Index for April 2013

Volume 12, Issue 4

  • (ECA Watch, Brussels, 29 April 2013) The ECA Watch network has launched its new look and re-furbished website at www.eca-watch.org

    Export Credit Agencies (ECAs) continue to be among the largest financiers for some of the most destructive industries in the world. Half of all new greenhouse-gas emitting projects in the developing world have ECA support, and projects that international banks avoid because of human rights or environmental concerns often still manage to attract ECA backing.

    The new website explores some of the most urgent concerns about the activities of notoriously secretive ECAs, and provides a one-stop shop for all the latest reports and news on export credits. ECA Watch’s monthly newsletter, What’s New! provides a roundup of the latest headlines direct to subscribers’ mailbox and is also published on the new site. Sign up to receive all the latest news via the website: www.eca-watch.org

  • (Friends of the Earth France, Paris, 26 April 2013) Following in the footsteps of BNP Paribas, the German HypoVereinsbank recently announced that it will not finance the Kaliningrad nuclear power plant in Russia. Today, to mark the anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster, Friends of the Earth France launches the mobilization against this project in France with an online petition (1), supported by Greenpeace, the Nuclear Exit (“Sortir du nucléaire”) network, ATTAC and BankTrack, demanding that Coface and Société Générale follow their example immediately. In addition, 94 organisations from 22 countries have signed an open letter (2) in support of this goal, while the Russian NGO Ecodefense, currently undergoing an inspection by the Russian authorities, demonstrates in front of the offices of Société Générale’s subsidiary in Kaliningrad (3).

  • (Banktrack, Nijegen, 18 April 2013) A coalition of seven NGOs (BankTrack, Jubilee Australia, Pacific Environment, Act Now! PNG, Mineral Policy Institute, International Accountability Project and Friends of the Earth France) today sent a letter to seventeen banks that are already involved in the financing of the highly controversial PNG LNG project to ask them not to extend any further financing to this project. Despite a first warning letter more than three years ago, 17 banks decided to finance the PNG LNG project, the biggest project ever in the history of Papua New Guinea. Because of huge cost overruns (20% from US$14bn to US$19bn), due in part to the failure to anticipate local conflict, ExxonMobil is looking for a US$1.5bn additional debt facility to complete the project from the very same banks. The export credit agencies involved in this financing were: Export Import Bank of China, Export Finance and Insurance Corporation Australia, Japan Bank for International Cooperation, Nippon Export and Investment Insurance, SACE S.p.A. and the Export-Import Bank of the United States.

  • (Jubilee Australia, Sydney, 19 April 2013) Jubilee Australia has made a submission this week to the Senate Foreign Affairs, Defense and Trade Legislative Committee, urging the Federal Government to ensure the key recommendations of the recent tax payer funded inquiry into export credit arrangements are adequately incorporated into legislation. Jubilee Australia and other advocates helped lead to the November 2011 establishment of a Productivity Commission Inquiry into Australia's export credit arrangements, the final report of which (released May 2012) suggested widespread changes to the EFIC (Export Finance and Insurance Corporation) Act.

  • (International Rivers, Berkely, 18 April 2013) On February 28th, 2013, the Chinese Ministry of Commerce and the Ministry of Environmental Protection released its “Guidelines for Environmental Protection in Foreign Investment and Cooperation” (“Guidelines”), which are based on recommendations by the Chinese NGO, Global Environmental Institute (GEI). These Guidelines provide civil society groups with a new source of leverage when it comes to holding Chinese companies responsible for their environmental and social impacts overseas.

  • (Berne Union, London, 8 April 2013) Atradius Dutch State Business – the Dutch Export Credit Agency – and Exiar – its Russian counterpart – have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) focused on increasing support to Dutch and Russian companies that jointly conclude export transactions or infrastructure projects in third countries. 14% of the merchandise going through the ports of Rotterdam has Russia as its country of origin or destination. Recently Atradius Dutch State Business, acting on behalf of the Dutch Government, covered current or planned Dutch export transactions to Russia for around half a billion Euros, mainly for capital goods. Important sectors of cooperation are oil and gas, machinery and agriculture.

  • (US State Department, Washington, 11 April 2013) Ministers and senior officials from more than a dozen donor countries met in Washington, D.C. on April 10-11 to discuss ways to meet the challenge of scaling up low-carbon investment in developing countries. Convened and chaired by the USA, participants included Australia, Canada, Denmark, the European Union and Presidency, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Attendees included ministers and senior officials from a broad range of government entities, including ministries of foreign affairs, environment, finance, and development, as well as representatives from development finance institutions and export credit agencies.

  • (Business Insurance, New York, 29 April 2013) People's Insurance Co. of China has issued the nation's first single short-term export credit insurance for local manufacturing firm Zhejiang Yuanda Electronic Development Co. Ltd., reports Hexun.com. The deal between PICC and Zhejiang Yuanda Electronic encompasses an annual payment of $3 million. Media reports indicate that China's Finance Ministry had, in January 2013, approved the insurer's pilot short-term export credit insurance program.

  • (ZDNET, 8 April 2013) Canada's export credit agency is lending European mobile giant Telefonica hundreds of millions of euros to spend on BlackBerry devices and services. The working capital facility from Export Development Canada (EDC) is meant to help the Canadian handset maker grow its market share within Telefónica, which operates in 24 countries.

  • (Ship & Bunker, 15 April 2013) The Export-Import Bank of China (China Exim Bank) is expecting to boost its loans to the shipping industry by $2 billion this year to a total of $14 billion, Chen Bin, the bank's deputy general manager, transport finance department, has told pan-Asia weekly Seatrade Asia Week.

    The bank was said to have inked around $12 billion of deals last year, and Chen said they have a lot of deals currently under consideration.