In the News

Accountability Counsel’s Gregory Berry outlines the responses, concerns, and flaws of the newly announced European Sustainability Reporting Standards.

Yes, the World Bank should lead a transformation in development finance, but only if that transformation includes increased accountability to the communities it impacts.

An investigation into the IFC’s funding of Cambodia’s troubled microfinance sector has implications far beyond the country’s borders.

The Asian Development Bank’s ambitions have no chance of success without an increased commitment to safeguards and accountability, a new op-ed argues, because projects aimed at mitigating climate change can – and do – go wrong.

It has been a year since the CBIRC issued the Green Finance Guidelines, which stepped up requirements for Chinese banks and insurers to manage ESG risks, including by establishing complaint channels for affected communities. However, to date, no Chinese bank has launched a bank-level complaint mechanism or announced a plan for developing one.

As the Asian Development Bank (ADB) commemorates its 56th year of operations in Asia, the NGO Forum on ADB and its allies raised concerns about the potential dilution of key safeguard commitments.

Complainants coming forward are seeing their communities being uprooted to make way for things like new roads, dams, and power plants. They are often powerless compared to those who have a financial stake in the projects’ success, and many face harsh retaliation for speaking out.

This week, 4,577 individuals from around the world demanded that the International Finance Corporation guarantee justice for communities harmed by international development projects.

A delegation of the Region of Vinnytsia in Central Ukraine recently visited various agricultural and rural development projects and facilities in the Region of Lüneburg in Low Saxony, Germany, in order to gather ideas for recovery and reorientation of farming and food supply in times of war.

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation announced that it would spend a record $8.3 billion to respond to the compounding crises of war, climate change, stumbling economies, and infectious disease. Unfortunately, this increased spending has not been accompanied by an increased commitment to accountability.

An aggressive startup set out to disrupt African education, supported by social impact investors. Now it’s plagued by a sexual abuse investigation.

The IFC has released a new policy to govern how it responds when projects go wrong and seriously harm people or the environment, but advocates lambasted its “shocking” failure to go far enough or address past problems.

In tackling some of humanity’s most pressing crises, the next World Bank president must be an accountability champion. That means not only respecting the rights of local communities, but also remedying harm caused by World Bank projects when it occurs.

A new grievance mechanism for Chinese overseas mining needs to be free to use, and must protect communities from company interference and retaliation.

In the weeks following the FTX collapse, some of the scrutiny has turned to Effective Altruism – but instead of asking whether to condemn or support the movement, the more crucial question is one that applies far beyond: who defines what effective giving is in the first place?

Global fund managers should push producers of lithium, cobalt and copper – key metals used in electric vehicles (EVs) and other decarbonisation equipment – for greater transparency on environmental and social issues arising from their operations, a proxy advisory firm said.

Beijing’s pledge a year ago has put a ‘significant dent’ in planned coal-fired projects overseas, says a climate report – but greater support is needed to get low-emission projects up and running to replace the cancelled coal projects, analysts say.

Stephanie Amoako, Senior Policy Associate at Accountability Counsel, said: “PDBs must be accountable to the communities impacted by their projects. All PDBs need to have an effective accountability mechanism to address concerns with projects and should commit to preventing and fully remediating any harm to communities.”

Either they get solved at the annual meeting of signatories starting today in Seoul, or the principles risk fading into irrelevance.

We’re reflecting on our project with Accountability Counsel as they look to the future, seeing where there are opportunities and challenges with data science in supporting their mission.