Discussion Note Highlights Key Considerations in ADB’s Safeguard Update
ADB has embarked on a safeguard policy update to enhance the effectiveness of its three safeguard policies (environment, indigenous peoples, and involuntary resettlement) and ensure relevance to changing client needs and new lending modalities and instruments. A discussion note highlighting key considerations for the update was posted on ADB's website on 26 October 2005. Comments on the note may be sent to safeguards_update@adb.org. In January 2006, ADB will begin broad-based consultations on the update with stakeholders, including those affected by ADB-financed projects. For more information, contact Albab Akanda, Principal Safeguard Specialist, Regional and Sustainable Development Department (RSDD), at aakanda@adb.org.
Website Provides Easy Access to Information about ADB Safeguards
A new website provides a one-stop information source on the ADB’s policies on environment, indigenous peoples, and involuntary resettlement. It provides links to the respective policies, Operations Manual sections, guidelines, and handbooks. It also presents information on ADB's safeguard policy update. For more information, contact Helen Cruda, Senior Environment Officer, RSDD, at hcruda@adb.org.
Civil Society Consultation to Inform ADB’s Water Policy Implementation
At least 70 representatives of advocacy NGOs, research institutes, universities, community-based service and environmental education organizations, and project-affected areas will participate in a Civil Society Consultation at ADB headquarters in Manila on 18 November 2005 to deliberate on the implementation of ADB's Water Policy in developing countries. Two NGO networks, WaterAid and the NGO Forum on ADB, will present case studies on ADB-assisted activities in the water sector. For more information, contact the review’s Lead Facilitator, ADB consultant, Kathryn Nelson at knelson@adb.org.
ADB Mobilizes Resources to Tackle Avian Flu
ADB is ready to assist its members to combat avian flu (H5N1) and to prepare for a possible human influenza pandemic. In the medium term, ADB could commit at least $470 million to support Asia's responses and readiness to fight avian flu. In October, ADB announced $28 million grant for a regional project addressing avian flu and human influenza preparedness, and another $30 million grant for a regional communicable disease control project in the Mekong. For more information, contact Jacques Jeugmans, Principal Health Specialist, RSDD, at jjeugmans@adb.org.
Villagers, Local Governments and ADB Reach Agreement on Indonesian Project
ADB, local government officials, and representatives of five villages in South Kalimantan, Indonesia signed village-level agreements concerning the Community Empowerment for Rural Development Project (CERDP) in Indonesia. ADB's Office of the Special Project Facilitator (OSPF) received a complaint from Forum Masyarakat Peduli on 18 February 2005 with three local NGOs acting as complainant’s intermediary. The issues of the complaint were: (i) infrastructure, (ii) sequencing of project components, (iii) information, and (iv) participation in decision making. The tripartite agreements, signed in late September, addressed these issues to the satisfaction of the parties concerned. For more information, contact Karin Oswald, Senior Project Facilitation Specialist, OSPF, at koswald@adb.org.
Poor Women in Bangladesh to Gain from New Phase of Primary Health Care Program
ADB will help improve the health status of Bangladesh's urban population, especially the poor, in six city corporations and five municipalities by providing a package of high-impact health services implemented largely by NGOs, through a $40 million loan and grant package. The project will ensure that at least 30% of the preventive, promotive, and curative health services target poor people earning less than Tk700 ($11) per month. Nutritional supplements will also be given to severely malnourished women and children. The project will likewise support the construction of 64 health facilities, upgrading of 4, and purchase of 12 apartments and/or buildings for primary health care facilities in Dhaka. For more information, contact Sekhar Bonu, Health Specialist, South Asia Department, at sbonu@adb.org.
Electronic Resource Provides Access to Dam-Related Information
A new "e-paper" has been launched on ADB's website to provide structured, easy access to a range of papers, case studies, and websites that address planning and implementation of dam projects. In launching the paper, ADB's Water Team seeks to make a wide spectrum of information on dams more widely available, generate informed discussion on the challenges facing future projects, and provide a resource document for the review of the implementation of ADB's Water Policy. For more information, contact Woochong Um, Director, Energy, Transport and Water Division, RSDD, at wcum@adb.org.
ADB’s Auditor General Highlights Impact of Corruption on the Poor
In a presentation made on 17 October 2005 at the North-South Institute in Ottawa, Canada, ADB Auditor General, Peter Egen Pedersen, reported on ADB’s implementation of its Anticorruption Policy. He reminded the audience of development practitioners that, “the fight against corruption goes hand in hand with the fight against poverty. Corruption is for all practical purposes a disproportional tax on the poor, and experience shows that corruption harms the economy, undermines the rule of law and weakens public trust in government.” Two days later, the Auditor General discussed corruption issues with NGO representatives in Washington, D.C.
Policy Brief Explores "Vulnerability" as Measure of Poverty
ADB’s Economics and Research Department has published a new policy brief entitled Conceptualizing and Measuring Poverty as Vulnerability: Does it Make a Difference?. The publication's co-authors, ADB economists Ajay Tandon and Rana Hasan, examine whether measuring poverty on the basis of vulnerability, rather than the standard "$1 a day" measure of income poverty, significantly alters the choice of policies and strategies for maximizing poverty reduction. They conclude that such an approach emphasizes the centrality of social protection and other risk-mitigating polices for poverty reduction.
Recruitment Notices Announce Opportunities to Work with ADB
Consulting Services Recruitment Notices (CSRNs) provide detailed information on consulting services required for ADB-financed or ADB-administered technical assistance and other grant projects. CSRNs include terms of reference for the assignment and are posted on ADB's website at least one month before short-listing. Many ADB project engage NGOs as consultants. For more information, contact ADB's Central Operations Services Office at consulting@adb.org.
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NGO Visitors: Blacksmith Institute
This regular feature spotlights one of the many civil society organizations that has recently met with ADB staff at the institution’s headquarters in Metro Manila, Philippines.
The Blacksmith Institute was formed in 1999 to address the most dangerously polluted sites throughout the developing and transitioning world. Legacy pollution problems and active polluters impact the health of entire communities and cause substantial suffering from pollution-related illness. Chronic pollution threatens international efforts to create sustainable economies and break the poverty cycle.
To combat this issue, Blacksmith Institute created "Polluted Places," a program designed to locate and remediate the dirtiest, most dangerously polluted sites overlooked by the rest of the world. The Institute works where people suffer serious health problems because of pollution. At and around these sites, life expectancy can often be below 45, and birth defect rates are sometimes over 50%. These are the Chernobyls and Bhopals about which no one hears.
Today, Blacksmith has over 40 projects active in more than 12 countries. Its partner base is made up of a variety of regional and national governments that usually finance specific remediation projects directly. Blacksmith believes that the development community urgently needs to scale up existing remediation efforts.
ADB and Blacksmith Institute are cooperating in India though a pilot initiative financed by the Poverty and Environment Program. "Polluted Places: India" aims to reduce levels of mortality and morbidity caused by chemical pollution in selected local communities in India and to strengthen local government and community capacity to initiate and undertake successful remediation efforts.
Blacksmith Institute’s Richard Fuller, President, and Karti Sandilya, Senior Adviser, visited ADB in October 2005 to brief ADB staff on the Institute's clean-up efforts in transition and developing countries. For more information on the organization, contact Mr. Fuller, at fuller@blacksmithinstitute.org, or visit the website at http://www.blacksmithinstitute.org*.
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