Press release:
Inter-American Development Bank annual meeting, Guatemala City, March 16-20
*** Press conference at 1pm, today, Sunday, March 18, in the Sala El Obelisco, First Floor, Westin Camino Real Hotel ***
Distributed by an alliance of NGOs from Latin América and the US in attendance at the IDB annual meeting
Guatemala City, March 18, 2007 – The “development” mandate of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) is being severely compromised by the bank’s tendency to subsidize the private sector’s unsustainable mega-projects, said an alliance of environmental, development, human rights and representative indigenous organizations today.
The warning came after a meeting between civil society groups and IDB President, Luis Alberto Moreno, during which Mr. Moreno rejected comments by various participants that the bank is not applying its own environmental and social safeguards, and violates its own indigenous rights policies.
Through regional development blueprints such as the Integration of Infrastructure in South America initiative (IIRSA) and the Plan Puebla Panama in Mexico and Central America, the bank is promoting mega-projects such as dams, hydrocarbon exploration and production, and the construction of mega-highways and the transformation of rivers into industrial waterways across Latin America. These mega-projects threaten communities and natural habitats such as the Amazon and the Pantanal. The results include human rights abuses, biodiversity loss, deforestation, and a significant rise in greenhouse gas emissions.
The challenge for the IDB, currently in the process of structural realignment, is to fully incorporate democratic participation, real social inclusion and the sustainable management of all its operations and projects. Instead, the bank appears set to weaken social and environmental safeguards in order to speed up its lending process.
The IDB also needs to address the excessive role of the private sector in development projects, regional integration and public works. Civil society organizations at the annual meeting proposed the strengthening of democratic procedures and the promotion of infrastructure projects that actually respond to the interests of the people and not large corporations.
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Quotes
César Gamboa, of Acción Ciudadana Camisea (ACC), a group of Peruvian NGOs campaigning on the Camisea gas Project: “Camisea has given the Peruvian state carte blanche to divide almost 70 percent of the Peruvian Amazon into concessions. We are now seeing the accelerating exploration and exploitation of hydrocarbon lots superimposed on hundreds of territories of indigenous communities, four Territorial Reserves for Indigenous Peoples in Isolation, and 13 State Natural Protected Areas, a policy that has jeopardized the human rights of these populations and the conservation of our country’s biodiversity.”
Vince McElhinny, Director of the Latin America and Caribbean Program, Bank Information Center, USA: “Even with a team of 90 people at the IDB dedicated to measuring and disseminating the results of the Bank’s investments, we have not heard anything from the Bank President about the impacts on poverty, equity and development in Latin America. Civil society challenges the IDB to show the effectiveness of its previous investments in a transparent and concrete way.”
Oscar Rivas, of Sobrevivencia, Paraguay: “The sovereignty of the communities and peoples of South America must be respected. If we want inclusive development, directed by the population, we have to encourage processes in which the desires and needs of the societies of the region come first. The IIRSA initiative must be submitted to public opinion, if it is aiming for sustainability and social inclusion.”
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Media Logistics
A civil society delegation of environmental, sustainable development and human rights groups as well as representative indigenous organizations, drawn from across Latin America and the United States is attending the IDB’s 2007 annual meeting.
For media enquiries, please contact the people mentioned at the top of this press release. Additionally, please feel free to drop by the civil society office in the Centroamericana Room, in the Westin Camino Real Hotel. Press conferences will be held next door, in the El Obelisco Room, of the Westin Camino Real Hotel. Both rooms are on the first floor. We will hold a press conference today, Sunday, March 18.
