As the International Finance Corporation, the private sector arm of the World Bank, announces plans to increase investment in agribusiness by up to 30 per cent in the next three years, NGO reports shed light on the IFC's role in 'land grabs' and flaws in its approach to the food crisis.
Human rights
Rights
Commentary
The IFC and incorporation of rights into its performance standards
A submission to the U.N. Special Representative to the Secretary General on Human Rights and Transnational Corporations and Other Business Enterprises, John Ruggie, highlights that the International Finance Corporation's performance standards, meant to serve as environmental and social safeguards in World Bank private sector lending, still lack substantive inclusion of human rights and are therefore inconsistent with Ruggie's framework. Furthermore, civil society has raised concerns about a 3 ye
Accountability
Background
Safeguard policies and performance standards
Originally drafted as internal operational policies to guide staff, World Bank safeguard policies evolved after pressure from environmental and social groups in the 1980s and were first officially implemented in 1998. They aim to protect people and the environment from the adverse effects of Bank-financed operations and are based on international agreements, even if these protections are not explicitly provided for in the borrower country's national law.
Rights
News
Good cop, bad cop?
There has been significant concern about IMF programmes in Honduras, where the IMF has not made clear whether it will deal with coup leaders who seized power from the elected president, and in Sri Lanka due to concern over allegations that the government is abusing the human rights of hundreds of thousands of Tamils.
Rights
News
Inspection Panel raps World Bank in Ghana
A complaint to the World Bank Inspection Panel by the NGO, Centre on Housing Rights and Evictions (COHRE), on behalf of the Agyemankata community has resulted in a report confirming violations of Bank policies on forced evictions and environmental hazards related to a planned landfill near Accra, Ghana.
Gender
News
Will rights and gender be at the heart of World Bank's climate response?
Initially flagged as a global environmental problem, increasing attention is being drawn to the impacts climate change has on human rights and equity related issues such as gender, as well as the World Bank's role in tackling them.
Accountability
Background
IFC and broad community support
Minutes of a session hosted by the IFC at the World Bank spring meetings, April 23, 2009
Rights
News
New book examines human rights and holding the Bank to account
The World Bank's responsibility to respect, protect and fulfill human rights has long been a topic of concern. With the release of a new book Global Poverty, Ethics and Human Rights: The role of multilateral organizations by Desmond McNeill and Asuncion Lera St. Clair, this discourse has once again been revisited.
Environment
News
Karachaganak: IFC still out of compliance
The International Financial Corporation is still out of compliance more than 6 months after findings by the Office of Compliance, Advisor/Ombudsman (CAO) found it to have disregarded its own regulation of toxic chemical emissions at Karachaganak Oil and Condensation Field in Western Kazakhstan.
Rights
News
Bank falls foul of Inspection Panel
Inspection Panel reports relating to Albania and Uganda expose World Bank non-compliance in a number of areas. These findings are compounded by allegations of corruption and the obstruction of the Inspection Panel investigation.
Featured briefings
6 April 2022
The Bretton Woods Observer: Spring 2022
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The Bretton Woods Observer: Winter 2021
8 November 2021
IMF surveillance and climate change transition risks
New briefing by ActionAid USA and the Bretton Woods Project highlights research showing that IMF policy advice has undermined a just energy transition since the Paris Agreement was signed.