Review and Update of the World Bank’s Environmental and Social Safeguard Policies Phase 3 Feedback Summary Date: December 15, 2015 Location (City, Country): NIAMEY Audience: CSOs/NGOs Key: C = Comment Q = Question ESF Issue Items Feedback Vision Rights Approach to rights in C: Concerns regarding how Bank will follow up and tackle human rights the ESF issues in the ESF. Q: If it was difficult to get some countries’ agreement to protect human rights even on paper, what will the reality be? Q: Food security is a human right. Why are the WB and ADB asking to do more studies on environmental and social issues? Is there a concern about the quality of the existing studies or is it due to the new norms that WB want to impose? Q: The Western conception of human rights does not match our culture and traditions. How does the WB guarantee that including the human rights norms is not contradictory with the Bank’s development objectives? Q: Since the scope of the human rights issues under the ESF is very narrow, wouldn’t that mean we are enabling project implementers to transgress the human rights?
Review and Update of the World Bank’s Environmental and Social Safeguard Policies Phase 3 Feedback Summary Date: December 15, 2015 Location (City, Country): NIAMEY Audience: CSOs/NGOs Key: C = Comment Q = Question ESF Issue Items Feedback Vision Rights Approach to rights in the ESF C: Concerns regarding how Bank will follow up and tackle human rights issues in the ESF. Q: If it was difficult to get some countries’ agreement to protect human rights even on paper, what will the reality be? Q: Food security is a human right. Why are the WB and ADB asking to do more studies on environmental and social issues? Is there a concern about the quality of the existing studies or is it due to the new norms that WB want to impose? Q: The Western conception of human rights does not match our culture and traditions. How does the WB guarantee that including the human rights norms is not contradictory with the Bank’s development objectives? Q: Since the scope of the human rights issues under the ESF is very narrow, wouldn’t that mean we are enabling project implementers to transgress the human rights?
niger_consultations_-_csos_-_december_2015_-draft_summary.docx