The World Bank and Other Financial Institutions
“Poverty alleviation,” “sustainability,” “prosperity” and "development" are key words in the public relations materials of the World Bank, its private arm, the International Financial Corporation (IFC), and other development finance agencies. In reality, the policies, programmes and projects promoted by these institutions have time and again caused more poverty, violence and forest destruction.
This article is about how so-called ‘development cooperation’ hides, and grants legitimacy to, an agenda of dispossession and capitalist expansion; and how this ‘cooperation’ actually co-opts the political agenda of grassroots movements.
We call on organizations to sign this open letter before this Friday 6th of November!!!
On the eve of the International Day of Struggle against Monoculture Tree Plantations, an open letter signed by more than 730 members of Mozambican communities, and 120 organizations from 40 countries has been released.
This Open Letter is a public reply from the Alert against the Green Desert Network from Brazil and WRM to an email from the investment department of the HSBC bank in the USA, requesting more information regarding the Suzano paper and pulp corporation in Brazil.
Sign this letter to alert people in the global North! Stop development agencies from promoting expansion of large-scale tree plantations.
That is the message from more than 80 organisations to the GCF Board on 17 August 2020. The organisations call on the Board to reject in particular two requests for so-called “Results-Based Payments” for deforestation supposedly reduced years ago.
We invite organisations to sign until Monday, 17 August. The letter urges the GCF Board to reject in particular two requests for so-called “Results-Based Payments” from the goverments of Indonesia and Colombia.
Communities have a long history of confronting the disasters imposed by corporations and elites. For them, the “emergency” was a reality well before the Covid-19 pandemic. Yet, profit-seekers are abusing the situation to advance land grabs and roll back legislation.
Agro- and meat industries are winning the jackpot with the Covid-19 pandemic. While the pandemic profits stay at the top, devastation is what trickles down to the bottom. The consequences are deadly. A new wave of structural adjustment is on the way that will focus on increasing foreign agribusiness investment and exports of agricultural commodities.
The environmental, climatic and social crisis has been a reality for many for a long time. Yet, rather than acknowledging their contribution to this crisis, corporations and allies use the pandemic to amplify their push to expand Protected Areas, presenting it as a "global solution".
When the Chure region was declared a Protected Area, the rights of thousands of Community Forest Groups were undermined. They keep resisting despite the overall violence and the accepted project from the Green Climate Fund.
On 11 March 2020, the Board of the Green Climate Fund (GCF) approved a requests from the Arbaro Fund for USD 25 million to set up industrial tree plantations in seven countries in Africa and Latin America.