In the News

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.

57 CSOs submit comments on the Draft operating procedures for the Accountability Mechanism and Inspection Panel. CSOs highlight concerns about the proposed mechanisms, including lack of clarity on the structure.

BIC junto a las organizaciones que endosan celebran la decisión de la Junta de Gobernadores de seguir la recomendación unánime del Directorio del BID y destituir rápidamente al Sr. Claver-Carone.

BIC and the endorsing organizations commend the decision of the Board of Governors to follow the unanimous recommendation of the Board of Directors and swiftly remove Mr. Claver-Carone.

In times of extreme political polarization and governmental dysfunction, “leverage-first” organizations create impact by working within existing systems, however imperfect they may be.

As Europe’s economy continues to buckle under a worsening energy crisis, proposals to expand investment in green energy projects should be welcome news. However, local communities that stand to be impacted by these projects have ample cause for alarm, given these institutions’ worrying track records of causing direct harm through their investments.

In 2020, USAID was directed to create an accountability structure, in order to address this, via an explanatory statement accompanying appropriations legislation. Almost two years later, USAID is still working on this mechanism and is yet to reveal what it might look like.

One activist group, the non-profit Accountability Counsel, points to a 231% rise in complaints between 2009 and 2019 as evidence development banks are backing projects without regard for communities.

At present, companies complicit in abuse of local populations can not only keep high ESG ratings, but sometimes see them increase. This is the message to the SEC from three non-profit organisations concerned with human rights and the environment: Inclusive Development International (IDI), Accountability Counsel (AC) and Friends of the Earth US (FoE US).