Ressources

FPP welcomed the opportunity during the 16th Session of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues to support IWGIA in raising important issues to the attention of the Forum regarding the issuance of waivers by the World Bank to key safeguard policies, including in the case of an investment into agricultural development in Tanzania.

A recent Position paper by the German Institute for Human Rights argues that the newly developed standards of the multilateral Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) and of the World Bank fall short in many respects of the human rights commitments that the Federal Government has imposed on itself. If Germany wishes to achieve the objectives it has set for itself, it will have to conduct its own human rights assessment of projects, and close monitoring of project implementation will be equally necessary.

On the 4th of August 2016, the Executive Board of the World Bank approved its new safeguard approach, detailed in a text called the ‘Environmental and Social Framework’.The Environmental and Social Framework (ESF) is intended to contribute to the so-called ‘twin goals’ of the Bank: eliminating extreme poverty and boosting shared prosperity. It defines the approach that the World Bank will take to assess and minimise negative impacts from World Bank investments, and promote social and environmental goods.

El 4 de agosto de 2016 el Directorio Ejecutivo del Banco Mundial aprobó su nuevo enfoque de las salvaguardias, detallado en un texto titulado Environmental and Social Framework (Marco Ambiental y Social).

Guest article from Helen Tugendhat in the Bretton Woods Project Observer regarding the World Bank’s decision to grant a waiver of OP4.10 for an agricultural investment project in Tanzania.

Indigenous rights experts have written to the World Bank President and Executive Board to underscore the importance of the World Bank adopting a standard of free, prior and informed consent for indigenous peoples potentially affected by development initiatives funded by the Bank. In the letter, the experts point out that the existing standard of Broad Community Support used by the Bank has failed to improve outcomes for development initiatives, and is a standard that is implemented ineffectively and inconsistently across the Bank’s portfolio. 

The holders of the UN Human Rights Council Special Mandates related to the rights of indigenous peoples have written to the President of the World Bank to reiterate their concerns about the use of the ill-defined term ‘broad community support’ in place of international standards requiring consent from indigenous peoples prior to projects that impact on their lands, lives, identities and resources.

Letter responding to consultation called on Development Policy Lending, an area of Bank financing that does not apply safeguards.Read the response in full here

Civil society organisations are expressing concern about the format of the third round of consultations for the World Bank safeguard review, requesting broad face-to-face consultations on specific issue areas as well as targeted consultations in Bank borrower countries.Download link

This week internal World Bank review documents identified serious shortcomings in the implementation, oversight and management of its resettlement policies and practices.

The World Bank is entering the final stages of reviewing its processes for assessing and managing social and environmental risk at a project level. Originally announced in 2011, consultations on the first draft close on March 1st 2015. The safeguard review process is then expected to come to an end at some point in 2015, after consultations on a second draft, and the new safeguard system to be enforced from January 2016.

El Banco Mundial se encuentra en  las últimas etapas de revisión de sus procesos para la evaluación y la gestión de los riesgos ambientales y sociales a nivel de proyecto. Anunciadas originalmente en 2011, las consultas sobre el primer borrador tienen como fecha límite el 1ero de marzo de 2015. Se espera entonces que el proceso de revisión de las salvaguardias termine en algún momento durante 2015, luego de realizar consultas sobre un segundo borrador, y que el nuevo sistema de salvaguardias sea respetado a partir de 2016.

The purpose of this submission is to highlight key issues for indigenous peoples in the new Environmental and Social safeguard system proposed by the World Bank. The policies referred to herein are the Environmental and Social Policy (ESP) and the Environmental and Social Standards (ESS), 1 through 10, with particular focus on ESS7 on indigenous peoples.

A compilation of a range of opinions from the members of the International Land Coalition regarding their analysis of the potential impact of the proposed changes to the World Bank Environmental and Social Framework on the situation of land tenure around the world.

The US Congress is putting new pressure on the World Bank to preserve its social and environmental rules for projects in developing countries amid fears that the emergence of rivals  backed by China may force it to weaken standards.The World Bank is next year expected to wrap up a review of its safeguards, which were introduced in the 1980s in response to criticism of environmental damage and rights violations linked to bank-funded megaprojects.

Tanzania indigenous organisations have written to the World Bank to express their concern at the overall weakening of the policy requirements for indigenous peoples in the draft of the proposed World Bank Environmental and Social Safeguards (ESS). Concerns include implications for the denial of the existence and rights of indigenous peoples under international human rights law, lack of meaningful and effective participation, forced eviction and lack of access to information.

A letter from the UN Special Rapporteurs to the World Bank critiquing the new proposed environmental and social safeguard framework.Read the letter here

Two years ago, the World Bank decided to undergo a review of its environmental and social policies. At the time when this process was launched, the Bank stated that the multi-stage review was being undertaken in response to the need "to better address environmental and social issues that countries face today, to deliver better environmental and social outcomes in the projects and programs the Bank supports."

360 civil society groups and indigenous peoples’ organisations have endorsed a statement warning the World Bank that the newly proposed safeguard system risks increasing the burden on vulnerable communities and undermining years of progressive developments in the recognition by financial institutions of the need to adhere to best standards in development.Click here to read the statement.

The Sengwer of Embobut Forest in the Cherangany Hills, Kenya, have - since January 2014 - been forced off their lands by armed Kenya Forest Service (KFS) guards, who have been burning all their homes to the ground. This has been despite an injunctive order in the High Court forbidding such action. Perhaps over 70% of the Sengwer have since returned to their lands, living in inadequate temporary shelters, and being harassed and arrested by KFS guards. '