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Bretton Woods Update 13

  • Jun 1999
  • Past Issues

IFI governance

News

Bank study finds adjustment impact studies inadequate

15 June 1999

A leaked May 1999 draft Bank review of structural and sectoral adjustment loans severely criticises their treatment of environmental and social issues.

Environment

News

CASE studies start

The Bank’s Environment Department is working with its country teams to develop “best practice” on greening Country Assistance Strategies (CASs).

15 June 1999

Land

News

Indonesian farmers criticise Bank project

The Yayasan Duta Awam Foundation (YDA) has conducted a 15 month grassroots investigation of the Bank-financed Integrated Swamps Development Project.

15 June 1999

Infrastructure

News

Chad-Cameroon discussions reach peak

The Bank is due to decide in the next few weeks whether to support the Chad-Cameroon oil pipeline.

15 June 1999

IFI governance

News

Bank health loans fail check-up

The World Bank’s Operations Evaluation Unit recently criticised Bank loans for Health, Nutrition and Population (HNP).

15 June 1999

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Accountability

News

15 June 1999

Curbing corruption

IMF policies have exacerbated corruption according to a Christian Aid briefing on new approaches to debt relief.

Knowledge

News

15 June 1999

Implementing the Bank’s new “Comprehensive Framework”

The Bank has established a secretariat to coordinate work on the Comprehensive Development Framework (CDF), the initiative on donor coordination and integrated analysis launched in January.

Private Sector

News

15 June 1999

Elections “don’t matter”: says Indonesia fund manager

Foreigners may not know much about these parties, they may not care much, but at the end of the day it doesn’t really matter who wins as long as the IMF and World Bank are still calling the shots.

Accountability

News

15 June 1999

Indonesian NGOs criticise safety net, oppose new loans

In response to concerns that ruling party Golkar would misuse World Bank funds for election purposes, the Bank and IMF agreed in May to put new loans into a special Bank of Indonesia account.

Knowledge

News

15 June 1999

Absolute poverty rising: targets doubtful

New World Bank estimates suggest that 1.5bn people live in abject poverty, up from 1.

Knowledge

News

15 June 1999

New Bank wisdom on economic crises

The Bank has identified 5 main ways in which macroeconomic crises affect the poor.

Finance

News

15 June 1999

New IMF credit plan too harsh

The IMF’s Contingency Credit Line (CCL), agreed during the Spring meetings, will not help developing countries facing financial crisis because the qualification conditions are too demanding.

Finance

News

15 June 1999

G7 agree crisis mechanisms

G7 finance ministers have agreed a framework to include the private sector in future crisis bailouts.

Social services

News

15 June 1999

Lack of commitment for Social Principles

The Social Principles, proposed last autumn by UK Chancellor Gordon Brown as the “fourth pillar” of the international architecture, are likely to prove ineffective.

IFI governance

News

15 June 1999

IMF voting reform examined

A small committee has been set up to investigate whether to reform the IMF’s formula for allocating votes between countries on its Board.

IFI governance

News

15 June 1999

Instituting IMF evaluation

Two more external evaluations of the IMF’s activities are about to be completed.

Rights

News

15 June 1999

IMF transparency improved

The IMF has outlined a new information policy.

Finance

News

15 June 1999

ESAF reforms to focus on poverty eradication

Clare Short, UK Secretary of State for International Development, has called in parliament for the reform of the IMF’s ESAF loans to make them pro-poor.

Social services

News

15 June 1999

Little new in IMF/WB pilots

Several of the pilot ESAF collaboration studies between the IMF and world Bank are in trouble, and new countries may need to be selected.

IFI governance

News

15 June 1999

Board approves Inspection Panel changes

In late April, after a contentious internal review, the World Bank Board approved changes to its Inspection Panel, the forum for citizen complaints about Bank-financed projects that harm people and the environment.

Land

News

15 June 1999

Brazilian land claim fails

Brazilian NGOs’ Panel claim with the Panel about the C

Infrastructure

News

15 June 1999

Energy policy crunch in July

The World Bank’s energy policy paper will come to the Board on 20 July, following two and a half years of discussions.

IFI governance

News

15 June 1999

World Bank reports on successes and future tasks

The Bank’s External Affairs team recently published a 14 page document summarising progress during Wolfensohn’s time as President.

IFI governance

News

15 June 1999

Reinventing the World Bank

In May Northwestern University, Chicago, and SOAS, London, organised a meeting to examine the World Bank’s mission, operations and research output.

Environment

News

15 June 1999

New report on problems with forest policy reform

The World Rainforest Movement and Environmental Defense Fund have produced a briefing on the World Bank’s Forest Policy Review and Strategy Development process.

Conditionality

News

15 June 1999

Forest conditionality explored

A new paper from the World Resources Institute examines the World Bank’s use of adjustment lending to promote policy reform for favourable environmental outcomes.

Knowledge

News

15 June 1999

WDR to tackle trade, finance, global environment

The World Bank’s 1999/2000 World Development Report, due for release in September, will contain much material of interest to NGOs working on international policy issues.

IFI governance

News

15 June 1999

World Bank appoints senior policy compliance advisor

The World Bank Group has appointed the first IFC/MIGA Compliance Advisor/Ombudsperson.

Private Sector

News

15 June 1999

MIGA policies finalised

In May the Board of Directors of MIGA, the World Bank Group’s private sector risk guarantee arm, agreed new policies and procedures.

IFI governance

News

15 June 1999

Bank hires UK corporate governance expert

This summer Anne Simpson will leave Pensions and Investment Research Consultants to develop the World Bank’s corporate governance strategy for the private sector.

Trade

News

15 June 1999

Research chief slammed for WTO role

NGOs at the WTO High Level Symposium on Trade and Development in March signed a statement expressing outrage at the way that Paul Collier (Director, Development Research Group, World Bank) chaired the session on “Linkages between trade and development policies”.

News

15 June 1999

Daily Bank press listings

To keep in touch with world press coverage of the World Bank, you can subscribe to the World Bank External Affairs Department’s free daily email Development News clippings service.

News

15 June 1999

Update error on IMF staff

The Bretton Woods Update (March 1999) reported that the 2 social advisors recently appointed to the IMF were being funded by the Department for International Development (DFID).

Social services

News

15 June 1999

IMF/WHO collaboration

IMF staff have met Dr Bruntland, head of the World Health Organisation, to identify mechanisms for IMF-WHO collaboration.

Knowledge

News

15 June 1999

Bank hosts e-discussions

The World Bank has recently been inviting NGOs to engage in a large number of electronic discussions on its website “Development Forum”.

Gender

News

15 June 1999

Gender policy paper progress

Next year the World Bank will produce a Policy Research Report (PRR) on Gender Development.

Conditionality

News

15 June 1999

Initiative changes

The G7 have agreed changes to the Heavily Indebted Poor Country Debt Initiative which will impose more conditionality in return for earlier relief from interest payments.

Environment

News

15 June 1999

Bolivia-Brazil Pipeline

The details of ensuring implementation of World Bank operational policies are explored in a recent report from the Bank Information Center.

Rights

News

15 June 1999

Poverty project endangers Tibetans

In early June the World Bank rushed to defend the proposed China Western Poverty Project from charges that it would disrupt the lives of ethnic Tibetans and had undergone too limited environmental scrutiny.

Rights

News

15 June 1999

Bank specialist assesses NGO networks

Kathy Bain, Latin America civil society specialist at the World Bank, has written a draft paper on The Accountability of Trans-National NGO Networks in Policy Alliances with the World Bank.

IFI governance

News

15 June 1999

New Bank NGO chief unveils plans

This spring Willy Reuben left a Costa Rican NGO to join the World Bank as head of its NGO Unit.

Social services

News

15 June 1999

Education Now

Oxfam International (OI) has launched a new campaign, Education Now: Break the Cycle of Poverty, calling for high-quality universal primary education by 2015.

 More news

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The Bretton Woods Project is a UK-based NGO that challenges the World Bank and IMF and promotes alternative approaches. We serve as an information provider, watchdog, networker and advocate. Our flagship publications are the Bretton Woods Observer, a quarterly critical review of developments at the World Bank and IMF, the Dispatch, a biannual analysis of the World Bank and IMF Spring and Annual Meetings, and the NewsLens, a bi-weekly roundup of key news and critical viewpoints published about the World Bank and IMF.

The Bretton Woods Project is an ActionAid hosted project (UK registered charity no. 274467).

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