World Bank Unmasked

[Orwellian_Ghost]

7th December 07 - World Bank Independent People's Tribunal (WBIPT) Secretariat

....

We, the twelve jury members, have listened to four days of testimony and depositions from September 21 to 24, 2007 by affected people, experts and academics from some 60 grassroots, civil society groups and communities from all over India. The presentations covered 26 different sectors of economic and social development, ranging in scope from the macro-economic impact of wide ranging economic policies to testimonies from representatives of communities said to have been harmed and impoverished by specific World Bank financed projects. Our members include former justices of the Indian Supreme Court and High Courts, lawyers, writers, scientists, economists, religious leaders, and former Indian government officials. We note that the World Bank Delhi office received an invitation to attend the Tribunal two weeks in advance, but did not wish to participate in the proceedings.

"First and foremost, the evidence and depositions we have witnessed presents a disturbing and shocking picture of increased and needless human suffering since 1991 among hundreds of millions of India's poorest and most disadvantaged in rural areas and in the cities. It is clear to us that a significant number of Indian government policies and projects financed and influenced by the World Bank have contributed directly and/or indirectly to this increased impoverishment and suffering. All this has taken place while a minority of India's population that constitutes the middle class and rich has enjoyed the fruits of an economic boom.

"The most disturbing leading indicator for this suffering is the alarming increase in farmer suicides since the 1990s. From 2001 to 2007 alone, according to the Indian minister of agriculture, 1,37,000 poor farmers have killed themselves. These deaths are not random events; the evidence we heard points to increasing financial pressures on farmers all over India as a result of some or all of the following policies, such as: reduced subsidies from the centre and states, higher prices for poor farmers for irrigation water, electric power, and seeds; reduced subsidies for agricultural inputs, reduced access to low interest loans for the poor, and opening up of the Indian economy to an uneven playing field in international trade in agricultural commodities. India's farmers must now compete with imports from the heavily subsidised farms of the European Union and North America, at the same time when even the most meagre state assistance for the poorest farmers is reduced. India was once self-sufficient in food production; its food security is now dependent on imports. It is clear to us that major World Bank Economic Restructuring, Structural Adjustment, and Sector Loans have directly promoted and helped to finance these economic policy changes which are a disaster for much of India's more than 700 million rural inhabitants, and most disastrous of all for poor farmers.

"Other World Bank loans have promoted the institution of user fees in the health and education sectors, as well as partial privatisation in these sectors. Whatever the justification for these policies, we heard how in practice, they have further disadvantaged the poor. The Bank is promoting legal and regulatory changes the main focus of which appears to lessen the social and environmental compliance burdens for industry and investors, rather than protect the vulnerable livelihoods and environments of India's poor majority. The net effect of many Bank prescribed policy "reforms" appears to be the reorientation of the Indian State priorities from striving to secure a safety net for the poor and vulnerable to providing a safety net for large domestic and international corporations and investors.

......

http://www.stwr.net/content/view/2498/1/