East African oil pipeline would cause more emissions than Denmark | China Dialogue

Chinese lenders should pull out of the risky Uganda–Tanzania oil project and invest in renewables instead, argues Erik Myxter-lino. Since 2017, China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC) has been working with oil majors Total and Tullow to exploit untouched oil in western Uganda. Yet the project is stuck in limbo. The stoppage is a chance […]

Watchdog to investigate World Bank Group’s opaque support for coal expansion in Philippines

The International Finance Corporation’s independent watchdog has announced that it will launch a compliance investigation into the World Bank Group member for its investments in a commercial bank in the Philippines that bankrolled the country’s recent coal power boom. After receiving $254 million in IFC funds, Rizal Commercial Banking Corporation became a key financier of […]

International call on banks: Don’t finance the East Africa Crude Oil Pipeline

Uganda pipeline

A coalition of African and international organizations is today calling on South Africa’s Standard Bank and Japan’s Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corp (SMBC) to withdraw from their role as lead arrangers for a massive oil pipeline under construction in Uganda and Tanzania. The East Africa Crude Oil Pipeline is being developed as part of a push to open oil fields […]

Civil society welcomes IFC’s moves to exclude coal in its financial intermediary lending

(Bali) – Civil society groups from around the world today welcomed news that the World Bank’s private sector arm, the International Finance Corporation (IFC), has taken significant steps to vastly reduce its exposure to coal through new financial intermediary (FI) investments. The CEO of the IFC, Philippe Le Houérou, has committed to help FI clients […]

World Bank and International Investors Bankrolling Climate Disaster in Philippines

Philippines

International investors have in recent years poured billions of dollars into coal-fired power plants in the Philippines, one of the world’s most vulnerable countries to climate change. The World Bank Group, commercial banks and asset managers have quietly bankrolled a coal boom on the island nation despite many of them pledging to end or cut […]

Report Shines a Light on Hidden Backers of World’s Most Destructive Coal Project

Some of the biggest players in global finance are quietly backing the world’s most dangerous coal plant, according to an investigative report released today. International investors are enabling and profiting from the proposed Rampal plant in southern Bangladesh despite persistent warnings that it will damage the world’s largest mangrove forest, intensify climate change and imperil […]

World Bank Fueling Climate Change, Philippine Groups Allege in Historic Complaint

(Washington DC, October 11, 2017) – More than 100 citizen groups and affected communities in the Philippines today filed a historic complaint against the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the World Bank’s private-sector arm. The complaint accuses the IFC of fueling global climate change through its opaque investments in a Philippine bank that is a major financier of the coal industry. This is the first climate change-related complaint received by the IFC’s independent watchdog, the Compliance Advisor Ombudsman.