Memorandum submitted by the Forest Peoples
Programme
The Forest Peoples Programme is a specialist
NGO set up to support the rights of forest-dwellers in forestry,
conservation and development activities.
As part of its work on securing the rights of
indigenous peoples in multilateral and bilateral development projects,
in April 2003, the FPP co-organised an international workshop
on Indigenous Peoples, Extractive Industries and the World Bank
in Oxford as part of the focussed research commissioned by the
World Bank's Extractive Industries Review, which is coming to
a close at the end of this year. The workshop drew on seven case
studies prepared by indigenous communities affected by World Bank
policies and projects in Colombia, Cameroon, India, Papua New
Guinea, the Philippines, Russian Federation and Indonesia. Thirteen
community representatives presented their own studies and experiences
directly to the EIR Eminent Person in the workshop, which aimed
to evaluate the impact of the World Bank's involvement in the
extractive industries on indigenous communities, and to assess
whether the World Bank Group should continue its involvement in
this sector. The results of the case studies and workshop have
been compiled in the attached document "Extracting Promises:
Indigenous Peoples, the Extractive Industries and the World Bank".
The findings of this independent study show
that World Bank Group loan operations for the extractives sector
that affect indigenous lands have consistently failed to implement
the Bank's own weak safeguard policy framework—let alone
international human rights standards. It further shows that the
Bank routinely violates voluntary best practice standards—such
as the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises. The systematic
failure of the Bank to deal with social and environmental issues
effectively means that indigenous peoples' human rights are often
violated and projected-affected communities typically find themselves
worse off as a result of Bank-assisted investments in the extractive
sector.
The studies also show that much of the World
Bank's upstream policy work on extractive industries through Technical
Assistance Loans and policy-based lending has lacked transparency
and resulted in national policies that increase extractive pressure
on indigenous lands against their wishes and to their detriment[66]
Indigenous peoples' and other social organisations complain that
these upstream technical interventions are largely unaccountable
to rights holders and citizens within borrower countries as they
are mainly undertaken by Bank staff and consultants with little
or no public participation.
The workshop also highlighted that although
the Bank's loans for extractive investments risk causing serious
adverse impacts on the rights and welfare of affected communities,
this intergovernmental body still refuses to condition Bank funding
on borrower countries' adherence to those international human
rights treaties they have already ratified. It has likewise refused
to adopt standards to ensure that indigenous peoples should not
be involuntarily removed from their lands to make way for development.
Given the weakness of its safeguards, its institutionalised opposition
to invoking binding human rights standards, the way it routinely
flouts its own procedures and the unaccountable nature of its
upstream operations, the indigenous authors of the case studies
concluded that the World Bank should not be involved in the Extractive
Industries Sector. Many rights holders and social movements in
developing countries support this conclusion. They oppose further
reengagement of the World Bank Group in the extractive sector
unless or until it addresses in good faith outstanding public
concerns on both fundamental global policy and standards issues,
and on specific grievances linked to past and present Bank-assisted
projects and programmes[67]
Even though grassroots case studies, declarations
of indigenous peoples' organisations, statements by social movements
and academic studies all challenge the arguments for further Bank
support for extractive industries, the UK government in its recent
submission to the Bank's Extractive Industries Review: "encourage[s]
the World Bank to ... continue to engage with the extractives
sector ..."[68]
The UK government submission focuses on the potential benefits
of Bank engagement with the extractive sector, while only brief
mention is made regarding the serious negative impacts of extractive
industry operations on "culture, health, livelihood and environment"
(paras 17 and 32).
Other than a restricted comment on rights in
relation to small scale miners (paras 44 and 45), impacts on human
rights are not discussed anywhere in the nine-page government
submission. This shortcoming is surprising given that the UK government
has publicly adopted a rights-based approach to development[69]
In its submission to the EIR, DfID proposes
that social and environmental issues in Bank-financed extractive
operations should be dealt with through upstreaming of safeguard
issues in Bank policies and programmes. It explicitly endorses
what it describes as the World Bank's "new framework"
for safeguard policies, which proposes this "upstreaming"
approach. However, at this time, such proposals for a new framework
only form part of a pilot approach for dealing with safeguard
issues[70]
This polite approach, which remains the subject of public consultations,
is currently causing serious concern among civil society organisations
and NGOs that track Bank policies and projects.
These organisations argue that the proposed
new framework risks undermining the accountability of the World
Bank as social and environmental concerns are "upstreamed
to nowhere", while project-related standards are diluted,
made optional or eliminated altogether[71]
In other words, there is no consensus on this controversial pilot
approach to safeguard issues and there are serious doubts about
its capacity to improve social and environmental performance and
make the Bank more accountable. DfID has been informed on numerous
occasions of civil society concerns about safeguard issues and
on the need to maintain binding operational standards in Bank
social and environmental policies. It is therefore disturbing
to note that these concerns are not clearly acknowledged by the
UK government.
The UK government's assertion in its submission
to the EIR that: "the World Bank Group is well-positioned
to act as a broker between the private sector, NGOs, civil society,
governments and other development agencies" (para 22) is
also seriously problematic. Most grassroots organisations and
social movements in the South do not trust the Bank as an honest
broker. This general lack of trust in the World Bank is precisely
why external rights holders and campaigners had called for an
independent review of the extractives sector in the first place.
These serious shortcomings in the position taken
and recommendations made by the UK government to the EIR raise
several questions.
Questions to Secretary of State:
— did DfID consult with rights holders
and poor people about their priorities and recommendations regarding
future World Bank engagement with the extractives sector? How
are the views and priorities of these rights holders and citizens
taken into account in DfID's advice to the EIR;
— does the new Secretary of State for
International Development find that the position adopted by DfID
is based on clear evidence that the Bank's previous support for
extractive industries has actually helped reduce poverty? Can
the Department point to specific examples where this is demonstrably
the case;
— in accordance with its rights-based
approach for development and in view of the tragic record of human
rights violations in extractive industry investments, will the
UK government recommend that the World Bank Group must require
borrowers' and clients' adherence to international human rights
standards;
— in relation to indigenous peoples,
will the UK government support the draft recommendation of the
EIR report that the Bank should not fund extractive investments
until its Operational Policy on Indigenous Peoples is revised
in a manner acceptable to indigenous peoples themselves?
October 2003
66 Caruso, E et al (2003) Extracting Promises
at pages 52-57. Back
67
See, for example, multiple submissions to the EIR made by indigenous
peoples' organisations and Southern and Northern civil society
organisations at: http://www.eireview.org/eir/eirhome.nsf/EnglishOtherLinks/Civil+Society?opendocument. Back
68
The UK Government's Submission to the World Bank's Extractive
Industries Review, September 2003-sent to with a cover letter
signed by Valerie Amos and dated 13 September 2003. Back
69
DfID (2000) Realising Human Rights for Poor People DfID,
Glasgow and London. Back
70
World Bank (2002) Safeguard Policies: framework for improving
development effectiveness: a discussion note ESSD and OPC,
World Bank, 7 October 2002, Washington DC. Back
71
See, for example, Bretton Woods Project (2003) At Issue-World
Bank social and environmental policies: abandoning responsibilities
BWP, September 2003-see http://www.brettonwoodsproject.org. EIR
Draft Report, 16 October 2003 at section 4.3.1. Back
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