News

Phulbari campaigner in Bangladesh injured at protest

The World Development Movement was shocked and saddened to hear that Professor Anu Muhammad was one of a number of protestors injured by police during a recent peaceful demonstration in Bangladesh.

Anu Muhammad injured in peaceful protest

Professor Muhammed, who is Secretary of the National Committee to Protect Oil, Gas, Mineral Resources, was protesting against the decision by the Bangladesh government to grant offshore oil and gas exploration deals in the Bay of Bengal for two international companies, ConocoPhillips and Tullow Oil plc.

Professor Muhammed has long been an opponent of the Phulbari open cast mine in Bangladesh, proposed by UK company Global Coal Management Resources, which would force more than 50,000 people off the land and threaten the water supplies of a further 100,000. Until a recent turnaround, the UK government publicly supported the proposed mine.

The World Development Movement worked closely with Professor Anu Muhammad on the Phulbari campaign and hosted his visit to the UK in December 2008, when he met with MPs, NGOs and the Bangladeshi community to raise...

A walk down memory lane with the World Bank,

Historically, the World Bank has been roundly criticised by the World Development Movement and others because of its flawed policies which deepened poverty. Exactly the same critique is as pertinent as ever but relates to its policies on climate change.

In the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s, the World Bank was notorious for damaging developing countries' economies by forcing them to adopt economic policies that made people poorer. The institutional problem of flawed analysis that gave the much-maligned institution its poor reputation can still be seen today when examining its policies designed to tackle climate change.

Rightly, the World Bank knows that climate change will devastate poor countries and is already increasing poverty and in its annual World Development Report released today, it called on nations to 'act differently on climate change'.

Also correctly, the World Bank says that the world's reliance on fossil fuels must be broken. But in its typically contradictory style, it is currently funding new dirty coal power stations to be built in the global south through...

Major development and green groups tell Miliband ‘coal kills…polar bears, birds and people.'

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...

First appearances are deceiving at the WTO meeting

The WTO mini-ministerial in Delhi has now concluded. On first appearances, it looks as if the meeting has given a boost to the cause of free trade and a WTO deal break through. Afterall, Shri Anand Sharma, India's commerce and industry minister issued a final statement to say, "There was a unanimous affirmation on the need to conclude the Doha Round within 2010."

But affirming the desire to finalise the process is not the same as actually taking concrete steps to reach that goal. So there are no new commitments on the table, and key players like the US have refused to reveal their hand. Importantly, developing and developed countries are still split over what subjects should be on the negotiating table and which countries will be invited to talk around it.

Assessing the final statement from the meeting, the World Development Movement's trade officer Vicky Cann says, "Even once the dust has settled, it will be hard to see what has come out of this meeting. Ministers may be sending their officials back to Geneva to re-start talks, but these negotiations remain based on highly flawed papers which can only lead to an outcome which penalises the poor and rewards major corporations. The WTO will re-convene ministers in December in Geneva and we, along with millions...

The G20 road show is back in town

The G20 road show is back in town, five months after the last jamboree was held in London.

Lost in the media circus surrounding April’s G20 meetings (which at times seemed more interested in Michelle Obama’s sartorial choices and the menu at the Jamie Oliver banquet in 10 Downing Street), was important discussion about who was – and was not – in the room for the substantive talks.

As with April’s meeting, this week’s G20 finance ministers meeting continues to see only the usual suspects from large economies present and specifically only one African country (South Africa) in attendance. As Nobel prize-winning economist Professor Joseph Stiglitz recently remarked, “There are 192 countries in the world, [and] 20 is a small percentage. Obviously what is necessary to respond to the crisis is not a G20 but a G192.”

But it’s not just attendance at these gatherings that needs to change; it’s the policy prescriptions that come out of them that also need to change, if we are to tackle climate change, global poverty and the spectre of rising unemployment around the world.

Amongst the rhetoric expected to flow from the G20 will be further demands for more free trade, even though free trade is associated with job losses and an undermining of local...

The last chance to save the WTO – again!

Once again, this week, trade ministers from around the world are meeting, this time in Delhi, with the stated aim of kick-starting stalled World Trade Organisation (WTO) talks. And yet again, there is a lot of smoke and mirrors concealing countries’ true negotiating positions.

Part of the gathering of 50,000 Indian farmers who rallied in Delhi against the WTO

Why is India hosting this meeting? Does it really want to finalise a Doha deal, or is it hurt by accusations that it scuppered the July 2008 talks and so it just wants to be seen to be ‘talking the talk’? What position will the Obama administration take? Rhetorically, it talks about the need to sign a deal and for countries to avoid protectionism, but it is under huge pressure at home as unemployment grows and the recession continues.

Meanwhile, Pascal Lamy (the WTO’s director-general) continues to tighten the negotiating screws, stating that only 20 per cent of issues remain to be resolved. Proposals have been circulated to speed-up the process, to ‘bank’ what has already been agreed, and to move on to look at timetabling issues with the hope that this will unblock the remaining issues...

Ed, E.ON and everyone?

Today saw the launch of the 10:10 campaign; for individuals and businesses in the UK to reduce their emissions by 10 per cent in 2010. This is matched by a demand for Ed Miliband to commit the UK government to a target of cutting emissions by as close to 10 per cent as possible in the same year.

It would be excellent if UK emissions did fall by 10 per cent next year. As East Africa once again suffers from drought, and latest predictions that climate change is already killing 300,000 people every year, such a cut would be an acknowledgment that dangerous climate change is already with us. We must cut emissions by as much as possible as soon as possible.

The chances of UK emissions falling by 10 per cent looked more likely as we heard that E.ON, along with EDF, Centrica and Scottish and Southern Energy, are joining the campaign. E.ON by itself emits around 30 million tonnes of carbon dioxide a year, generating 10 per cent of the UK’s electricity and over 15 per cent of the UK’s emissions from electricity. Presumably E.ON will be shutting down its Kingsnorth coal power station in 2010, five years ahead of schedule, which would meet the 10:10 target and double it to 20 per cent in 2010.

Alas no. E.ON is launching “a nationwide drive to help homeowners and...

Climate camp targets carbon trading

This year’s Camp for Climate Action pitched up their tents on Blackheath in London yesterday. There are around 1,000 people there already, with more expected as the weekend gets closer. Along with the workshops and demonstrations of sustainable living, there will also be non-violent direct action during the week, and some climate campers have kicked this off already with an action-cum-street theatre outside the Climate Exchange on Bishopsgate.

Climate campers outside the Climate Exchange on Bishopsgate. Credit: Amy Scaife

One of the key reasons for bringing the Climate Camp to London this year is to challenge the role of the City in creating the climate crisis. The fact that our society is geared towards endless economic growth has resulted in a headlong rush towards global warming. WDM has long argued that redistribution to tackle inequality is the key to ending poverty, rather than unsustainable growth which threatens the planet and fails to ‘lift up the poor’.

Moreover, the obsession with the free market, which has dominated official global politics for the last 30 years, means that politicians are looking to a ‘market mechanism’, carbon...

Social justice in the news

High up in the news agenda this week has been the Vestas wind turbine factory occupation and RBS' interim profits. Not stories that people automatically assume resonate with the work of the World Development Movement but what ties these, at first glance, disparate strands of news together is climate justice. And that means justice for the workers at Vestas, who are fighting for their jobs; justice for climate-conscious tax payers, who are fighting for their money to be used wisely; and justice for the world's poorest people, who are fighting for their lives.

The workers at Vestas have been putting up a fight not only in attempt to protect their jobs, or better their meager redundancy package, but also because they are proud that they have genuinely green jobs, and know that the UK needs more of these jobs, not fewer.

RBS continues to lend to dirty and destructive energy companies, when it should be contributing to a more sustainable and ethical future for us all. Although last week Ed Miliband announced he would influence RBS to invest in wind power, it's unclear at this stage whether it will happen. But it is clear that our money will be put to the best use by RBS investing in a low carbon future rather than in undemocratic regimes and environmentally...

Help our supporters raise money in the London Triathlon

This weekend a group of brave supporters are taking part in the London Triathlon to help raise money for the World Development Movement.

We've put together a guide to the people taking part - and a link to their sponsorship pages.

WDM triathlon logo

Kate Etheridge*

I'm attempting my first triathlon on 4 July. Now I can front crawl for more than half a length, and have a bike (and worked out how to pump up the tyres), I'm feeling slightly more confident. So please have faith and sponsor me.

Sponsor Kate at http://www.justgiving.com/katesfirsttriathlon/

*actually Kate did a Triathlon in July but we're including her here too!

Emilia Hanna

In August I am going to be doing an Olympic Triathlon (hopefully! If I survive!) which is a 1.5km swim, a 40km cycle and a 10km run.... eeeek! I am doing it for the World Development Movement which is totally rad and works on campaigns including climate change, trade and water.

Sponsor Emilia at: http://www....

1 minute to tell the world about climate change

1 minute to save the world has teamed up with World Development Movement, other NGOs from around the world including Greenpeace, New Economics Foundation and Stop Climate Chaos, and the Guardian newspaper to give you your chance to tell the world about climate change.

1minutetosavetheworld

1 minute to save the world is an international short film competition which is open to anyone, amateur or professional, who has something they want to say about climate change. The films you make will be distributed around the world and the winning entries will be shown in cinemas at the Copenhagen climate summit in December.

Multinationals and their advertising agencies have long known the power a short film can have. We’ve decided to harness the medium to raise public awareness and pressure governments into meaningful action. It’ll be a truly international competition and festival.

-Jessica Dunlop, festival producer.

Prizes include up to £1000 cash and the judges include leading film makers and climate experts.

For full details see: www....

War of words over global trade

Global Trade Alert a website part-funded by the UK government, was launched last month, has hit the headlines as a weapon in rich countries' armoury in the war of words designed to defeat protectionism and help free trade to conquer all.

The database monitors and highlights 'protectionist' policies that countries are implementing due to the economic down turn. This could go a long way to explaining the myriad of articles that declare that protectionism is killing global trade]

In The Times, the co-founder of the site, Professor Evenett, criticises developing countries for raising tariffs. But this is a very one-sided view point as European governments are currently implementing protectionist measures with gusto: they are bailing out the banking and car industries; increasing export subsidies for the dairy industry; and supporting a global intellectual property rights regime which through patents and monopolies means that European businesses can keep their technology to themselves. For developing countries, this means missing out on access to medicines and renewable energy technologies to combat climate change.

At the same time as being blamed for...

World Development Movement reaction to the 'Low Carbon Transition Plan'

The World Development Movement welcomes progress made on renewable targets but fears that the reliance on carbon trading to reduce emissions is a 'dangerous get-out-of-jail-free card'.

Deborah Doane, director of the World Development Movement said:
"The commitment to generate 30 per cent of electricity from renewable sources and to reduce emissions in the UK power sector is welcome. But the politics is still lagging behind the science as this target doesn't come close enough to what is needed to prevent dangerous climate change.

"Worryingly the government has said it can use carbon offsetting to meet targets if we fail to cut emissions. This is a dangerous get-out-of-jail-free card which could be disastrous for the climate and for the world's poorest people. The government has to be completely committed to reducing our emissions here in the UK, not pass the buck onto developing countries.

"Ed Miliband's own department has previously acknowledged that we don't need new coal power stations to keep the lights on. So it's contradictory to see his continued claims that we need to build new coal power stations."

ENDS

For more information, please all Kate Blagojevic on 020 7820 4900 / 07711 875 345

Notes to editors
The...

World Development Movement comment on the Energy White Paper

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...

G8: an illegitimate institution making disastrous decisions on climate and trade

Today, the World Development Movement condemns the G8 as an illegitimate institution that is making decisions on measures to tackle the climate and financial crises that will have disastrous effects on the world’s poor.

Deborah Doane, director of the World Development Movement said:

"The G8 has no legitimacy, but it is making decisions on climate change and trade that will have disastrous effects on the world’s poorest people. This injustice is palpable and the G8 should be left for dead.”

Commenting on the announcement that the WTO deal will be completed next year, Deborah Doane said:

"The global economic crisis will not be fixed by more free trade sealed in a rushed deal at the WTO. The G8’s aim to avoid protectionism through a new WTO round is little more than a smokescreen to protect big business in G8 countries, at the expense of poor people. If our analysis of the financial crisis taught us anything, it’s that over-reliance on free market ideals harms labour, development and environmental standards around the world. Unfair free trade deals aren’t the answer: they are part of the problem.

Commenting on the measures to tackle climate change, Deborah Doane said:

"G8 countries emit 40% of...

New Kingsnorth fatal impact on people in developing world

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...

Campaigners land blow on 'oil and gas' bank

The government has been roundly criticised from various quarters for the use of public cash to bail out and prop up RBS. Scandals over Sir Fred's pension and now the ten million pound salary and bonus package for the new RBS boss have been grabbing headlines and stoking public outrage. And rightly so. Now the World Development Movement, along with PLATFORM and People and Planet, have dealt a further blow to the government's hands off approach to how it manages the billions of pounds of taxpayers' money poured into the self-styled 'oil and gas' bank. We launched a legal action today to challenge the Treasury's disastrous decision to finance RBS but ignore the government's own environment and human rights criteria to check that taxpayers' money is not spent in a harmful way.

Before launching the judicial review of this decision, Platform wrote to the Treasury to ask why they decided to ignore the fact that public money was being spent to fund a bank that is known for financing high carbon projects, several of which have also been linked to serious human rights concerns. The answer came back that 'environmental and human rights records of individual banks were of no relevance'. The excuse was that taking these considerations into account wouldn't be in the public interest...

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Welcome to the new WDM website

Welcome to the new World Development Movement website.

We will be trying out new things, keeping the old things that worked well from our existing website, and moving forward with new and exciting technology.

You can leave comments below about what you think about the new website, send us a message through our contact form, or you can tweet your comments to Pete @wdmuk.

In the meantime we are keeping our old website running untill all the pages are moved across to the new system, so you may occasionally come across content in the old format.

Climate-conscious celebs, grannies, kids, bird and cake lovers to come to Kingsnorth

Thousands of people who care about climate change and global poverty, including celebs, bird watchers, cake lovers, grannies and young people from across the UK will form a 'Mili-band' – a human chain around Kingsnorth coal power station - on the 4 July to say no to dirty new coal power stations.

The Women's Institute, Christian Aid, RSPB, the youth organisation – the Woodcraft Folk, Oxfam and the World Development Movement are jointly organising the fun-filled, family and future-friendly event to highlight the human cost of dirty coal and the effect that climate change will have on millions of people in poor countries. After forming the human chain, the celebrity speakers, musicians and games at the Sturdee Social and Sports Centre will provide fun for all the family.

The name of the event is inspired by Ed Miliband, the minister for climate change, who will make the decision about whether to give the Kingsnorth plant the green light.

Kirsty Wright, from the World Development Movement said:

"This day is about having fun but is also about sending an important message to Ed Miliband. He needs to rule out new coal power in the UK unless all the climate-wrecking carbon emissions are captured from the start. He's made good progress...

After the elections, the hard work really starts…

So the results are in and weeks of fevered speculation and variable opinion polls now give way to the post European election analysis. In the UK, the voters have delivered a bloody nose to Labour, which may or may not turn out to be a fatal blow for Gordon Brown. The rise of the far right gives all of us serious pause for thought and emphasises that there has never been a more important time for progressive politics to stand-up against racial extremism.

Across Europe, a not dissimilar picture has emerged with the right doing well and the left in many countries having performed poorly. The exception to these trends has been the strong showing of the Greens in the UK and across Europe. Europe-wide, the Green-bloc has picked up some new seats, and in the UK their vote share was up, although they did not add to their existing two seats.

As for the World Development Movement’s campaign to ask candidates to commit to taking action to ‘stop Europe's unfair trade deals’ in the new parliament, the hard work really begins.

For those 18 elected UK MEPs who have signed the pledge to be a trade hero and raise the issue that unfair trade deals do not work for poor people, supporters will now be following up with them to make sure that their commitments are turned into...

Apathy in the EU: Is it us or the politicians?

Apathy and discontent are a heady mix. MEP candidates in the UK are facing both in this week's EU elections. But is it really the voters who are apathetic?

World Development Movement (WDM) supporters are committed people who care deeply about global poverty and work hard in their spare time to campaign locally on global justice issues and engage others to take part in the democratic process. During the EU election campaign, WDM supporters have written hundreds of probing emails and letters and held numerous MEP hustings across the country encouraging candidates to pledge to stop Europe's unfair free trade deals, if they are elected.

Of course, in the context of global economic crisis the issue of free trade is one of the most important facing these aspiring parliamentarians. At the last count, 75 candidates had signed the World Development Movement's ‘Trade Hero’ pledge, with more pledges coming in every day. Clearly MEP candidates have a responsibility to offer solutions and opinions to their constituencies.

And yet, despite the success of the pledge, feedback from WDM supporters also shows disappointment in the candidates who arrived at meetings late, unprepared or both, or who cancelled attendance at the last minute. Surely, prospective politicians should...

The latest from WDM

Welcome to the World Development Movement news pages. You can view our news by category in each campaign section, or get the whole lot below. For press inquiries please contact the press office.

We have RSS feeds for all our news, or listed by category.

You can also follow us on Twitter for reactions and news about events as they happen.

What WDM could spend those expenses claims on...

The headlines over the last few weeks have been dominated by revelations over the expenses claimed by MPs.

So to coincide with the publication of our 2008 annual review WDM have calculated what we could spend those expense claims on:

£18,000 for bookcases – would fund a campaigner’s salary for a years worth of work on our anti-poverty, fair trade or climate change campaigns.

£2,000 for ‘moat cleaning services’ – would fund a report similar to the one that we used to persuade the Norwegian government to stop pushing controversial water privatisation in poor countries.

£1,851 for a rug – would be enough for props, placards, banners and costumes that would help us get our campaigns noticed and make headline news (like we did in 2005 with Make Poverty History and again in 2009 at the G20)

£1,645 spent on a ‘duck island’ – would fund all our web hosting costs for a year, including email actions like the one that helped stop a devastating coal mine from being built in Bangladesh.

£730 for a massage chair - would fund for a visiting speaker like Mary Lou to come and talk to local groups and activists.

£105.75 for an engineer - to attend to...

What the World Development Movement wants from the G20

This briefing includes the World Development Movement's critique and recommendations to the G20 leaders on the following areas: trade v protectionism; refuelling the IMF; resurrecting the WTO Doha development round; the climate crisis and the Green New Deal.

This is not just a banking crisis.

The banks collapsed and were bailed out. The global economic system as a whole has broken down, and must be radically revised to ensure that it puts people and the planet first.

A consequence of the capitalist casino system of international finance and consumption is the climate crisis. The economic and climate crises are intrinsically linked and should have been addressed as such by the G20 leaders.

This meeting defined the future of the global economy more than any other in the last sixty years; and as such had profound implications for the world’s poor and efforts to tackle climate change. We want an economic system that is up to the challenges of the 21st century.

Dr Julian Oram, head of policy at the World Development Movement, said:

"The G20 must not prescribe more of the same toxic medicine that led to the current...