Press release

Barclays chief Antony Jenkins announced today that the bank would stop speculating on food, saying the practice is “not compatible with our purpose”. It is unclear whether the bank will continue to broker speculative deals for its clients. Campaigners have renewed calls for tough regulation to prevent speculation fuelling price spikes and contributing to the global hunger crisis.

Jenkins announced the move today as part of the bank’s strategic review. He said the end to the bank’s trading in agricultural commodities for speculative purposes was an example of Barclays “putting its words into action”. He told UK MPs last week that he would build a “socially useful” bank and “shred situations where we're short-termist, too aggressive and too self-centred.” But Jenkins made no commitment to change the bank’s speculation on other commodities, such as oil, which has a knock-on impact on food prices.

World Development Movement campaigners protesting outside Barclays' 2012 AGM

Until now, Barclays has been the leading UK bank involved in speculation on food including staples like wheat, maize and soy. The bank...

WDM has reacted with concern to international development secretary Justine Greening’s announcement today that no new British financial aid grants will be made to India with immediate effect, and that from now on UK aid to India will focus on private sector projects designed to help the poor while generating a return.

Responding to this news, Alex Scrivener, policy officer for the World Development Movement said:

“It is worrying that the UK government has decided to cut all financial aid to India, which is home to a third of the world’s poorest people. While there may be a lot of money within the Indian elite, the country remains a very unequal society, with around half a billion people living in extreme poverty.

“But what is more worrying, is that UK aid money will continue to be spent on private sector projects that support the interests of big business rather than the poor. In the Indian state of Orissa, UK aid has been used to draft a government policy giving free land and tax breaks to auto-component multinationals and promote public-private partnerships in health and education – a model that has served only to fill the pockets of big business at taxpayers’ expense here in the UK. In neighbouring Bangladesh, UK aid money has helped set up ‘...

On the final day of the Rio+20 summit, the World Development Movement has slammed the lack of commitment from rich industrialised countries in the Rio+20 agreement, and has condemned the UK government’s use of the summit to push for the privatisation of nature. 

Kirsty Wright, campaigner at the World Development Movement, said:

Rio+20 has produced a pathetically unambitious document devoid of solid commitments and packed with diplomatic fudges and ambiguous language. This will do nothing to solve the multiple crises we face.

The UK government, ignoring developing countries’ solid opposition to its plans to put a financial value on nature, has used the summit to push forward its ‘great nature sale’, which would see control of resources like water and biodiversity taken from the people who depend on them, and handed over to multinational companies.

Role of the UK government 

Kirsty Wright said:

The UK government has used the Rio+20 summit as a smokescreen for pushing forward the interests of bankers and multinational corporations. As we steamroll towards environmental destruction and ever growing gap between rich and poor, the UK and its allies are championing the same broken...

European proposals for the regulation of the commodity markets are inadequate to prevent excessive speculation from contributing to food price spikes, according to a new report released today.

Proposals discussed yesterday by the European parliament’s Economic and Monetary Affairs (ECON) committee rely on a system of ‘position management’ or ‘position checks’ to prevent market manipulation and excessive speculation from distorting commodity prices. But the report, from the World Development Movement, argues that the proposals are doomed to failure and that a system of position limits is essential.

Financial speculation on the commodity markets is fuelling price volatility and contributing to price spikes, increasing food bills for consumers and driving up hunger and poverty.

The report, ‘Back to fundamentals’, shows that:

• Position limits are the international norm for regulating the commodity markets.

• Position limits have a track record of success - US markets functioned effectively for...

The UK’s financial regulator is compromised by corporate capture and is increasingly acting as a lobbying arm for the sector it is supposed to regulate, a new report reveals today.

The report, ‘Financial Services Authority: watchdog or lapdog?’, by the World Development Movement, documents how funding from the City of London, a board dominated by figures from the banking sector, and a rapidly revolving door have led to a close relationship between regulators and the financial sector. 

The report exposes the Financial Services Authority (FSA)’s use of its resources to influence financial reform legislation in the financial sector’s favour. It argues that the regulator is working to prevent effective regulation of the commodity markets, where financial speculation has contributed to sharp spikes in food prices.

A text drafted last week by an FSA secondee in the European parliament has proposed to severely weaken European Commission proposals to regulate the commodity markets, failing to reflect the concerns of many MEPs.

FSA staff have been seconded to every UK and EU institution involved in financial reform, and are lobbying MPs in the European...

Campaigners from the World Development Movement will protest at Barclays’ AGM tomorrow, exposing Barclays’ role in fuelling global hunger by betting on food prices.

Where: Entrance to the Barclays AGM, Royal Festival Hall, South Bank, London SE1 8XX

When: 10.30-11.30am, Friday 27 April

Two suited, blue masked Barclays ‘eagles’ on Barclays bikes will join protestors holding placards reading, ‘Barclays banks on hunger’.

The campaigners also staged an award ceremony outside Barclays HQ in Canary Wharf today to hand over a ‘shame award’, which the bank won for speculating on food prices.

The World Development Movement estimates that Barclays made up to £189 million from speculating on food in 2011. The bank is the biggest UK player in commodity markets, and claims to be in the global top three. Massive influxes of speculative money in food markets have been driving sharp price spikes, sending the cost of food soaring beyond the reach of the world’s poorest people.

Barclays CEO Bob Diamond, currently in the spotlight over his £17.7 million pay package, responded to the Occupy movement by telling the BBC in November that banks must be “better citizens”. Diamond...

The battle over EU commodity market regulation commences this week, with key bureaucrats meeting in Brussels tomorrow to thrash out an agreement on regulation of commodity derivative markets.

The European Parliament’s rapporteur for the review of the Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (MiFID), German MEP Markus Ferber, said on Friday that he intends to introduce strong controls on financial speculation in these markets:

Highly speculative investment must no longer influence the price of agrarian raw materials. Excessive speculation on foodstuffs and raw materials threatens the smooth functioning of commodity future markets and creates massive price volatility. We certainly need to contain that.”

It is unclear whether the officials from member states meeting tomorrow will make a similar recommendation. The UK government is known to be opposed to the introduction of ‘position limits’, which advocates believe to be the most effective tool in limiting speculative activity in commodity derivatives markets. The UK is expected to block any attempts to remove a loophole which would allow weaker ‘alternative arrangements’ at tomorrow’s meeting. Position limits would set maximum limits for the market share traders could hold.

The...

555 million women go hungry worldwide, according to estimates released today by the World Development Movement to mark International Women’s Day.

The anti-poverty campaign group is calling for action to tackle spiralling food prices, which disproportionately affect women. The EU will vote later this year on measures to prevent excessive financial speculation in food markets from driving up prices.

An estimated 60 per cent of the world’s 925 million hungry people are women, and 315,000 women die annually in childbirth due to lack of iron. Food prices in 2011 were 24 per cent higher than in 2010, driving more people into hunger, malnutrition and poverty.  

Indian government food advisor Biraj Patnaik told the World Development Movement:

Among the complaints of starvation deaths that we receive in my office to investigate, a large number are from single women who are bringing up children … Women often, given the gender inequity in our society, ration their own food so they can feed the children and feed parents."

Judith Atieno Odhiambo from Kenya told the World Development Movement how a sudden price hike affected her:

The prices shot up and later...

 The World Development Movement has today warned that the UK’s new drive to provide aid to Somalia is looking like a ‘cynical’ attempt to grab its oil, rather than being aimed at ensuring a better future for people in one of the world’s poorest countries.

A report in the Observer newspaper on Sunday revealed that UK officials have been engaged in secret negotiations with Somali leaders to secure access to the country’s immense oil reserves. The revelation came after the UK announced a large aid package for Somalia, and David Cameron hosted a conference in London last week on the development of the war torn state. 

International development secretary Andrew Mitchell has denied that the timing of the aid programme is linked to the imminent start of oil extraction in Somalia. But the World Development Movement is concerned that the UK may have set off an international scramble for the country’s fossil fuel resources that will be of no benefit to the local population. Other countries, like Nigeria or Angola, that have embarked on resource extraction as a form of “development” are now plagued by the resource curse, which may actually lower GDP over the long-term, while...

Barclays Bank has today won a Public Eye ‘shame award’, for speculating on food prices. Barclays’ activity is fuelling hunger and poverty worldwide, says the World Development Movement, which nominated the bank.

The award was presented today in Davos, Switzerland, to coincide with the World Economic Forum.

Barclays is estimated to make up to £340 million a year from speculating in food ‘futures’ markets, making it the biggest UK player in the markets. Massive influxes of speculative money in food markets have been driving sharp price spikes, sending the cost of food soaring beyond the reach of the world’s poorest people.

Barclays won the Public Eye ‘global award’, selected by a panel of judges. The ‘people’s award’, decided by an online vote, went to Brazilian company Vale, for its involvement in the construction of the controversial Belo Monte dam in the Amazon. Forty thousand people are likely to be forced from their land if the dam goes ahead.

Barclays CEO Bob Diamond responded to the Occupy movement by telling the BBC in November that banks must be “better citizens”. 

Rules to curb speculation are being...

European banks, pension funds and insurance companies are increasing global hunger and poverty by speculating on food prices and financing land grabs in poorer countries, according to a new report released today (January 12) by Friends of the Earth Europe and the World Development Movement. [1]

The report, ‘Farming Money’, analyses the activities of 29 European banks, pension funds and insurance companies, including Barclays, RBS, HSBC, Deutsche Bank, Allianz, BNP Paribas, AXA, Generali, Allianz, Unicredit and Credit Agricole. It reveals the significant involvement of these financial institutions in food speculation, and the direct or indirect financing of land grabbing. Environmental and development organisations are calling for strict regulation to rein in these destructive activities.

Hannah Griffiths, head of policy and campaigns at the World Development Movement, said:

Financial speculation on food and the financing of land grabbing have destabilised global food prices, with steep price hikes forcing millions of people into poverty and hunger. Banks like Barclays are making vast profits at the expense of the lives of the world’s most vulnerable people....

The World Development Movement has slammed the outcome of the UN climate talks in Durban as a ‘spectacular failure’ that will condemn the world’s poorest people to hunger, poverty and ultimately, death.

Murray Worthy, World Development Movement policy officer, said: “Developed countries have behaved shamefully, blocking meaningful progress on tackling climate change. They have refused to acknowledge their historical responsibility for the crisis, either by agreeing to reduce their emissions or by providing finance to help developing countries deal with climate change. 

“These talks have been held hostage by the EU. It seems EU countries came to Durban to impose a deal, not negotiate one. The spectacular failure to achieve an outcome on the most urgent issues puts the world on course for devastating climate change, condemning those least responsible to greater hunger, poverty and ultimately, death.

“The Kyoto Protocol is now only a shadow of what it was and the second commitment period will be its last. There is nothing more than hope in a new deal to replace it, a deal that could well be based on the weak ineffective voluntary approach first put forward at Copenhagen, and that would come into force too late to have any chance of avoiding the most...

A new climate change finance package, announced today by Chris Huhne, will push up developing countries’ debt, say campaigners from the World Development Movement.

At least £235 million of the money announced today by UK Energy and Climate Change Secretary Chris Huhne will be in the form of loans rather than grants, going through World Bank climate lending programmes that have already pushed some of the world’s poorest countries deeper into debt. 

£150 million, the largest part of today’s announcement, will go to the World Bank’s Clean Technology Fund. UK money previously given to this fund helped finance private sector projects including a wind farm in Mexico which violates the rights of indigenous people and does not increase energy access, instead selling all of its electricity at a discounted rate to US multinational Walmart.

But campaigners welcomed the announcement that £10 million would be given to the UN Adaptation Fund, to directly help people in developing countries cope with the effects of climate change. The UK has until now given no money to the UN fund, which is threatened with closure if contributions from developed countries do not increase...

A report launched by the World Development Movement reveals shocking bullying and bribery tactics employed by countries including the UK and the US to try to kill the Kyoto Protocol, as negotiators from the world’s governments gather today in Durban, South Africa, for the start of the 2011 UN climate talks.

Through exclusive new interviews with negotiators from developing countries, the report exposes the ‘unfair, undemocratic and deceitful’ tactics used by developed countries to skew the climate change negotiations in their favour and backtrack on their legal commitments.

The report features previously unpublished testimonies from insiders at the Copenhagen and Cancun climate summits in 2009 and 2010. They reveal how key agreements such as the Copenhagen Accord were developed, including though secret meetings and the sidelining of developing country negotiators, followed by agreements being presented to developing countries on a ‘take-it-or-leave-it’ basis.

The Copenhagen Accord marked a unprecedented shift in the UN climate negotiations, away from the...

UK money will be used for a ‘climate loan’ to Jamaica, increasing its already heavy debt burden, following a decision by the World Bank this week.

Campaigners have condemned the loan, which will drive the Caribbean nation deeper into poverty. Jamaica’s foreign debt stands at $2,500 per person, and the country spends $1.2 billion a year on debt repayments. The government’s foreign-owed debts are 55 per cent of national income, making it's debt burden one of the heaviest in the world.[1]

The $10 million loan agreed this week is intended to help Jamaica adapt to the effects of climate change. But campaigners say countries like the UK should give climate funds as grants rather than loans.

Jubilee Debt Campaign spokesperson Tim Jones said today:

Debt has devastated lives across the world, bringing economic collapse and diverting money from essential public services. The Jamaican government already spends $450 per person annually on debt repayments, more than on education and healthcare combined. The World Bank and UK government should be cancelling Jamaica's debt, not adding to it with new unjust climate loans."

...

Plans for EU financial reform to be announced today are expected to be insufficient to tackle soaring global food prices, say campaigners from the World Development Movement.

Proposals to be released in Brussels today for a major overhaul of the EU’s financial architecture are set to include measures to increase regulation of commodity markets, where banks and hedge funds speculate on the price of food. But a leaked draft revealed a series of loopholes which campaigners say would make the proposed rules “completely ineffective” in preventing financial speculation from driving up food prices.

The US has already moved to curb excessive speculation on food prices, and on Tuesday American regulators voted to introduce limits on the largest speculators’ involvement in food markets. French President Nicholas Sarkozy is pushing for tough European regulation, but UK Chancellor George Osborne, influenced by the City of London, is understood to be blocking tighter controls.

European commissioner for the internal market, Michel Barnier, who is expected to announce the EU plans today, has spoken out in favour of regulation, telling the European Parliament in January last year, “Speculation in basic foodstuffs is a...

International financial regulators have called today for tighter controls on financial speculation in commodity markets, but anti-poverty campaigners the World Development Movement have branded the regulators’ rules as ‘too weak’, saying they will not tackle the growing hunger and poverty caused by speculation on food prices.

The International Organisation of Securities Commissions (IOSCO), representing regulators from 115 countries, has recommended rules to control the amounts that traders such as investment banks and other financial players can hold in commodity markets.

The Pope, the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation and the UN special rapporteur on the right to food and are among those who have blamed financial speculation in commodity markets for contributing to spiralling global food prices. The prices of basic foods such as wheat have jumped by over 30 per cent in the past year, while rising prices pushed 44 million people into extreme poverty in the last six months of 2010 alone.

The World Development Movement, while welcoming the regulators’ view that controls are urgently needed, has said that the degree of flexibility in the rules recommended by IOSCO could make them ineffective....

The World Development Movement has called for urgent measures to regulate financial speculation on food prices in the wake of the Horn of Africa famine, revealing that the price of food aid has doubled since 2001.

The World Food Programme paid $390 per tonne of food last year, compared with $200 in 2001. On Monday the organisation said it needed an extra $360 million in order to tackle the crisis now affecting more than 12 million people.

Speculation on food prices by investment banks like Goldman Sachs and Barclays Capital has dramatically risen in the last decade, pushing prices to record levels. Around $100 billion has poured into agricultural markets over the past ten years as financial players have looked for new areas to place their money, without a penny of this going to actual improvements in agriculture.

The US has already passed legislation aimed at preventing excessive speculation on food, and similar measures are being debated in the EU. But the UK government is set to block the European proposals. 

Deborah Doane, director of the anti-poverty campaign group the World Development Movement, said...

An action plan supposed to address food insecurity launched today by the G20 agriculture ministers has been criticised by campaigners, who say it fails to fully address the root causes of volatile food prices, including financial speculation, which is driving up prices.

Anti-poverty group the World Development Movement said that opposition from countries including the UK had led to the watering down of proposals that could have seen countries commit to setting limits on speculators’ share of the market.

Deborah Doane, director of the World Development Movement said:

Without tackling excessive speculation, the G20’s efforts to rein in volatile food prices will be wasted. The agriculture ministers have ducked controversy, so it falls to G20 finance ministers to address speculation and the hunger and poverty it causes."

The anti-poverty group has called on the UK government to back EU and international efforts to regulate commodity markets. 

Ms. Doane continued:

The UK government’s stance in defence of excessive speculation is untenable. It must put its weight behind European plans for regulation, putting the needs of hungry people before the profits of banks like Goldman Sachs and Barclays Capital.”...

A human rights campaigner from Madagascar is in the UK this week to demand that the Royal Bank of Scotland withdraw its financing of companies mining tar sands in her country.

The Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) has a long track record of financing companies operating in the Canadian tar sands, which are devastating the land and lives of First Nations people in Alberta. The bank has also financed French oil giant Total’s test mining of tar sands in Madagascar over the last three years. Total is expected to decide next month whether to go ahead with larger scale exploitation of tar sands in the country.  If it does, the water supply of more than 120,000 people in one of Madagascar’s poorest areas could be disrupted and poisoned and its unique biodiversity severely threatened.

Malagasy woman Holly Rakotondralambo, who represents a coalition of community organisations from Madagascar, will visit London, Edinburgh and Glasgow this week in a tour organised by the World...

• Campaigners take food speculation protest to Barclays’ AGM
• New research shows true extent of Barclays food speculation activities
• Barclays accused of ‘profiting from hunger’

Following a month of protests at over 22 local Barclays’ branches around the country [1], campaigners from the World Development Movement [2] protested at the Barclays AGM this morning over the banks leading role in food speculation. The campaigners - dressed as Barclays eagles, bankers and selling food at hugely inflated prices - say speculation is fuelling the price of staple foods, and having a disastrous effect on the lives of millions of the poorest people across the world.

The protests come following research published by the World Development Movement yesterday that investigated the extent of Barclays’ involvement in food speculation, and found Barclays to be the UK’s leading bank in food speculation [3].

The report concludes that Barclays could be making as much as £340 million in profit annually from food speculative activities, leading to accusations from campaigners that Barclays is ‘profiting from hunger’. In addition, Barclays have been found to be a key facilitator in helping other financial players – such as pension funds – speculate on food...

Press release, 07.03.2011

People making pancakes on Shrove Tuesday will face higher prices of key ingredients, such as flour, milk and sugar, as prices have sky rocketed to a new record high on the global markets.The UN Food and Agriculture Organisation last week announced that prices had risen to a new record high.  According to the UN FAO's food price index, prices have risen for the 8th consecutive month to the highest since the index was started in 1990. The index consists of a basket of key commodities such as wheat, milk, meat and sugar. The index is widely watched by economists and politicians around the world as the first indicator of whether prices will end up higher on shop shelves in their own countries.

In response to these price rises, anti-poverty campaigners, the World Development Movement argue that banks and hedge funds are helping to drive up the price of food to record levels through reckless speculation on basic foods such as wheat and sugar. Wheat prices have increased by 60 per cent in the last year and the campaigners say that this is being fuelled by speculation because, despite drought and fires affecting harvests,...

Current soaring food prices are being worsened by record levels of financial speculation, according to a leading UK anti-poverty group. Latest figures from the World Development Movement reveal that hedge funds, investment bankers and pension funds have poured over $200bn into food markets since the financial crisis, betting on the rising price of food.

This huge wall of speculative money has now reached record levels according to the US commodities regulator [1]. This has caused the market to over-react to shortages in supply or rising demand, pushing food prices ever higher.

This week the UN’s food price reached a record high and food riots broke out in Algeria as the impacts begin to be felt around the world [2]. Food prices have now risen above those seen during the global food crisis of 2008 [3] when riots broke around the developing world and over 1 billion went short of food.

Many speculators are simply trying to avoid inflation by throwing money into food markets, betting on long term rising food prices and not reflecting the current state of global food markets. Much of this money has come from efforts to deal with the financial crash like the banking bail out and so-called ‘quantitative easing’ in Europe and the US.

The World...

The World Development Movement reacted critically to the announcements saying that for 30 years developing countries had faced the same austerity measures which led to more poverty and more injustice for the poorest people. It also said that it was deeply deceptive that climate finance and the Green Investment Bank were being touted as 'good news stories' by the coalition government.

 Deborah Doane, director of the World Development Movement said:

 Resisting austerity: lessons from the developing world

"The experience of austerity measures imposed on developing countries should sound alarm bells for us all. These measures are not a new innovation; they were cooked up by Thatcher and Reagan in the 1980s and forced onto developing countries by the IMF and World Bank. The effects were devastating: inequality, poverty and injustice increased as public services and welfare spending were slashed.

 "Recently, such policies have been completely discredited; even the World Bank and IMF held their hands up and said they got it wrong. Countries, like Malaysia and Vietnam, that resisted the austerity measures remained far less vulnerable than those that had to succumb to these failed economic prescriptions. If we don’t resist this illogical...

The World Development Movement (WDM) has said proposals to establish three new European banking regulators could help prevent food crises, as wheat price rises fuelled by financial speculation trigger bread riots in Mozambique.

WDM has been pushing for urgent action to prevent banks and hedge funds engaging in excessive speculation in food derivatives markets, which drove the 2006-2008 food price crisis [1] and is fuelling the recent wheat price spike. Wheat prices have rocketed nearly 70% since January, causing riots in Mozambique this week in which seven people have died.

Negotiators from the European Commission, European parliament and Council of Ministers yesterday agreed to establish the three watchdogs, which will include a European Securities and Markets Authority covering derivatives as well as other markets.

Deborah Doane, director of the World Development Movement said:

"The feeding frenzy on wheat derivatives is once again causing hunger and unrest in the world’s poorest countries. It is essential that we end the reckless speculation by big banks and...

* New report: Gambling by banks like Goldman Sachs increased food prices

* UK must 'back, not block' new banking reform in Europe, say campaigners

* Over 800 people have pledged to call the FSA to demand action to stop banks gambling on food

Today banks have come under fire for risky and secretive gambling on coffee, cocoa and wheat which is playing havoc with prices.

Lovers of chocolate spread on toast with a cup of coffee in the morning face paying more for their breakfast as prices have rocketed on the international markets.

The same banks, secretive hedge funds and dangerous speculation that caused the sub-prime mortgage crisis and global financial meltdown are also causing food prices to rise massively, argues new research from anti-poverty campaigning group, the World Development Movement.

Cocoa prices have reached their highest levels for 33 years, increasing by 150 per cent over 18 months which could force some chocolate makers to raise prices and in some cases use less cocoa.

Although poor harvests acted as the initial trigger for price rises in cocoa, the finger is being pointed at hedge funds and big...

David Cameron has announced today that his government will be the 'greenest government' ever. We welcome the sentiment but we are sceptical and said that ‘history will judge this government on its green credentials by its policies to cut the UK’s emissions dramatically and getting a fair international climate deal, not by turning off its lights at night.’

The World Development Movement reacted angrily to today's Royal Bank of Scotland's annual results and bonuses announcements.

WDM is campaigning for RBS to phase out its investments in mining companies like Vedanta and projects, like oil extraction from tar sands that are linked with controversial human rights violations. They are arguing that the bonuses awarded for investments that hurt the lives of ordinary people and the publically owned bank should be benefitting society in the UK and around the world.

Julian Oram, head of policy at the World Development Movement said:
"What really annoys people is what these top bankers are being paid their bonuses for. Is it for investing public money into job-creating small businesses, better public transport systems or a greener economy that benefits society as a whole? No. It's for trying to make a quick buck out of dirty and destructive projects like tar sands that make bankers rich but everyone else worse off.

"Until the government directs RBS and the other bailed out banks to linking bonuses to 'doing good' rather than acting with the same callous disregard to fairness, or people and the planet that they have over recent years people will continue to get riled by issue of executive pay."

...

• Last November's £25 billion cash injection deemed 'unlawful' by campaigners
• Treasury's intervention in bankers' bonuses strengthens campaigners case

Three pressure groups today served the Treasury with their application to the High Court, challenging last November's decision to provide a further £25 billion of public money to the Royal Bank of Scotland.

According to the Treasury's guidance, when determining if and how public money is spent, an assessment of the likely impact the proposed spending will have on human rights and the environment has to be completed before the money can be provided. The World Development Movement, PLATFORM and People & Planet believe that no proper assessment was undertaken and that the Treasury have failed to adequately calculate the negative impact of allowing RBS to invest taxpayers' money into harmful projects.

The same groups took the Treasury to the High Court last year where one of reasons given by the Treasury for not ensuring public money invested in RBS is spent in a way consistent with its own commitments on human rights and climate change is that such a restriction would be harmful to the “financial stability” of the bank. The Treasury also argued that to use RBS’ need for capital as a mechanism...

After Tuesday’s earthquake, which has left up to 50,000 people dead, WDM has joined the Jubilee Debt Campaign in calling for an urgent cancellation of all of Haiti's remaining debt.

"The poverty that already exists in Haiti will be even more devastating as a result of this emergency and it clearly requires high levels of aid to combat it. This should also come with wholesale debt cancellation and the need to need to ensure that aid is given in the form of genuine grants as opposed to traditional IMF-backed loans, which would undoubtedly worsen an already dire situation", said Julian Oram, Head of Policy at WDM.

We welcome the cancellation of two thirds ($1.2 billion) of Haiti’s debt in 2009, but condemn the fact that the country still has $641 million in debt on its books and in 2010 is projected to pay around $10million to International Financial Institutions.

We also think that the International Monetary Fund’s proposed offer of $100 million in new lending to Haiti is completely inappropriate. Even though lent at very concessional rates of interest, the proposal contradicts the IMF’s own policy recommendations that Haiti should not borrow more money because, even after debt cancellation, its potential for debt distress remains high.
...

A catalogue of bribery and bullying tactics are being used against developing countries in an attempt to force through a deal at all costs at the Copenhagen talks campaigners revealed today.

UK based, anti-poverty campaigners, the World Development movement said that developing countries are being bribed in numerous ways, including by threatening that international aid and finance for adapting to the impacts of climate change would only be delivered if countries cooperated with developed countries' demands.

The campaigners are arguing that there is no hope for a deal with justice at its heart, and so no deal would be better than forcing through a bad deal.

The campaigners have compared the kinds of tactics used by developed countries to those that take place in World Trade Organisation negotiations, which are widely viewed as notoriously undemocratic, unaccountable and immoral. And they say that the UN talks have been 'darkened by blatant bullying by rich countries saving face, but not the climate.'

Tim Jones, climate policy officer at the World Development movement said:
"It's absolutely scandalous that developing countries are being told that international aid and finance to cope with the impacts of climate change is dependent on cooperation...

World Development Movement response to Prime Minister speech

Commenting on the speech by Prime Minister Gordon Brown at COP15, World Development Movement Policy Officer Tim Jones said:

“Gordon Brown was strong on rhetoric but weak on substance. The Prime Minister called for the strongest level of ambition, yet did not increase the UK’s current feeble target for reducing its own emissions. A call for money was made, but the Prime Minister failed to say the UK is giving just £500 million a year, much of which was first announced in 2007. Almost all of this is loans, further increasing the unjust debts of developing countries.

“Talks in Copenhagen are stalled because rich countries are failing to make serious commitments to reduce emissions. Offers of money are small amounts to try and secure an unjust deal, rather than the real reparations needed for countries affected by climate change. The Prime Minister failed to play his part in unblocking these talks.”

ENDS

Tim Jones is inside the Bella Centre and can be contacted on +44 7817 6281962

A year ago, the British public became the majority shareholder in the Royal Bank of Scotland and to make this inauspicious anniversary, this weekend 40 leading figures including environmental and anti poverty campaigners, faith groups, trade unions, academia, MPs and the author Iain Banks have written to Alistair Darling to call on him to transform RBS into a Royal Bank of Sustainability.

The group have asked the Treasury to ensure that it and other publicly-backed banks help pay for Britain's transition from a high-carbon economy with rising unemployment to a low carbon-society that provides millions of green jobs and better public services.

In the strongly worded letter, the group accused the Treasury of failing to stop taxpayers' money being used by RBS to finance climate change and human rights abuses that spans the globe from Wales to India to the Democratic Republic of Congo.

The World Development Movement, People & Planet and PLATFORM have commissioned a report that sets out the business case for transforming the bank into the Royal Bank of Sustainability. The report argues that UKFI, the company set up to manage the government's shares in the bailed-out banks, should take an 'active...

The World Development Movement condemns rich countries at the Barcelona climate negotiations that ended today for ‘killing Kyoto and Copenhagen’.

The anti-poverty campaigners believe that rich countries are talking down the possibility of legally binding deal at Copenhagen, and at the same time are refusing to make the emissions cuts already agreed as part of the Kyoto protocol. They say that rich countries are taking the uncertainty over the Copenhagen deal as a cynical opportunity to abolish the Kyoto protocol.

Tim Jones, climate policy officer at the World Development Movement said: “The fact that rich countries are trying to wriggle out of their emissions reductions targets under the Kyoto agreement and have essentially quashed any hope for a legally binding and fair deal at Copenhagen is absolutely disgraceful.

"It looks as though they are trying to kill Kyoto and Copenhagen deals. Developing countries are absolutely right to be incredibly angry. Developed countries that have caused climate change are trying to push the burden of tackling and coping with it onto poorer countries. This is unbelievably immoral.

“The extent of the rich world’s climate debt to developing nations is staggering. And if rich countries continue to ignore and...

A High Court judge today blocked a request for permission to hold a Judicial Review over what campaigners say is the Treasury’s lack of adequate environmental and human rights consideration of Royal Bank of Scotland’s investments.

Campaigners from the World Development Movement, PLATFORM and People & Planet, who brought the case against the Treasury expressed ‘disappointment’ at the ruling and have decided to appeal this decision.

Deborah Doane, the director of the World Development Movement said,

“We're incredibly disappointed with the court's decision not to allow to a full hearing on this important case and will be appealing the judgement. Essentially, the judgement means that RBS' profits come before the climate and human rights of people.This is particularly hard to swallow after Gordon Brown's soaring rhetoric on climate change yesterday. We're incredibly angry to see that just one day later the Treasury outrageously argued that for a director of business to take environmental concerns into account would be a 'burden' and 'handicapping'. Yet, this is precisely the kind of positive action that the government should be promotoing, if we are to believe one word of Gordon Brown's speech yesterday.

The lawyers acting on behalf of the groups...

Scottish campaigners greeted with delight the news that Danish energy giant Dong Energy has dropped plans to develop new coal fired power stations at Hunterston in Ayrshire, and also in Germany.

The case for new coal fired power stations in Scotland is crumbling after the developer pulled out, citing financial difficulties and a strategic change of direction towards lower carbon investments.

Following Dong’s announcement that it would prioritise investments in renewables, and last week’s news that Eon energy had postponed plans for a coal-fired power station at Kingsnorth in Kent, Liz Murray, Head of Scottish Campaigns at World Development Movement commented:

“It’s clearer than ever that dirty coal is a risky investment. Energy companies are finding it impossible to justify such climate-trashing developments. Banks that continue to invest heavily in coal – such as Scotland’s RBS – should also beware the writing on the wall, and switch their investments to support renewable energy instead.”

Friends of the Earth Scotland’s Chief Executive Duncan McLaren added:

“We are delighted that Dong has withdrawn. But dirty coal is more than a bad investment, it’s also bad policy. The Scottish Government must...

Campaigners from RSPB, the World Development Movement, Christian Aid, Oxfam, WWF and Greenpeace will hold a 'coal kills' vigil today outside the Department for Energy and Climate Change on Whitehall.

At 16.30, the organisations' CEOs and campaigners will hold up images of glaciers, polar bears, birds, food and water supplies of the millions of people in the developing world who will lose their lives and livelihoods and a stark message of 'coal kills'. These will represent what the campaigners believe that Climate Minister, Ed Miliband will save if he makes the right decision - to rule out new coal.

The charities are coming together to remind Ed Miliband that he must go further on his policy proposals on coal and provide a cast-iron guarantee that no new dirty coal-fired power stations will be built in the UK unless all of the carbon emissions are captured from the start.

The CEOs will invite Ed Miliband to meet with the groups to hand him personally a statement detailing the thousands of powerful pledges and statements that each organisation has collected from supporters. These include letters from young RSPB members asking Miliband to do more, photos from Christian Aid supporters asking him to reconsider, and promises of thousands of Greenpeace and World...

Ed Miliband is today unveiling the Energy White Paper and UK carbon budgets. The World Development Movement is concerned that the UK’s climate change strategy will be heavily reliant on carbon trading and unproven techno-fixes to reduce carbon emissions.

Deborah Doane, director of the World Development Movement said:

"What we hope is that Ed Miliband will commit to substantial investment in the renewable energy sector. This will help to create new jobs, reduce our carbon emissions and develop technologies which can be used to tackle climate change across the world. What we fear is that Ed Miliband will have fallen prey to the heavy lobbying from the energy companies who prefer the status quo.

"We are very concerned at reports that the carbon budgets will be very heavily reliant on carbon trading, which is a dodgy, creative accounting technique that reduces our emissions in name only. Carbon trading places the burden on poor countries to reduce their carbon emissions so that we can continue to pollute. This is double counting on an audacious scale and is an incredible injustice.

"Ed Miliband is holding onto the hope that carbon capture technology fitted onto new coal power stations will decarbonise the electricity sector at some...

New stats showing Kingsnorth's impact on water, food, refugees, drought and death

A new Kingsnorth coal plant could be responsible for 100,000 more people in the developing world losing their water supply in dry seasons reveals the World Development Movement today.

The anti-poverty campaigners have released a catalogue of shocking new statistics that show the devastating human impact that carbon emissions from a new Kingsnorth plant alone could have on people in the developing world because of its contribution to climate change. The World Development Movement reveals:

• 100,000 more people losing their dry season water supply
• Up to 300 more people dying every year due to malnutrition
• Up to 60,000 more people suffering from drought in Africa
• 50,000 more people going hungry due to drought and lower crop yields
• Up to 40,000 more people exposed to malaria
• 20,000 people being forced our of their homes and becoming climate refugees
• Around 30,000 more people losing their homes every year due to coastal flooding

Deborah Doane, director of the World Development Movement said:

These figures reveal, for the first time, the devastating human impact of building a new Kingsnorth coal power...