European Development Bank Funding of Feronia-PHC Oil Palm Plantations in the Democratic Republic of Congo
Jutta Kill
Campaigners from across Europe and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) have published a new report chronicling one of the most scandalous failures of development bank investment in agriculture. The report details how Europe's largest development banks poured upwards of US$150 million into an oil palm plantation company in the DRC despite the company's land conflicts with communities and allegations of serious human rights violations and opaque financing made against it.
Groups Call for Urgent Inquiry into Failure of Ministers to Act despite Whistleblower Warnings
Global Justice Now and The Corner House
The Corner House and Global Justice Now are calling for a parliamentary inquiry following a report from the BBC's award-winning Africa Eye team on concerns about alleged fraud, bribery and other highly-questionable business practices by two British managers appointed by a UK aid-backed private equity fund to run its investee Kenyan firm Spencon.
See the downloadable press release above.
Nicholas Hildyard
The World Bank has invested almost a quarter of a billion dollars in Seven Energy, an oil and gas company operating in Nigeria. Months before the first investment was made, the then Governor of Nigeria's Central Bank alleged that the company's flagship contract involved operating a scheme that was looting billions of dollars in state revenues. A number of the people associated with the contract are now either on the run or charged with money laundering.
Larry Lohmann
Effective research and other action in the field of environment and law requires an understanding of how profoundly both have changed under neoliberalism. The growth of the neoliberal state amid productivity crisis and the move to a more financialized, rent-based global economy has been accompanied by sweeping legal innovations relating to property, trade, investment, rent and criminality as well as an expansion in the mass of written law and in the gaming of legislation.
Institutionalised Corruption and Development Finance
Nicholas Hildyard
Many lawful, routine, accepted practices in today's economic system are regarded by the general public as corrupt. They have created a distorted, privatised vision of the “public interest” and represent a new trend of state capture by for-profit interests.
Nicholas Hildyard
This presentation challenges the current rush towards mega infrastructure projects that are being planned the world over as a means of boosting economic recovery.
NGO submissions and correspondence
The Corner House and others
In December 2009, the UK's Export Credits Guarantee Department (ECGD) announced a public consultation on proposed revisions to its Business Principles, including wide-ranging changes to its environmental, social and human rights safeguard policies and its anti-bribery and corruption measures. The Corner House and others submitted a joint response detailing the potentially signficiant negative impacts triggered by the proposed changes to policies on child labour and forced labour, greenhouse gas accounting, transparency, anti-bribery and financial risks.
Memoranda to the Joint Committee on Human Rights
The Corner House
The Joint Committee on Human Rights of the UK Parliament requested evidence for its inquiry into business and human rights on the State's duty to protect against human rights abuses by businesses; corporate responsibility to respect human rights; and the need for individuals to have effective access to remedies when their human rights are breached. The Corner House submission to the Committee focused on the policies and practices of the UK Export Credits Guarantee Department (ECGD) in the context of the state's duty to protect human rights. The Committee subsequently called for supplementary evidence on the government's Draft Bribery Bill and the Industry and Exports (Financial Support) Bill, which The Corner House provided.
Peter Marshall, Newsnight
BBC2 Television's Newsnight current affairs programme summarised its 8 minute broadcast: "In 2006, the British government scotched a serious fraud investigation into BAE's biggest deal, with Saudi Arabia. Now, Peter Marshall [Newsnight presenter] reveals that the company may have returned the favour. It has stopped a billion pound insurance contract which tied the government to the Saudi business." Information about stopping the insurance contract came to light as a result of legal correspondence between The Corner House and Campaign Against Arms Trade with the UK Export Credits Guarantee Department.
following up OECD Phase2bis report
solicitors Leigh Day & Co, and Export Credits Guarantee Department
This exchange of letters between the UK's export credit agency and lawyers acting for The Corner House and Campaign Against Arms Trade revealed that BAE Systems had cancelled all its public insurance for its arms sales to Saudi Arabia with effect from 1 September 2008. These sales have been underwritten by the agency for more than two decades and accounted for half its portfolio.
Memorandum to Environmental Audit Committee Inquiry
The Corner House
How Rich Country Export Credit Agencies Facilitate Corruption in the Global South
The Corner House
The Corner House interviewed by the US magazine, Multinational Monitor, on export credit agencies and corruption.
The evidence so far from the OECD Working Group on Bribery Phase 2 reviews
Susan Hawley for ECA-Watch
The OECD's Working Group on Bribery regard export credit agencies (ECAs) as essential to combating bribery and believe that ECA procedures to do so could be significantly improved. The Group's reviews of various OECD countries emphasise the importance of ECAs having proper procedures in place to detect and report bribery suspicions to law enforcement agencies, and to exclude companies convicted of corruption from further export credit support.
Dr Susan Hawley
On 21 October 2005, the ECGD announced several proposed changes to its anti-corruption procedures. This document outlines The Corner House's concerns about these proposals, particularly the weak audit clause and the non-requirement to supply the identity of agents.
The Corner House
On 21st October 2005, the ECGD announced its provisional response to the public consultation on its anti-corruption procedures. The ECGD proposes to take some steps towards re-strengthening its procedures, but has still stopped short in some key areas.
How export credit agencies are offering new subsidies for destructive projects under the guise of environmental protection
ECA-Watch
Northern governments may grant more export credits for large dams by classifying them as "renewable energy". This report details the negative impacts of five large dams and one water privatisation scheme financed with export credits.
The Case for Strengthened Standards
Nicholas Hildyard, The Corner House, UK; and Eliah Gilfenbaum, Environmental Defense, USA
This paper documents new subsidies that ECAs may give for large dams; evaluates the accompanying standards that ECAs may require for dam projects; and identifies future ECA actions if funding for dams is not to have negative environmental and social impacts.
A historic opportunity
ECA-Watch
This submission to the OECD Working Group on Export Credits and Credit Guarantees argues that a strong new OECD Action Statement on Combating Bribery in Officially Supported Export Credits should be agreed in October 2005 and recomends key anti-bribery measures to be incorporated into it.
The Agenda for 2005
Dr Susan Hawley
This submission to the EU Council Working Group on Trade details how the OECD Action Statement on Combating Bribery in Officially Supported Export Credits should be strengthened and how European Export Credit Agencies should improve their anti-bribery procedures. It was prepared for a special meeting held between the EU Council Working Group on Export Credits and NGOs on 22 June 2005.
Dr Susan Hawley
In January 2005, the UK's export credit agency, ECGD, announced a public consultation into its weakened anti-corruption procedures, introduced following industry lobbying. This submission to that consultation argues that the ECGD should revert to its revised procedures if it is to prevent bribery in the projects that it supports.
Memorandum from The Corner House
Dr Susan Hawley
At the beginning of 2005, the UK Parliament's Trade and Industry Select Committee conducted an inquiry into the UK's Export Credits Guarantee Department (ECGD). During its inquiry, it interviewed the Government Minister responsible for the ECGD about the Department's watering down of its anti-bribery procedures following industry lobbying. In March 2005, the Committee published a report, Implementation of ECGD's Business Principles, that was highly critical of the changes the Department had made to its procedures. This document is The Corner House's submission to the Committee's inquiry.
The Corner House
In December 2004, The Corner House began legal proceedings against the Export Credits Guarantee Department, claiming it had weakened its anti-corruption rules after consulting corporations only. It was awarded the first-ever full "protective costs order" to challenge the changed rules: The Corner House would not have to pay the Department's legal costs, even if it lost, because the challenge was in the public interest.
In December 2004, The Corner House instituted legal proceedings against the UK's Secretary of State for Trade and Industry as the government minister responsible for the Export Credits Guarantee Department.
Towards a model for excellence: A discussion paper
Dr Susan Hawley
Enforcement of overseas corruption offences involving British companies and individuals under the UK's anti-corruption legislation is crucial to tackling corruption internationally. The current arrangements in the UK between various law enforcement agencies are not the most effective means of ensuring that these offences are investigated and prosecuted. A more pro-active enforcement regime could detect overseas corruption offences as and when they occur and could act on credible suspicions of bribery.
Export Credit Agencies and Corruption
Susan Hawley
The taxpayer-backed export credit agencies of industrialised countries are underwriting the bribery and corruption of large, mainly Western, companies operating abroad.
Corruption and the UK Export Credits Guarantee Department
Dr Susan Hawley
Institutional practices within the taxpayer-funded UK Export Credits Guarantee Department have exacerbated bribery and corruption by Western companies.
The ECGD's recent record
Susan Hawley, The Corner House
The UK Export Credits Guarantee Department (ECGD) has a long record of backing corrupt projects. New vetting procedures have loopholes, leaving the ECGD open to charges of complicity in corruption, contends this presentation at an NGO Seminar on Export Credit Reform held in the House of Commons, London.
NGO Seminar on Reform of Export Credits Guarantee Department - Seminar Report
Sean Scannell, The Ilisu Dam Campaign
Summary of an NGO seminar held in the UK parliament to discuss Export Credit Agency reform.
Recommendations to the UK Export Credits Guarantee Agency
Kirstine Drew, UNICORN, Public Services International Research Unit
The UK Export Credits Guarantee Department (ECGD) has a legal obligation to combat corruption. But its failure to adopt non-discretionary, transparent procedures is fundamentally flawed, argues this presentation at an NGO Seminar on Export Credit Reform held in the House of Commons, London.
Barry Coates and Daniela Reale, World Development Movement
The UK government's Export Credits Guarantees Department (ECGD) supports British exporters. Using public money to support private businesses is only justified if it has a demonstrable public purpose.
Global Witness
Publicly-traded companies involved in resource exploitation should be required to publish a breakdown of all payments which they make for the products of every country in which they operate.
Britain's Role in Promoting Corruption, Cronyism and Graft
The Corner House
This Corner House submission to British House of Commons' International Development Committee's Inquiry into corruption urges the Committee to examine the structural causes of corruption in the countries of the South, such as the policies and programmes that Western governments and agencies push on these countries. It recommends that the Committee focus less on the perceived "lack of political will" to tackle corruption and more on those vested interests that generate immense political will to block investigations when they are initiated and to undermine anti-corruption drives.
The Final Report of a Fact-Finding Mission to the Ilisu Dam Region
Ilisu Dam Campaign; the Kurdish Human Rights Project; The Corner House; World Economy, Ecology and Development; Eye on SACE Campaign and Pacific Environment Research Center
The companies that want to build the controversial Ilisu Dam on the River Tigris in the Kurdish region of Southeast Turkey have sought financial backing from the export credit agencies (ECAs) of their countries. In January 1999, the ECAs attached four conditions to be met before they would issue export credits. During 9-16 October 2000, an international Fact Finding Mission of Non-Governmental Organisations from the UK, USA, Germany and Italy went to the region of the proposed dam to assess the Turkish government's progress meeting the four conditions.
A Political Economy of Ethics in the Export Credit Debate
Nicholas Hildyard
“Moral dilemmas” are not unattached to political, bureaucratic, social and economic interests. They are deeply political and are products of everyday conflicts over meaning, resources and ways of living and power. Who raises a particular moral dilemma and why is thus of critical importance.
Export Credit Agencies, Corporate Welfare and Policy Incoherence
Nicholas Hildyard
Projects backed by export credit agencies (ECAs) are frequently environmentally destructive, socially oppressive or financially unviable. It is the poorest people in the countries where the projects are located who end up paying the bill. With rare exceptions, the major ECAs lack mandatory environmental and development standards, and are secretive and unaccountable.
How Opinion Polls and Cost-Benefit Analysis Synthesize New “Publics”
Larry Lohmann
Opinion polls and cost-benefit analysis, like public relations, attempt to construct new, simplified “publics” which are friendly to bureaucracies, politicians and corporations. The success of these attempts is limited by popular resistance at many levels. For a related article, see http://www.thecornerhouse.org.uk/resource/toward-different-debate-environmental-accounting.
Larry Lohmann
All development projects follow a three-act dramatic plotline, as development agencies try to impose plans, meet local opposition, and improvise freely in an attempt to overcome resistance.
Nicholas Hildyard
The rich have never been shy about praising the qualities that created their wealth. Nor are they short of convenient explanations for the poverty of others -- from “the breeding habits of the poor” to “economic mismanagement” and “protectionism”. But they have always found it difficult to explain poverty in ways that do not implicate themselves, contends this contribution to an Oxford Union debate, held at Oxford University, UK.
