World bank

African Agriculture and the World Bank: Development or impoverishment?

Kjell Havnevik, Deborah Fahy Bryceson, Atakilte Beyene and Prosper Matondi look at the destructive role the world bank has played in African agriculture and food production Agriculture’s dominant role in Sub-Saharan Africa’s local, national and regional economies and cultures throughout pre-colonial history has been foundational to 20th century colonial and post-colonial development. No other continent has been so closely identified with smallholder peasant farming. Nonetheless, smallholder (...) read

World Bank attempt to privatise Mumbai’s water runs aground: Citizens reject report

> Focus on the Global South

On 3rd June, the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai (MCGM) held a stakeholders meeting in which the New Zealand based consultant group Castalia (hired by the World Bank and the Public Private Infrastructure Advisory Facility) to conduct a study in the K-east ward of Mumbai, presented their findings and recommendations after a year-long study, for the Water Distribution Improvement Programme (WDIP). The meeting was attended by the MCGM Labour Union, K-east ward residents, activists, (...) read

Love, Lies, Wolfowitz, and the World Bank

> The Zeleza Post

The unfolding corruption scandal of the World Bank President, Paul D. Wolfwitz, is an intriguing and entangled tale of love: the personal love life of Mr. Wolfowitz himself, the current love affair between neo-conservatism and neo-liberalism, and the long-standing marriage between capitalism and corruption, the development industry and the military-industrial complex, and the Northern-dominated international financial institutions and the institutionalization of dependency and poverty in (...) read

Annual World Bank and IMF Meetings Close Under Heavy Criticism

> International Financial Institutions Under Fire with Regard to Developing Country Voting Rights and Civil Society Repression

http://www.liberationafrique.org/spi (...)

As the annual World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) meetings closed under heavy fire, both from within and from civil society activists, Africa Action today condemned the undemocratic nature and harmful policies of these institutions. The organization underscored that the countries most affected by World Bank and IMF policies, particularly the debt-burdened countries of Africa, must have a greater say within the international financial institutions.
This week, the IMF re-organized the system of voting rights, increasing the voting power of China, Mexico, South Korea and Turkey, and the World Bank indicated that it would also be willing to consider a similar shift. But Africa Action notes that while developing country finance ministers and civil society from around the world have pushed for a more representative voting structure, these latest minor changes still leave power disproportionately concentrated in the hands of the wealthiest nations.
Ann-Louise Colgan, Acting Co-Executive Director of Africa Action, said today, "The World Bank and IMF persist in ignoring the priorities of the developing world, and African countries continue to pay the price. The decisions made by these institutions have long-lasting effects on African countries, and yet there is little opportunity to hold them accountable. As a result, Africa’s illegitimate debt burden remains at overwhelming levels, and the World Bank and IMF continue to impose unfair conditions on Africa’s economies."  read

Groups in Africa, Latin America condemn World Bank biosafety projects

> Libération Afrique

http://www.liberationafrique.org/spi (...)

The World Bank is set to secure funding from the Global Environment Facility (GEF) for two projects that will undermine public debate and aggressively drive GM crops into the heart of peasant agriculture. The two projects, one in West Africa and the other in Latin America, will hasten the spread of GM crops into farmer seed systems and even into certain centres of origin.
The projects are clearly being driven by an outside agenda. At their core is a longstanding strategy pursued by the World Bank and the US government to harmonise regulations for GM crops across regions in order to override national processes that are more susceptible to local opposition. The idea is to establish favourable regulations in a few countries whose governments are open to GM crops and then to use these regulations as a model that can be imposed on neighbouring countries by way of regional policy bodies. In this way, harmonisation side-steps any possible democratic debate and provides corporations with a large, one-stop shop for their GM crops.  read

Sell IMF gold to cancel the debt: decision time is now

> Report, April 2005, 9 pp., PDF

http://www.eurodad.org/uploadedFiles (...)

Debt owed to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), World Bank and other multilateral institutions has grown rapidly in recent years and these institutions are now the major creditors of the world’s poorest countries. Because there are serious consequences for countries which default on payments to these bodies, multilateral debt can be extremely onerous for countries struggling to provide for even the most basic social and development needs of their citizens.  read