G8 LEADERS URGED TO DUMP THE WORLD BANK'S CLIMATE INVESTMENT FUNDS

G8 leaders meeting in Hokkaido July 7-9 to tackle issues such as rising oil prices and global warming are being urged to dump the World Bank’s highly controversial ‘climate investment funds’.

MEDIA ADVISORY
Friends of the Earth International
July 4, 2008


G8 LEADERS URGED TO DUMP THE WORLD BANK'S CLIMATE INVESTMENT FUNDS


HOKKAIDO, JAPAN, July 4, 2008 -- G8 leaders meeting in Hokkaido July 7-9 to tackle issues such as rising oil prices and global warming are being urged to dump the World Bank’s highly controversial ‘climate investment funds’.

Friends of the Earth International Climate and Energy Coordinator Joseph Zacune said:

"The G8 meeting is being promoted as an opportunity to address global warming but G8 nations are promoting policies such as World Bank climate funds and carbon trading for forests that will damage the environment and harm developing country communities that are least responsible for climate change and most vulnerable to its impacts."

“G8 countries have benefited economically by exploiting fossil fuels across the planet for the past 250 years and they must live up to their historical and current responsibilities by radically cutting their own emissions and supporting developing countries and communities’ efforts to reduce their emissions and adapt to climate change," he added.

Campaigners and community leaders will be protesting and speaking out against the World Bank's launch of its climate investment funds during the G8 Summit, which are being supported by the United States, the UK and Japan.

Friends of the Earth US International Finance campaigner Karen Orenstein said:

"If the Bush, Brown, and Fukuda administrations are trying to generate international good will and show commitment to tackling climate change, then the World Bank is the exact wrong institution to do so. There is immense distrust of the World Bank by the very constituencies it professes to serve, precisely because of its long record of miring the South in crushing debt; its financing of polluting industries, oil extraction, mega-dams, logging, and industrial plantations; and its widespread disregard of the rights of communities affected by its policies and projects."

“The Bank's new climate funds will undermine United Nations climate talks, increase debt, and pay polluters. They will potentially also threaten Indigenous Peoples' land rights through the Bank’s carbon trading for forests initiatives. Industrialised countries should reject the Bank’s funds and proactively support a technology financing mechanism for clean, safe and renewable energy under the full authority of the United Nations.
They should also support Indigenous Peoples' land rights and radically reduce their own wasteful consumption," she added

Friends of the Earth International believes that industrialised countries should be supporting and committing to funds established under the authority of the UN Climate Change Convention, to pay for adaptation, mitigation, forest protection and clean sustainable development in developing countries. In addition they should implement moratoria on fossil fuel finance and subsidies and ensure forest protection programs that uphold the rights of Indigenous Peoples and communities.

Friends of the Earth Japan will be holding events parallel to the G8 Summit demanding climate justice, opposing the World Bank's climate funds, and highlighting the dangers of the rush for agrofuels.

Friends of the Earth Japan campaigner Kenichi Nakazawa said:

“Agrofuels are fuelling deforestation, loss of biodiversity and climate change. They are also causing food price increase, hunger, land rights violations, water scarcity and human rights abuses. Governments must say no to agrofuels.”


FOR MORE INFORMATION:

IN JAPAN:

Joseph Zacune, Friends of the Earth International Climate and Energy Coordinator:
Mobile in Japan: +44-79-67877593 (English, Spanish, Swedish).

Kenichi Nakazawa, Friends of the Earth Japan
Mobile in Japan: +81-90-3506-4542 (English and Japanese)


OUTSIDE JAPAN:

Meena Raman, Friends of the Earth International Chair
Mobile in Malaysia: + 60-124-300-042 (Malay and English)

Tom Picken, Friends of the Earth England, Wales and Northern Ireland
Mobile in the UK: + 44 -7810 558 247

Janneke Bruil, Friends of the Earth International Mobile in the Netherlands:

+31-6-52118998 (English, Dutch, Spanish, French)

Juana Camacho, Friends of the Earth International Climate and Energy Coordinator Mobile in Colombia :

+57-311-558-4655 (Spanish, English)