PANNA: NGOs Challenge World Bank's Rural Development Strategy

This month, government leaders, United Nations officials and thousands of peasants, activists and ordinary people from all corners of the world will gather in Johannesburg, South Africa to forge a plan for environmentally sustainable development at local, national and global levels. The World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannes-burg is the second global conference on sustainability. At the first, ten years ago in Rio de Janeiro, 178 governments committed to Agenda 21, a landmark environmental and social document calling for development to relieve poverty, injustice and disease while at the same time protecting the world's natural and cultural resources. This month in Johannesburg, the world will weigh progress towards meeting the commitments of Agenda 21.

Yet on the eve of the Johannesburg Summit, the World Bank has chosen to take the opposite course, evidenced by its recently released draft Rural Development Strategy. The strategy has drawn sharp criticism from civil society leaders around the world, who argue that it ignores the environmental ethic of Agenda 21 and is more likely to increase rural poverty, indebtedness and hunger than relieve it. Critics point to the Bank's emphasis on industrial agriculture, trade liberalization, the privatization of public resources and its failure to address the political and social causes of poverty.(1) In April, PANNA led an international delegation to Washington, DC to lobby World Bank Directors to revise the draft and subsequently sent a letter signed by 150 organizations in 40 countries urging the Board to reject the strategy (see Lobbying Against the Strategy). It now appears that adverse reaction to the draft has delayed approval and adoption of the Rural Development Strategy by the Bank's Board.

Agenda 21, pesticides and the World Bank

Ten years ago in Rio, Agenda 21 was considered a victory by many environmentalists, in part because it acknowledged the devastating health and environmental impacts caused by overuse of pesticides and called upon responsible agencies to reverse their harmful effects by promoting ecologically based integrated pest management (IPM).(2) By endorsing Agenda 21, governments and participating agencies such as the United Nations and the World Bank made a commitment to support IPM rather than toxic pesticides.

Throughout the 1990s, however, the World Bank ignored Agenda 21, revising and weakening its own policy on pesticides to merely "avoid the excessive use of pesticides."(3)  Finally in 1998, in response to mounting public pressure,(4) the Bank issued a revised Operational Policy 4.09 on Pest Management, the official policy that now guides all Bank lending.(5) This policy requires the Bank to assist farmers in reducing their dependence on chemical pesticides and to promote farmer-driven ecologically based pest management.

However, the Bank has not successfully implemented this policy.(6) Many World Bank projects today still supply farmers with toxic pesticides and introduce agricultural systems that lead farmers to become highly dependent on chemical inputs and/or fail to provide effective training in ecological alternatives -- all violations of the Bank's IPM policy.(7) 

Furthermore, the Bank continues to push a broader agenda that favors large-scale industrial agriculture and benefits multinational corporations -- including pesticide companies -- rather than the world's rural poor. This bias toward industrial agriculture is clearly reflected in the Bank's recently released draft Rural Development Strategy (see Lobbying Against the Strategy). Thus, in the ten years since Rio, the World Bank has not only failed to implement Agenda 21's objectives regarding pesticides and pest management, it has also undermined international commitments towards sustainable agriculture and rural development through its relentless promotion of corporate-dominated agriculture.

The World Bank's flawed approach to rural development

The World Bank's draft Rural Development Strategy is based upon the Bank's analysis of the causes of rural poverty (notably climatic and technological constraints to agricultural production, restricted markets and weak public sectors). Thus, the strategy's recommended approach to eliminating poverty relies upon tools and mechanisms such new technologies, private sector partnerships and market measures considered congruent with that vision. Because many national governments, particularly those seeking financial support in the form of development loans, look to the World Bank for leadership, the strategy directly influences the formation of rural development initiatives the world over.

Although the Bank's draft Rural Development Strategy restates the Bank's commitment to poverty reduction, the document fails to acknowledge the crippling effects of the Bank's trade liberalization and privatization policies on the rural poor.(8) Grassroots organizations and NGOs, argue that promotion of cash crops and water privatization have disrupted food security and forced small farmers off the land.(9) The strategy ostensibly supports locally based decision-making, yet disregards the powerful influence of multinational corporations on national policy and implementation of local projects.

While admitting that "the poor are more affected by market failures," the World Bank strategy's focus remains one of using market mechanisms to shift "subsistence-oriented" and "small market-oriented" farmers into the commercial farm sector. Yet reliance on global commodity markets is risky, and when export crop prices drop, poor farmers suffer (as evidenced by the desperate plight of small coffee producers today). Furthermore, the focus on export cash crops (with the exception of specialty organic markets) almost invariably leads to greater dependence on harmful chemical inputs and threatens human health, biodiversity and soil, water and air quality.

The strategy does recognize the importance of ecologically based pest management and reducing pesticide use, but does not affirm the Bank's commitment to reducing reliance on pesticides, a central requirement of the Bank's pest management policy. The strategy's occasional reference to promoting organic agriculture and organic certification is positive, but unfortunately overwhelmed by the strategy's overall emphasis on industrialized agriculture, increased use of "modern inputs" and the cultivation of high value export crops, generally grown with large amounts of pesticides.

The World Bank's critics also argue that commercialization of agriculture can lead to farm consolidation. This occurs when small farmers sell out to large agribusinesses with greater ability to purchase expensive inputs such as seeds, fertilizers, pesticides and now even water (formerly a public good, but under policies promoted by the World Bank, increasingly privatized). The Bank's strategy offers no concrete or credible plan for protecting poor farmers from market failures and in fact baldly suggests that if struggling farmers cannot compete successfully in the commercial sector, they should abandon their livelihood and culture, and seek off-farm employment instead.

To many civil society leaders heading to Johannesburg in August, this approach is unconscionable and reflects a reprehensible disregard for farmers' rights: the right to grow safe and nutritious food, the right to a livelihood of their own choosing, and the right to food security for their communities and food sovereignty for their countries.

Wrong technologies

The draft Rural Development Strategy emphasizes increasing investment in science and technology in order to increase productivity. Certainly science by and for farmers has much to offer, but the strategy ignores traditional knowledge and farmers' own scientific capacity, and instead prioritizes private investment in "new" (and likely expensive) technologies.

In the ten years since Rio, powerful biotechnology companies have stepped up their promotion of genetically engineered seeds as the solution to world hunger and poverty. Their strategy has included targeting influential public institutions such as the World Bank, United Nations and government agencies as high visibility partners whose support will enhance the multinational corporations'credibility and increase the sale of their products worldwide. Consequently, the World Bank is echoing industry claims that genetic engineering in agriculture has "enormous potential" to assist in poverty reduction and is already financing research in the genetic engineering of seeds.(10) 

The Bank's draft Rural Development Strategy claims that "there is an emerging consensus in the scientific community that biotechnology is likely to be a valuable tool in [the] struggle (to increase agricultural productivity, alleviate rural poverty, enhance food security and nutrition and conserve the environment)."(11)  In the context of World Bank partnerships with multinational corporations that produce transgenic crops(12)  and its current financing of transgenic crops through project loans, it is reasonable to assume

that the strategy's reference to biotechnology includes the genetic engineering of seeds. However, a growing number of scientists and development experts are questioning the capacity of transgenic crops to reduce poverty and hunger, while voicing concerns about the environmental and health risks of the technology.(13) 

Critics of agricultural biotechnology argue that the release of transgenic crops into the environment can threaten biodiversity, cause genetic contamination of conventional and organic crops as well as indigenous landraces, threaten the safety of the food supply, and pose serious risk of allergenicity to humans.(14)  Furthermore, many rural communities are rejecting transgenic crops because their use frequently denies farmers' cultural right to save, breed and exchange seed, while giving control of their food production to transnational corporations that ultimately have no interest in their well being. Tens of thousands of farmers in Brazil, India, Indonesia and elsewhere have organized mass protests of GE crops and are demanding that their governments forbid importation of GE seeds.(15) 

In addition, a number of countries are unwilling to import GE products, due to consumer rejection of genetically engineered foods.(16)  Farmers in Southern countries who export to markets in Europe, Japan and Korea, for example, could find themselves at a grave disadvantage if they start planting transgenic crops. These farmers would be exposed to greater financial risk and increased vulnerability upon adoption of such technologies.

Wrong partners

The draft Rural Development Strategy proposes increased involvement of the private sector in virtually all aspects of rural development, including research in science and technology, agricultural extension, and access to global markets for new exports. Lip service is given to the participation of local interests and civil society, but the strategy does not suggest how this goal can and should be implemented. While the private sector can contribute to sustainable development (particularly by the action of locally owned small and medium sized enterprises), the strategy indicates a preference for large transnational corporations with no proven ability to reduce poverty and with track records of environmental and human rights abuses.(17)  The strategy asserts that private sector investments must be protected, but makes no mention of how the excesses of transnational corporations will be curbed, or the livelihoods and rights of the poor protected.

In the name of poverty alleviation, the World Bank has formed partnerships with some of the most notorious and aggressive producers of hazardous pesticides. Within the framework of the Bank's Staff Exchange Program, personnel exchanges routinely occur between the World Bank and the major pesticide companies (e.g., Rhone-Poulenc Agro (now Aventis(18)), AgrEvo (now also Aventis), Novartis (now Syngenta) and Dow AgroSciences). (19) These companies have a long list of "red flag" issues in which the companies have placed their commercial interests above public interest. Examples include illegal toxic shipments, chemical dumping and accidents, Superfund sites, chemical testing on humans, false advertising, and convictions for racketeering.(20) Furthermore, a number of these companies have histories of unethical manipulation of pesticide registration decisions, corruption, refusal to withdraw products that have caused frequent casualties and use of massive public relations campaigns to deceive the public about the health and environmental risks of their products.

World Bank partnerships with pesticide companies to promote "safe use" are also unlikely to lead to reduced use, or even safer use, of pesticides. Field studies and independent assessment of industry's "safe use campaigns" have found no credible evidence that these trainings have reduced either use or incidence of pesticide poisoning. (21)  In some cases they have had the opposite effect, particularly when used as a marketing tool to showcase products.(22)  Even the Novartis Foundation concludes that safe use programs are not effective in changing farmers' behaviors and that when pesticide manufacturers cannot guarantee the safe handling and use of hazardous products, these products should be withdrawn from the market.(23)

For taxpayer monies to support the placement of World Bank staff at pesticide/biotech companies constitutes a gross violation of the Bank's pest management policy and its business partnership guidelines.(24)  It is also antithetical to the Bank's commitment to sustainable development and a misuse of public funds.

Another way forward

The World Bank has an opportunity to show leadership in its approach to rural development by revising its draft strategy to reflect the needs and concerns of the rural poor. A sound rural development strategy should start with an accurate assessment of the social and political roots of poverty. It should provide an effective plan of action to enable countries to move away from corporate-controlled agriculture and towards locally owned agriculture that relies on environmentally sustainable methods such as organic farming. The strategy should emphasize proven low-cost, low-risk agricultural technologies (such as ecologically based IPM and low external input sustainable farming) rather than inadequately tested, risky technologies such as genetic engineering.(25) 

Suitable partners would include peasant and producer organizations, NGOs, and international institutions with proven capacity to empower farmers. Carefully selected private sector entities, such as producers of biological pest control agents, food and commodity producers, processors and retailers with an interest in reducing pesticide residues, would also be appropriate.

A revised strategy must uphold workers' and farmers' rights to produce safe and nutritious food for themselves and their communities and to retain decision-making control over their choice of livelihood and methods of agriculture. It should uphold the right to food security and food sovereignty. The strategy should also articulate a plan for regulating the private sector, particularly transnational corporations, in order to prevent violations of human and environmental rights. In addition to organic certification, the strategy should promote Fair Trade certification.

Ultimately, however, for the World Bank to achieve lasting progress towards the environmentally sustainable development goals outlined in Agenda 21, the Bank must cease promoting the industrial model of agriculture through its structural adjustment loans and other measures. It must also reduce the influence of multinational corporations in the design and implementation of its projects, policies and strategies and redirect its vast resources towards supporting community-based approaches to safe, equitable and sustainable food production.

Marcia Ishii-Eiteman is PANNA's World Bank Accountability Project Coordinator. The author would like to thank Jessica Hamburger and Phoenix Lawhon for their valuable input to this article.