From: cls@truffula.sj.ca.us (Cameron L. Spitzer)
Subject: Please help mitigate destruction by World Bank (2)
Organization: Save the Humans!
Date: Fri, 24 Jul 92 04:06:51 GMT


Hi folks!  Here's Part 2 of the July 15 '92 Earthcare appeal.
There's background info, and a place you can write to help save the Earth.
Don't pretend you can't do anything; this will cost you a few minutes and a
stamp.


                 World Bank Water Policy Trickles Down

    The World Bank Board of Directors is also poised to adopt a new water
policy in October 1992.  The policy needs significant strengthening to protect
environmental values and the rights of citizens.

    Please write your director before October.  Stress the following points.
The World Bank *must*:

    o   Ensure accountability by clearly stating the Bank's goals, objectives,
        and conditions for involvement, monitoring and evaluation criteria.

    o   Fund alternatives -- such as demand-side management, water
        conservation and re-use, and small-scale systems -- before making
        investments in new, costly, and environmentally damaging large-scale
        irrigation and dam projects.

    o   Target projects to meet the needs of marginal groups, including the
        poor, women, rural communities, and indigenous peoples.  Recognize
        and uphold water rights for these users.

    o   Protect and restore rivers, wetlands, fisheries, forests, watersheds,
        and other water-dependent ecosystems.  Ensure that adequate water and
        funds are allocated for these areas.

    o   Guarantee citizen participation in the development of water management
        projects.


                 Stop Argentina's 20-Year-Old Money Drain

    For nearly two decades, the Yacyreta Binational Entity has been
squandering millions of dollars trying to build a hydroelectric power plant on
the Parana River, bordering Argentina and Paraguay.

    The estimated final cost of the 65 km-long dam has ballooned from $1.5
billion to nearly $6 billion.  If the dam is completed:

    o   50,000 people will be forced from their homes;
    o   All of the plants and most of the animals in the region, many of
        which are endangered, will perish; and
    o   Industrial runoff and sewage in water supplies could lead to outbreaks
        of yellow fever and malaria.

    The World Bank has already spend $460 million on the project, and the YBE
is requesting an additional $300 million.  If it approves another loan for the
project, the Bank will again be ignoring its own environmental regulations.


50,000 People with Nowhere to Go

    Though 50,000 people will be forcibly displaced by the dam, the project's
resettlement plan has not yet been fully outlined, not has sufficient land
been secured.  And the funds set aside for relocation could be in jeopardy due
to a planned privatization of the dam.

    The World Bank ignored viable alternative sources of energy -- such as
small-scale generators and hydroelectric -- and energy efficiency investments
have not been explored.  There is little proof that Argentina and Parguay,
with their serious economic problems [and endemic corruption -CS], can produce
the electricity demand to warrant a power plant generating at full capacity.

    The Bank's own studies have shown that filling the reservoir to only 76
meters above sea level -- as opposed to the planned 83 meters -- would
mitigate much of the environmental damage, and eliminate the need to resettle
some 32,000 people.  However, the World Bank has decided this is not an
economically feasible option.


                Tell the World Bank to Follow the Rules!

    Write to the World Bank president and urge him to reconsider funding the
Yacyreta hydroelectric dam/power project.  Too much money has already been
drained by this fiasco -- it must not be allowed to continue.  Your letter is
crucial.


               World Bank Monopolizes Conservation Funding

    The World Bank wants to control global conservation funding through its
new Global Environmental Facility.  Through the GEF, the World Bank would
distribute funding for the Global Warming and Species Extinction treaties
adopted at the Earth Summit.

    This is absurd given the Bank's abysmal environmental record.

    o   The World Bank has yet to demonstrate that it can adhere to basic
        principles of public accountability, let alone its own policies.

    o   The World Bank refuses to publicly release information about its
        conservation projects.
   
    o   During the preparation of the GEF and other projects, the Bank has
        neglected to consult with affected peoples or interested non-
        governmental organizations in the country where the project will
        occur.

    o   The Bank still spends less than 4 percent of its total energy lending
        for end-use energy efficiency.

    o   GEF projects are going forward despite the fact that its guidelines
        are not yet in place.

    For more information on the World Bank's Global Environmental Facility,
and what it's considering doing in your country, write:

Ian Johnson
Program of the GEF
World Bank
1818 H ST NW
Washington, DC 20433


                  World Bank Fails Performance Reviews

    According to a 1990 report by the World Bank's Operations Evaluations
Department:

    o   Only two-thirds of World Bank projects have achieved satisfactory
        results.

    o   Only half of the Bank's agricultural projects were "satisfactory."

    o   Only one quarter of the projects aimed at building the "instiutional
        capacity" of developing countries attained their goals.

    Why is the Bank failing?  For one thing, only 80 of the Bank's 8,000
employees have any environmental expertise.  Most are economists.

    The Bank's lack of environmental concern is highlighted by its failure to
complete Environmental Impact Assessments for all projects which would have a
significant environmental impact -- despite a 1991 Operational Directive to do
so.  Since January 1992, the United States [a leader in Bank funding but
hardly an advocate of environmental protection] has abstained on 35 of 155
World Bank projects due to incomplete EIAs.

     Direct all letters from the United States to ...
          President Lewis Preston
          World Bank
          1818 H ST NW
          Washington DC 20433
with a copy to
          Patrick Coady, US Executive Director
          same address, Room D1328.

The other Executive Directors are at the same address.  Please send email here
for the name and room number of the Director for your nation; there are 21
directors for 102 member nations.


Earthcare Appeals is published in the US by Sierra Club International Program,
408 C ST NE, Washington, DC 20002.  It is published in other nations by
equally prestigious organizations.  Contributing writers/editors: Jennifer
Barral and Kurt Rosenthal.

Keyed to disk and posted by Cameron Spitzer, aka cls@truffula.sj.ca.us
Newsgroups: alt.save.the.earth