright ban on negative impacts in forests defined as HCVF.
• In accordance with the precautionary principle, all old growth forests are considered HCVF unless established otherwise, with demonstrable public acceptance, through inclusive and open processes of participation.
• Condition Bank support for operations in non-HCVFs on internationally accepted certification standards
• Any proposed Bank-funded logging operation would need to be sustainable at the stand level, meaning FSC or equivalent
• Any proposed Bank-funded logging operation should only take place in any particular forest ecosystem if a viable, ecologically representative protected area network exists for that particular ecosystem
• Any proposed Bank-funded logging operation would have to demonstrate clear poverty alleviation benefits and local benefit sharing
• Any proposed Bank-funded logging operation would have to include some form of corporate code of conduct (or performance bond or some other mechanism) to ensure that there were not corrupt practices
• Secure the tenure rights of forest-dwellers as a precondition to Bank operations affecting forests
• Ensure inclusive and participatory decision-making
• Ensure borrower or client adoption of policies and an institutional framework consistent with sustainability
• Ensure borrower or client adoption of a participatory approach to the management of natural forests
• Ensure adequate provisions to safeguard the interests of local people, including forest dwellers and indigenous peoples
• Improved monitoring and evaluation
• Establish adequate enforcement mechanisms.
• The Bank does not finance projects that contravene applicable international environmental and human rights agreements.

Definitions:

High Conservation Value Forests are defined as:

‘those that possess one or more of the following attributes:

1. forest areas fundamental to meeting basic needs of local communities (e.g.  subsistence, health) and/or critical to local communities’ traditional cultural  identity (areas of cultural, economic or religious significance)
2. forest areas that provide basic services (e.g. watershed protection, erosion control) that are crucial and unable to be effectively replaced by other land cover.
3. forest areas containing globally, regionally or nationally significant concentrations of biodiversity and forest areas that are in or contain rare, threatened or endangered ecosystems.’

   ‘Such areas are to be determined locally through a consultation process and based on internationally accepted standards.’

Process of Consultation to ascertain HCVFs: (to be elaborated by Bruce)

The full participation of local peoples is agreed as being necessary. More details are set out in my second input.