(December 2, 2010) After the collapse of UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) talks in Copenhagen in December 2009, the future financial architecture for funding climate change mitigation and adaptation continues to be fiercely debated. At the 2010 climate summit in Cancun, Mexico, the issue will again be on the table for negotiation.
In Cancun, the role of public and private finance will be considered, and thus the role of export credit agencies (ECAs). ECAs sit at the nexus of public and private finance, and may become increasingly important. Many ECAs support billions of dollars worth of exports to fossil-fuel projects which emit greenhouse gases. ECA financing for fossil fuels eclipses ECA financing for climate-friendly technologies.
This briefing outlines the negative impact of ECA fossil fuel financing. The paper also raises the question of whether ECAs have a role to play in contributing to “climate finance.”
(November 11, 2010) Released the day before the November 2010 G-20 summit in Seoul, this press release by ECA-Watch outlines why G-20 leaders should ensure ECAs are included in efforts to end fossil fuel subsidies.
(2010) This paper from Christine Eberlein (Berne Declaration), Heike Drillisch (CounterCurrent), Ercan Ayboga (Initiative to Keep Hasankeyf Alive) and Thomas Wenidoppler (ECA Watch Austria) analyses the actions of three ECAs in relation to the Ilisu dam in Turkey, and explores the roles of NGOs within the process of achieving best practice.
Abstract: The World Commission on Dams (WCD) report focused attention on the question of how those displaced by large dams can be adequately compensated and properly resettled. An important debate from the Dams and Development Forum concerned the appropriate roles of different stakeholders, and the question as to how governments and ‘external stakeholders’ such as international institutions, financial investors and non-government organisations (NGOs) can be encouraged to implement the WCD recommendations and international standards on resettlement and environmental protection. This article analyses the actions of three European Export Credit Agencies (ECAs) aimed at improving the outcomes of the Ilisu Dam and hydroelectric power project in Kurdish-populated southeast of Turkey. It also explores the role of NGOs within the process of achieving best practice and preventing poor outcomes. Even though the ECAs’ efforts to meet World Bank project standards were unsuccessful and ended in July 2009 with their withdrawal, this was the first case in history where ECAs tried to implement specified social and environmental project conditions. This article aims ultimately to analyse the reasons for the failure to meet the ECAs’ conditions, and the lessons to be learned from this process.
First published in Water Alternatives 3(2): 291-312
(March 19, 2008) Joint Call to halt Ilisu Dam Development on the Occasion of the International Day of Action Against Dams and for Rivers, Water and Life 14 March 2008.
Brussels, 29 November 2007 – With a resounding majority (540 MEPs in favour), the European Parliament today passed a resolution on trade and climate change which calls for “the discontinuation of public support, via export credit agencies and public investment banks, for fossil fuel projects”.
(November 7, 2007) Citing their frustrations at years of silence in response to repeated proposals for effective implementation of environmental and social standards, as well as for coherence with related OECD goals and agreements, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) representing hundreds of thousands of taxpayers in OECD member nations, walked out of an OECD meeting called to consult civil society organisations.
(November 7, 2007) Memorandum of FERN and ECA-Watch Concerning the OECD Export Credit Group’s Lack of Coherence with OECD Goals and Objectives and Other Major Problems
(November 7, 2007) Letter from FERN and others to the ECG setting out the reasons for the 5 November 2007 NGO walk-out in protest over the OECD Export Credit Group’s unwillingness to engage in substantive exchanges of views on issues that have been raised by NGOs over the years.
(FERN, Brussels, 29 Nov. 2007) With a resounding majority (540 MEPs of 785 in favour), the European Parliament today passed a resolution on trade and climate change which calls for “the discontinuation of public support, via export credit agencies and public investment banks, for fossil fuel projects”. The step was widely welcomed by environmental and development NGOs campaigning on export credit agencies (ECAs) and the European Investment Bank (EIB).
(May 31, 2007) A joint ECA-Watch/FERN press release: On 23-24 April 2007, the OECD’s Export Credit Working Group (ECG) appears set to approve revised and weakened environmental and social standards governing projects supported by export credit guarantees or loans of greater than 10 million SDRs (US$15.3 million or 11.2 million).
Article 13 of the virtually final negotiating draft of these standards, known as the ‘Recommendation on Common Approaches on Environment and Officially Supported Export Credits’, allows export credit agencies (ECAs) to opt out of applying any standards at all, provided that they report this to the notoriously secretive and effectively unaccountable OECD working group.
