Global biodiversity loss is occurring at an alarming rate, with a growing consensus that we are entering a sixth mass extinction. Rapid human development and associated habitat loss, principally ...through agriculture, infrastructure and extractive industries, is a significant contributor. The critically endangered western chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes verus) is at the nexus of the development-habitat loss conflict with 83% of the subspecies occurring outside protected areas. To protect its habitat, robust regulation of large-scale development, in particular through Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) procedures that adequately incorporate the Mitigation Hierarchy Principles (MHPs), is required. We developed a framework to review EIA and related legislation in all eight western chimpanzee range countries and assessed how well they incorporate MHPs, focusing specifically on mining activity. Costa Rica was selected as a benchmark of good practice, based on the recognised quality of its biodiversity laws. Overall performance of the eight countries fell substantially below that of Costa Rica. Whilst isolated good examples were identified, the overall approach legislates for broad concepts but fails to deliver on detailed provisions. As recommended by the current regional action plan for the conservation of western chimpanzees, all countries would benefit from urgent legislative reform to better incorporate MHPs within EIA procedures. This study provides recommendations in that regard together with a replicable tool for assessing EIA legislation in other jurisdictions.
•Western chimpanzees are threatened by a lack of regulation of development, particularly mining.•Mitigation hierarchy principles are critical to species conservation.•The mitigation hierarchy is not uniformly incorporated into environmental impact assessment and related laws.•Offset measures are all but absent from the legislation of the western chimpanzee range countries.•Environmental impact assessment laws require reform to embed mitigation hierarchy principles.
The IPBES Global Assessment proposed five key interventions to tackle the drivers of nature deterioration. One of these proposals was to take pre-emptive and precautionary actions in regulatory and ...management institutions and businesses. Performance standards are tools that can be used to help achieve these interventions. The most influential standard is Performance Standard 6 (PS6) of the International Finance Corporation (IFC), part of the World Bank Group. Institutions like the IFC invest in the private sector in developing countries, including in the infrastructure, agribusiness, forestry, oil, gas and mining sectors, all of which have the potential to cause large environmental impacts. A core element of PS6 outlines the need for the consideration of “natural and modified habitat” within investment screening processes. Here we use freely available data layers in combination to develop a new global layer that identifies natural and modified habitat. It is aligned with the IFC PS6 definitions of natural and modified habitat. However, we propose this layer as an output that can be used beyond the IFC and could be integrated into the investment decision making of global and regional banks, or the decision making of international corporations.
This study explores whether partnering with the World Bank’s International Finance Corporation (IFC) protects foreign investors from aggressive actions by host countries’ governments. Building on the ...obsolescing bargaining model, we theorize that host states fear that hostile actions towards IFC-supported investments will damage their relationships with the World Bank. Within this context IFC support deters host government aggression towards investments. We assess our argument using country-level panel data as well as interviews with a sample of high-level managers. Findings suggest that IFC-support helps to reduce host state aggression against investing firms.
Determining if and why an impact is significant is a key task to inform decisions on the acceptability of a project through Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA). Hence, an Environmental Impact ...Statement (EIS) should be coherent in reaching conclusions about impact significance and in reverberating them in recommendations about mitigation. In this paper we present a procedure to analyze whether significant impacts are addressed coherently in an EIS, by analyzing if significance determination is grounded in information presented in the baseline and project description, supported by prediction of impact magnitude and if it unfolds into mitigation measures. In order to test the procedure, we applied it to two EIS selected from the International Finance Corporation's database. Results show that all impacts classified as significant were supported by information presented in the baseline and project description, as well as connected to corresponding mitigation measures. However, prediction of impact magnitude was not substantiated either on qualitative or quantitative methods. We argue that coherence in addressing significant impacts is one measure of EIS quality. If an EIS does not address its impacts coherently its reliability and credibility are impaired.
Addressing significant impacts coherently means providing relevant information in appropriate EIS sections. Display omitted
•This paper presents a procedure to analyze coherence in an EIS.•Significant impacts should be related to descriptive sections and impact prediction.•Mitigation or enhancement proposals should be developed for each significant impact.•The procedure was applied to reports prepared to meet to IFC's performance standards.•If an EIS does not address impacts coherently, its reliability is impaired.
Good practice social impact assessment (SIA) should lead to improved local community development outcomes. However, the social benefits alleged to flow from projects are often not as evident to ...affected communities as the project's adverse impacts. Projects still give inadequate attention to social issues and fail to achieve social development outcomes. Using a prominent gas project in Russia, the Nord Stream 2 project, as an illustrative example, we explore the potential of environmental and social impact assessment (ESIA) to enhance the effectiveness of project contributions to local community development. We analyse the main steps of the community development process for the Nord Stream 2 project, and consider how it benefitted from the SIA process. We also reflect on the potential further contribution of SIA to community development. Even though SIA and community development are interrelated, we conclude that SIA, as currently practiced, is constrained in its ability to contribute to community development outcomes. Adjustments to the SIA and corporate social investment frameworks are needed to make them more effective in achieving social development outcomes.
International organizations enjoy unprecedented privileges and immunities which shield them from the neediest individuals. This comment examines the failed immunity and internal accountability regime ...of international organizations. By highlighting the unique characteristics of the Tobacco Master Settlement Agreement, this comment proposes wholesale changes to organizational accountability.
Marine industries face a number of risks that necessitate careful analysis prior to making decisions on the siting of operations and facilities. An important emerging regulatory framework on ...environmental sustainability for business operations is the International Finance Corporation’s Performance Standard 6 (IFC PS6). Within PS6, identification of biodiversity significance is articulated through the concept of “Critical Habitat”, a definition developed by the IFC and detailed through criteria aligned with those that support internationally accepted biodiversity designations. No publicly available tools have been developed in either the marine or terrestrial realm to assess the likelihood of sites or operations being located within PS6-defined Critical Habitat. This paper presents a starting point towards filling this gap in the form of a preliminary global map that classifies more than 13 million km2 of marine and coastal areas of importance for biodiversity (protected areas, Key Biodiversity Areas KBA, sea turtle nesting sites, cold- and warm-water corals, seamounts, seagrass beds, mangroves, saltmarshes, hydrothermal vents and cold seeps) based on their overlap with Critical Habitat criteria, as defined by IFC. In total, 5798×103km2 (1.6%) of the analysis area (global ocean plus coastal land strip) were classed as Likely Critical Habitat, and 7526×103km2 (2.1%) as Potential Critical Habitat; the remainder (96.3%) were Unclassified. The latter was primarily due to the paucity of biodiversity data in marine areas beyond national jurisdiction and/or in deep waters, and the comparatively fewer protected areas and KBAs in these regions. Globally, protected areas constituted 65.9% of the combined Likely and Potential Critical Habitat extent, and KBAs 29.3%, not accounting for the overlap between these two features. Relative Critical Habitat extent in Exclusive Economic Zones varied dramatically between countries. This work is likely to be of particular use for industries operating in the marine and coastal realms as an early screening aid prior to in situ Critical Habitat assessment; to financial institutions making investment decisions; and to those wishing to implement good practice policies relevant to biodiversity management. Supplementary material (available online) includes other global datasets considered, documentation and justification of biodiversity feature classification, detail of IFC PS6 criteria/scenarios, and coverage calculations.
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•A global map identifying potential and likely Critical Habitat, marine and coastal.•Critical Habitat as per ‘International Finance Corporation Performance Standard 6’.•Eleven biodiversity features: protected areas, seagrass beds, corals, seeps, etc.•The ocean was 1.6% ‘Likely Critical Habitat’, and 2.1% ‘Potential Critical Habitat’.•The map can be used as an early screening aid by industries.
Discussions and analysis following Ghana's 2018 banking crisis have placed the burden of blame on both managers of the failed institutions and the Bank of Ghana. This study investigates the corporate ...governance practices employed by leaders of the collapsed institutions and how these factors contributed to the country's banking crisis. A total of 186 newspapers between 2017 and 2019 were scanned for insight regarding the 2018 Ghanaian banking crisis and a content analysis method was employed in analysing the selected text. The findings reveal that some of the actions of managers and shareholders that led to the crisis included: interrelated lending, loan approval without the necessary process, lending to risky borrowers, and breaching the single obligor limit among others. The study recommends that the Central Bank reviews corporate governance regulation and guidelines with the hope of curtailing similar manager and shareholder actions which could prevent future bank failures.
To address the need for greater volumes of private investment tackling sustainable development goals in the most isolated regions, the Global Emerging Markets Risk Database Consortium (GEMs) issued ...its first public report on credit default statistics for private and sub-sovereign lending. Established by the European Investment Bank and the International Finance Corporation, GEMs is a network of 25 multilateral development banks and development finance institutions. GEMs pools anonymised credit information with a focus on emerging markets and developing countries where data are scarce and finance is most needed. Since 2009, the GEMs members have collected and shared credit risk data internally. Members have now decided to make this knowledge public. More information on the GEMs consortium can be found at www.gemsriskdatabase.org
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