[stop-imf] URGENT World Bank Extractive Industries Review Action Alert

[Robert Weissman]

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-please distribute widely-

URGENT ACTION ALERT

World Bank Extractive Industries Review (EIR) Nears Completion
Counter Industry=EDs Influence Now!

Industry is flooding the EIR Secretariat with fake "community" requests
for more World Bank support for coal and oil. Please write Emil Salim,
head of the EIR, NOW at <esalim@rad.net.id>  or <esalim@eireview.org>
and tell him you demand that the EIR resist industry pressure.  Be sure
to include your name, organization, and or community so the EIR can tell
that you are a real stakeholder.  Please blind-copy <seen@seen.org>.

The World Bank=EDs Extractive Industries Review (EIR) is almost done. By
mid-October, the EIR will produce a final version of its report on the
poverty, and other social and environmental impacts associated with oil,
gas, and mining projects.  While the report will not be presented to
World Bank President James Wolfensohn until December, the time to take
action on this is now.  So far, the report, despite massive problems,
contains some strikingly strong recommendations. Over the next few
weeks, the trick will be to keep them in, build further on them, and
keep the bad things out.

It is imperative that the EIR Secretariat and Emil Salim hear from NGOs
and communities now in order to insure that the report contains the
strongest and most objective recommendations possible.

The report currently includes language that calls for:

    -An immediate phaseout of World Bank support for coal projects;
    -Full and generous support for impacted workers and communities
through =ECjust transition=EE funds;
    -A phaseout of Bank support for oil projects (text recommends the
Bank should focus on gas, and leave "oil exploration and oil transport
to the private sector")
    -A reversal of =ECthe lending ratio between fossil fuels and
renewables, efficiency,  and conservation as soon as practicable"
    -prior informed consent for indigenous peoples
    -an end to World Bank support for mines utilizing submarine tailings
disposal and other environmentally destructive technologies.
    -a recognition of and end to the negative social and environmental
impacts of  =ECstructural adjustment loans=EE.

All of this language needs to stay in the report. The final report
should also include strong language on "no-go zones"  that would
prohibit Bank extractive projects in areas of poor governance, high
conflict, human rights abuses, and environmental sensitivity.

Write a brief note, in your own words say why you think the World Bank
should be out of the business of supporting oil, gas, and mining
projects - and reference the need for the points above to stay in the
report.

Thanks for your urgent attention to this.
_____________________
Steve Kretzmann
Sustainable Energy & Economy Network
Institute for Policy Studies
www.seen.org



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