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Major World Bank Programs |
NGO participation | |
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Poverty reduction activities Environmentally sustainable development |
The high level of nongovernmental organizations'
(NGOs) participation in Bank-supported development activities was maintained, with
47 percent of operations approved in fiscal 1997 involving
NGO participation in some
capacity (see Operations and Projects Approved and table
2-2). Figure 2-1 shows the NGO involvement in Bank projects by type of
NGO.
To further NGO contributions to Bank-supported development work at the field level, NGO liaison staff have been appointed to seventy-two resident missions; more than half of these are full-time NGO specialists. They are strengthening communication and information flows and ensuring more systematic in-country consultation and dialogue between the Bank and indigenous NGOs. Several initiatives to strengthen NGO partnership were undertaken in fiscal 1997. A donor-Bank-NGO workshop hosted by the Regional Environmental Center in Budapest, for example, included meetings between senior Bank management and environmental NGOs to discuss operational experience and identify opportunities for additional partnership. And subregional workshops in Brazil, Ecuador, and El Salvador brought together NGOs, government, private sector representatives, and senior Bank management for the first time to discuss and analyze partnership roles for the joint fight against poverty. The new Corporate Citizenship Program, launched during the Annual Meetings in October 1996, is bringing together government leaders, business, and civil society to forge innovative public-private partnerships to foster social and human development. Pilot projects are being developed in Angola, Colombia, the Philippines, Poland, and Slovenia. Collaboration between the Bank and NGOs continues to be enhanced through the NGO-World Bank Committee. Several important new initiatives were launched in the fiscal year, including an interagency working group on NGO capacity building, which was proposed by Southern NGO members; a joint NGO-Bank program to monitor stakeholder participation in eight Bank projects; and NGO participation in the Global Conference on Social Funds, organized by the Economic Development Institute (EDI), which examined lessons learned from the past ten years. A discussion paper on NGO involvement in World Bank-financed social funds, published in December 1996, reviews NGO contributions and identifies key issues and lessons learned from experience to date. Initiated in 1994, the Forest Market Transformation Initiative (FMTI) began a second phase of operations in fiscal 1997 and exemplifies the innovative work partnerships can undertake. This strategic coalition of conservation NGOs, private sector forest industry leaders, researchers, development practitioners, and financiers, including the World Bank, is working to develop innovative approaches to the adoption of more environmentally friendly forest management and marketing practices in the remaining forest frontiers. The FMTI is particularly concerned to accelerate a shift in private sector behavior in the remaining intact forest frontier areas of the Asia-Pacific region, Central Africa, Latin America, and the Russian Federation--regions that are coming under increasing pressure from unsustainable and environmentally destructive forms of forest exploitation. FMTI aims to develop and promote financial and other incentives--with support from the Global Environment Facility (GEF), the IFC, voluntary foundations, and other sources--to help companies overcome barriers to the sustainable use of forests. Companies would be encouraged to begin transforming forest sector markets toward sustainable practices and to encourage the development of alternative fiber products. This would reduce the pressures on natural forests from demands for timber and other industrial products. |
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