15 September 1999
On 15 August the Chinese Government arrested three people for trying to investigate the World Bank Western Poverty Project.
A report launched in June condemns World Bank support for medical waste incineration.
The World Bank’s Operations Evaluation Department is carrying out a review of “Promoting Environmental Sustainability in Development”.
Ann Simpson, head of the World Bank’s new corporate governance initiative, explained her plans to UK NGOs in August.
On 1 July the Bank held an informal Board seminar to discuss “governance indicators”.
Indian NGO INTACH has been studying the likely impact of the World Bank-supported expansion of coal mining in Bihar on wild tigers.
In July some NGOs received letters from Maninder Gill at the World Bank seeking comments on the proposed conversion of its Operational Directive (OD) on Resettlement.
In August the IMF produced a “question and answer” paper on its Enhanced Structural Adjustment Facility.
The Bank is about to start a review of information disclosure.
The Bank’s NGO Unit has commissioned a needs assessment of communications strategies between the World Bank and Civil Society Organizations (CSOs).
The regional consultations that will inform the World Bank’s forest policy review have had to be delayed; they will not start until February or March 2000.
The Bank’s World Development Report 1999-2000, due out in mid-September, will examine globalization, localization, urbanization, and environmental change, presenting their implications for institutions and for policy.
The Bretton Woods Project has received copies of draft papers by two academics critically querying the World Bank’s claims to have become a “knowledge bank”.
A dozen major international dam-building companies involved in the World Bank-funded Lesotho Highlands Water Project (LHWP) have lavishly bribed a top official on the project, allegedly giving nearly US$2 million in bribes over ten years.
US NGO grouping InterAction is reviewing Bank social assessments.
UK NGO Christian Aid has begun a research project on the role of civil society groups in Consultative Group and Round Table donor coordination and planning bodies.
In late August India’s central bank chief told a meeting of bankers in Sri Lanka that the voting structure of international funding agencies should be changed to reflect the economic strengths of developing nations.
The Financial Times reported in July that World Bank East Asia Vice President Jean-Michel Severino admitted that the Bank and other organisations had been naive about the benefits of private infrastructure.
The Bretton Woods Project will run an electronic conference to discuss the first draft of the World Bank’s Poverty World Development Report.
Relations between the Bank and the government of Papua New Guinea were strained in July by the government’s decision to issue bonds to raise money from the private sector.
NGO preparations are already underway for the World Bank’s 2000 annual meetings.
Over a year after it was due to come out and after initial consultations were held with NGOs, the Department for International Development (DFID) has still not published its Institutional Strategy Paper on the World Bank Group.
UK MPs on the International Development Committee took evidence from Myles Wickstead, UK Alternate Director at the World Bank, plus senior DFID officials.
After 5 years of preparation the World Bank and IFC have jointly published a Pollution Prevention and Abatement Handbook.
Contact the Bretton Woods Project for copies.
At the end of June IUCN and the World Bank signed a Memorandum of Understanding to formalize their partnership agreement.
The Bank’s paper on best practices for implementing the social principles will be discussed by the Board on 10 September.
The World Bank Board recently agreed that the Bank can extend its partial credit guarantee instrument to cover structural and social policy reforms.
In June the World Bank agreed to step up cooperation with the International Chamber of Commerce to boost the private sector, trade and investment in the Bank’s member countries.
The Asian Development Bank Institute (ADBI), led by its new head Masaru Yoshitomi, has mounted an attack on the IMF’s use of conventional policies for dealing with the crisis in Asia and plans to hold meetings and seminars to challenge the IMF’s approach at the Bank/Fund annual meetings.
Wolfensohn’s Comprehensive Development Framework, which aims to make the World Bank more responsive to different policy proposals, and encourage long-term, integrated decision-making, is now being piloted in 12 countries.
In July, rising transport and fuel prices in Ecuador led to strikes and public protests, and an up-rising by thousands of indigenous people who are also concerned about privatisation plans.
In late August Colombian labour unions began an indefinite national strike in protest at the government’s political, social, and economic agenda and calling on the government to declare a moratorium on the payment of its internal and external debt.
Last year the World Bank lent billions of dollars to Brazil, claiming that they would support social safety-nets during the financial crisis.
The International NGO Forum on Indonesian Development (INFID) has criticised the Bank and Fund for failing to properly supervise the use of loan funds which were intended to help refinance the shattered banking sector.
Massacres perpetrated and condoned by the Indonesian army have led to calls to halt World Bank and IMF aid programmes to Indonesia.
The FBI and US Congress are investigating allegations that the Bank of New York, the Republic National Bank and other Western financial institutions were involved in laundering IMF loans siphoned out of Russia by the mafia helped by top Kremlin officials.
The IMF has agreed to lend US$7.32 bn to the Zimbabwean government despite continued concerns about corruption in the land reform process; the cost of supporting Zimbabwean troops in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC); a planned privatisation of the Hwange power plant; and the reintroduction of price controls.
Indonesian NGOs, concerned about the spread of oil palm plantations since the onslaught of the crisis, have formed “Sawat (Oil Palm) Watch”.
African NGOs met in Nairobi in August to discuss and formulate an Africa Consensus on economic and social development to challenge the Washington Consensus.
The UK International Development Select Committee of MPs has criticised the IMF and Bank for failing to raise concerns with the Rwandan government about the discrimination and intimidation of Tutsis prior to the civil war.
The Bretton Woods Project recently obtained two documents in which the World Bank evaluates progress of its Strategic Compact internal reform initiative and sets out strategy for the next few years.
Many NGOs wrote to the Bank raising questions about the proposed Prototype Carbon Fund, adopted by the Board in July.
The World Bank held its first Annual Bank Conference on Development Economics - Europe this June in Paris.
The World Bank is considering setting up new fora to discuss issues of global importance which are not being effectively handled by existing national or international mechanisms.
The Interim Committee is likely to change its name to the “International Monetary and Finance Committee”.
The IMF, which monitors all its members’ economies through its Article IV consultation process, is not content with monitoring the codes on fiscal policy, corporate governance and monetary policy.
EarthRights International examines how the Jam v. IFC case has helped to shift the landscape of accountability for international financial institutions by successfully challenging their claim to “absolute” immunity in US courts, potentially opening IFC up to further legal challenges in future.
