New report from portfolio.earth scores 12 leading development banks’ nature and biodiversity financing exclusion policies.

LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM, November 29, 2021 /EINPresswire.com/ -- INVESTIGATION REVEALS PUBLIC MONEY FUELLING LARGE-SCALE ENVIRONMENTAL DAMAGE

New report from portfolio.earth scores 12 leading development banks’ nature and biodiversity financing exclusion policies – casting doubt on COP26 MDB statement on nature.

- Investigation reveals IFC among funders of projects killing hundreds of critically endangered West African Chimpanzees, fuelling the plastics crisis, and funding pesticides deemed hazardous in Sub-Saharan Africa.
- Development Finance Institutions (DFIs) score extremely poorly on strength of policies to protect nature, with an average score of 1.9/10 – contrary to public statements made this year and at COP26.

A new investigation from non-profit group portfolio.earth has revealed how government-funded Development Finance Institutions (DFIs) such as the International Finance Corporation (an arm of the World Bank), CDC Group (UK), KfW (Germany), Proparco (France), and African Development Bank are spending taxpayer money subsidising the destruction of nature.

In a report released today – ‘Subsidising Extinction: Public Money for Public Harm’ – 12 of the most prominent DFIs, most of whom receive funds from G7 and G20 nations, were scored on the strength of their financing exclusion policies for projects and companies that have the highest destructive impact on biodiversity. However, despite the funders and shareholders of these banks having recently made commitments to ‘halt and reverse biodiversity loss’, the banks they help run scored an average of only 1.98 out of 10 for the policies they currently have in place.

This extremely poor score highlights the lack of oversight from governments as to how their development funding is being spent.

An ‘MDB Joint Statement on Nature’ at COP26 from a handful of development banks stated they had already mainstreamed environmental sustainability into their policies and operations. This report brings the validity of this statement into question.

portfolio.earth’s investigators also uncovered several remarkable and harrowing examples of DFIs’ wilful disregard for nature including ‘offsetting the lives of chimpanzees’, ‘Drowning in plastics’, ‘peat - the forgotten fossil fuel’, and ‘Toxic for people, toxic for nature’.

Liz Gallagher, Convener of porfolio.earth, said:

“The hypocrisy of governments simultaneously shouting about their green credentials whilst the development banks they fund and help govern provide support for such large-scale environmental destruction is staggering. Governments need to ensure that the DFIs they support set in stone policies that prevent public money funding public harm.

“All DFIs should commit at the Finance in Common Summit to assessing how at risk nature is as a consequence of their financing.”

portfolio.earth DFI scoring analysis

portfolio.earth assessed the exclusion policies 12 of the world's most important DFIs had applied to tackling the world’s biodiversity crisis. To evaluate the exclusion policy strength, a scoring system was developed and applied against 8 of the most important sectors that contribute to the global biodiversity crisis: Natural Habitat, Fisheries & Farming, Agriculture, Forestry & Bioenergy, Mining, Fossil Fuels, Infrastructure and Plastic.

We found that no development bank assessed is doing anywhere near enough to exclude nature destructive projects:

• None of the development banks assessed have enough policies in place to exclude nature destructive projects, scoring on average less than 2 out of 10.
• Only 3 of 12 banks assessed achieved more than 3 out of 10 points.
• The highest scoring bank in this assessment was the French development bank AFD, still only scoring 3.6 out of 10.
• The lowest scoring bank was the African Development Bank (AfDB), scoring 0.2 points and featuring in all 3 of this report's case studies.

Liz Gallagher, Convener of porfolio.earth, added:

“Meeting environmental and social standards is a core part of DFIs’ mandates, ensuring the long-term viability of economic activity within the countries they are supporting. This research shows an abject failure to deliver that mandate. The delegates at tomorrow’s Finance in Common summit should address these failings as a matter of urgency.”

- Ends -
Notes to editor
Media contact
- Ola Adeyemi, ESG Communications
- T: + 44 (0)7721655294| ola@esgcomms.com

Summary of exclusion policies of twelve major development banks from ‘Subsidising Extinction: Public Money for Public Harm’

Media is encouraged to reproduce this figure, but please credit portfolio.earth.

Ola Adeyemi
We Work
07721655294
email us here

Legal Disclaimer:

EIN Presswire provides this news content "as is" without warranty of any kind. We do not accept any responsibility or liability for the accuracy, content, images, videos, licenses, completeness, legality, or reliability of the information contained in this article. If you have any complaints or copyright issues related to this article, kindly contact the author above.