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The views expressed in this presentation are the views of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views or policies of the Asian Development Bank (ADB), or its Board of Governors, or the governments they represent. ADB does not guarantee the accuracy of the data included in this presentation and accepts no responsibility for any consequence of their use. Terminology used may not necessarily be consistent with ADB official terms. ADB Safeguard Policy UpdateEnvironment Policy Stephanie Fried, Ph.D. Environmental Defense May 2007
Update process • ADB announces plan for “update” of safeguard policies: 2005 • Safeguard Policies: Indigenous Peoples, Environment, Resettlement • NGO Forum on ADB: NO to Weakened Standards, YES to Accountability • Deep concerns: end result will be weakening or elimination of safeguards, move away from internationally accepted norms
Infrastructure Plans • $3 trillion in “infrastructure needs” • $300 billion / year sought – increasing private sector involvement • Strong safeguard policies even more important
Environment • Categorization: significantly weaker than WB (all “sensitive” projects are Category A, require full environmental assessment) • ADB has “B-sensitive” projects, no EA requirement • WB: projects are sensitive if impacts “may be irreversible” (loss of habitat), or relate to indigenous peoples, natural habitats, management of cultural property or involuntary resettlement; • WB: must analyze “without project” alternative • WB: must recommend “any measures needed to prevent, minimize, mitigate or compensate for adverse impacts and improve environmental performance
Recommendations • Eliminate “B sensitive”, use WB standards for sensitivity • Any project involving Politically Exposed Persons should be defined as sensitive • PEP: individuals currently or in the past involved in “prominent public functions”, heads of state, senior politicians, government, judicial, military officials, executives of state-owned companies, close associates, family members
Meet or exceed WB Extractive Industry Review recommendations • WB Pollution Abatement Handbook • World Commission on Dams • Require analyses of alternatives including “no action” • Instead of “least cost mitigation” require prevention, minimization, compensation • Commit to preference of “preventative measures over mitigation or compensation” (WB)
For mitigation: • Not “least cost” but mitigation resulting in no harm to affected communities or ecosystem • Ensure institutional basis for implementing mitigation is in place, including monitoring capacity and function Avoid ‘no go’ zones
Require EIAs to be conducted by independent experts “not affiliated with the project” • Independent internationally recognized advisory panel, members with site-specific experience for high risk projects • Make monitoring reports re social and environmental impacts publicly available when they are written • Monitor CO2 emissions associated w/ADB portfolio, cap on emissions
Consultation and Participation • Free Prior and Informed Consent before implementation of any ADB supported activity or policy • Information made available to in-country stakeholders and potentially affected communities “in a form and language that are understandable and accessible to the groups being consulted” • Publish views of those consulted and demonstrate how these views have been taken into account and influenced EA and project design and implementation
Cofinancing Maintain current requirement that all components of a project must comply with EA policy, regardless of whether or not ADB is financing a particular component
OED Findings The results of the OED survey of 147 Appraisal Mission Leaders (AML) regarding environmental safeguards found that a significant majority of staff interviewed support the Environmental Safeguards process, and do not feel that it imposes unreasonable costs or delays on project implementation. A majority also felt that follow-through was inadequate to ensure proper mitigation of impacts.[1]
For example, 45 – 52% of those questioned disagreed with survey statements indicating that the safeguards process “causes unacceptable project delays and, thus increases costs”, that criteria for classifying projects by environmental category (i.e. A, B, C) are “too rigid, causing higher than necessary costs” or that “environmental requirements cost too much for the Executing Agencies.” Only 13 – 26% agreed with those statements.
Between 54 to 65% of those surveyed disagreed with assertions that the Safeguard process “does not address specific project needs effectively”, is “mostly box-checking”, and “fails to focus on key environmental impacts”. Only 20% agreed with those assertions.
Fully 67% of those surveyed felt that “the environmental safeguard process is working effectively and delivers satisfactory results.” • Fully 58% felt that even subprojects needed to have environmental assessments. 51% of the AMLs felt that there was a lack of adequate follow through to ensure adequate mitigation measures.
Yet the Executive Summary of the OED report concludes: • “the efficiency and sustainability of ADB’s current procedures are questionable due to the high transaction costs and limited benefits. • There is a need to revise Environment Policy in “recognition of the need for alignment with national systems, “a shift to an emphasis on capacity building rather than project focus”[1] and a move away from the “negative emphasis” of “avoiding environmental harm.”[2] The staff survey does not lead to these conclusions. Neither does an examination of the case studies.
Case Studies: India and ChinaDe facto “country systems” “self-monitoring”; host country environmental assessments • The OED conducted 16 brief case studies (often without visiting sites) on six projects in China, two in Vietnam, four in the Philippines and India. Descriptions of the case studies are found in Appendix 4 of the OED report.
In India, OED expressed concerns about the quality of environmental assessments: • “vague on details of potential impact” • no “quantitative assessment of type, magnitude, location of possible adverse impact” • “without site-specific assessment.” They found that the IEE reports for all of the case studies “show a close resemblance in content” and featured a “relatively weak” analysis of alternatives and prediction and assessment of impacts.
They found a “failure to initiate the EIA at the earliest stage of project design. In some cases, EIAs were undertaken when most of the crucial aspects of the project design had already been decided.”[1] “prediction and assessment of impacts is found to be generic”, appropriate analytical tools were not used and “little attention was paid to induced, secondary, and offsite impacts.”
The “absence of regular environmental safeguard personnel” in the ADB’s India Resident Mission was cited as a key factor. They found that the ADB is “almost completely relying on the semi-annual self-monitoring reports” of project proponents; Road rehabilitation and construction projects routinely declared as Category B projects despite “potentially serious significant environmental impacts”; and that “the ADB has never sent an environment-related mission.”
China The Chinese projects all used official Chinese environmental assessments – i.e. “commissioned by the Sichuan Provincial Communications Department” or “compiled by the Highway Research Institute of the Ministry of Communication.”
Projects cited often had significant impacts on minority populations yet claims were made, for example, that “public consultations indicated that between 86% and 90% of the people supported the projects.”[1] They note (in the Appendix) that “the samples may have been skewed, and the people who did not show support could have been those who were adversely affected.”
OED found that projects included those which had chosen routes which “while minimizing project costs, meant more flat land used and more resettlement required”[2]; • projects with “zero costs” budgeted for environmental protection measures;[3] • a project in the “experimental part” of a National Nature Reserve where the original EIA (which was “missing”) had failed to assess the impacts caused by hydropower development and transmission lines. The SEIA failed “to address the impact of the access road on the fragile local ecosystem due to improved access to areas previously inaccessible.” [1]
Sewer project : environmental assessment that “is quite vague about how to deal with one of the main pollutants from wastewater treatment, viz., sludge.” The ADB’s environmental consultants “were engaged primarily for translating and reformatting the EIA report.” • The OED did not visit the site of a Category A railway project “located between several major natural reserves and inhabited by a number of ethnic minorities, rich in cultural and archaeological artefacts” but were informed by officials that “since the 1990s, the Ministry of Railways has accumulated substantial experience in environmental management… and its environmental awareness and practices have improved significantly.”.[1]
Chinese officials “stressed that the EIA procedures in the PRC are stringent, and the laws and regulations are in place” but indicated that the 120 day rule for Category A projects “may have caused delays in loan approval, especially considering that the domestic EIA process already included consultation with project-affected people and local civil society.”[2]
Country Systems • When interviewed, ADB Staff expressed concerns regarding the potential use of “country systems” – i.e. adopting the environmental safeguard system of client countries – such as is may already be occurring in China. • “When asked about the risks that ADB would face in adopting the country system for the project in various countries [specified by country] 22% indicated that ‘the country environmental safeguard system was either non-existent or inadequate,’ 61% indicated that ‘the country system looked good on paper but implementation was weak,’ and 13% felt that ‘corruption would have prevented effective implementation of the country system.’”[1]
Thirty three percent of respondents felt that the “ADB could not have adopted the country’s environmental safeguard system without compromising its own safeguard system.” Only 17% of respondents felt that “ADB could have adopted country’s environmental safeguard system without compromising its own safeguard system.” 29% felt that country system could work but only with “additional efforts on monitoring and enforcement” 10% felt that country system could work with “additional efforts on monitoring, enforcement, and an accreditation system supervised by ADB”.
Need for increased safeguard implementation, funding Case study reports documented the fact that – due to a startling lack of environmental staff and the dismantling of the environment department -- the Bank is, de facto, devolving away from its own safeguard systems and allowing client countries to carry out due diligence on themselves. The OED’s “internal desk study” finding that resettlement practices were “uniformly unsatisfactory” and environment case study findings of a lack of detailed and appropriate environmental analyses with alarming environmental and social impacts point to the need for increased staffing for environmental and social monitoring and increasing attention to international best standards.
Nonetheless, the report’s Executive Summary concludes that given the “high transaction costs and limited benefits” of the existing safeguard system, “a uniform approach to safeguard procedures…does not respond effectively to the specific needs” of each country.[1] • The Bank recommends “a progressive shift in emphasis to reliance on national procedures…targeted first at those countries such as PRC and India that have made good progress in institutional development and environmental legal frameworks.”
Demands developed via NGO Forum Process • NGO Forum on ADB: NO to Weakened Standards, YES to Accountability • Deep concerns: end result of SPU will be weakening or elimination of safeguards, move away from internationally accepted norms • Enhance, strengthen, fully fund implementation of safeguard policies to ensure rigorous social and environmental protections • Uphold, ensure compliance with international human rights, labor, environmental, Indigenous Peoples laws, conventions, best practice;
“Country Systems” Unacceptable to use a “country systems” approach that would allow downgrading of internationally recognized standards, moving away from internationally accepted norms or a re-setting of safeguard requirements for each recipient country according to that country’s “capacity” *Upward harmonization
Rights-based Approach • Apply rights-based approach to SPU • Protection, promotion of human rights of project-affected people should be the central focus of ADB’s policies and practice • Recommended by World Commission on Dams as a “principled basis for mediating development choices among competing interests” • Broad community support, negotiated settlements, free, prior, informed consent • Best international practice, ADB as contributor and Forum member of WCD
Build on Lessons Learned • ADB accountability mechanisms and OED documentation of numerous cases of egregious safeguard violations • Most instances and trends of non-compliance still not addressed • OED SPU “internal desk study” of 15 projects found “resettlement processes and outcomes are almost uniformly unsatisfactory.” Study not released to public
Resettlement – “uniformly unsatisfactory” Buried towards the end of the separate file of “Supplementary Appendixes” to the OED Evaluation Study on Involuntary Resettlement Safeguards is a table summarizing the “internal desk study prepared by Mohammed Zaman for the Environment and Social Safeguard Division.” 15 projects, including 6 projects studied by OED: “the resettlement processes and outcomes are almost uniformly unsatisfactory.” Unfortunately, this desk study is not made public, findings are tersely summarized in a table. Most of Appendix G is taken up with “reasons” for this finding – including the fact that the author “uses relatively more cases outside People’s Republic of China.” For the purposes of public consultation, it is important that this study be released to the public in its entirety.
Resettlement • ADB must shift resources to implementation, monitoring, supervision • Address frequent underestimation of numbers of Affected persons • Timebound action requirements
Three Guiding Principles • Avoid involuntary resettlement • Minimize resettlement where population displacement is unavoidable • Ensure displaced people receive assistance so that they are better off than under “no project” scenario Poverty alleviation, protection of vulnerable groups as central criteria to measure effectiveness of IR policy
Indigenous Peoples • Commitment to full consultation with Indigenous Peoples, Free Prior Informed Consent • Uphold international standards on human rights, indigenous rights • Strong concerns about “country systems” and implication that this may mean moving away from international norms and standards • Concrete policy recommendations • Deep concerns about projects in repressive states or regions of conflict between state and Indigenous Peoples
Can you make a commitment here today that the ADB will not weaken in any way the safeguard policies or replace the detailed specific safeguard requirements with a single, vague general policy?
Can you commit here today that any move to “country systems” or “alignment with national systems” will not, in any way, involve a move away from internationally recognized standards or norms – or be weaker in any way than these standards?
