IFC

The process of land consolidation in Ukraine stands to accelerate as the government leans into agribusiness as a vehicle for rebuilding the country, arguing that only large companies have the capital needed to repair an agricultural sector devastated by war.

A year after the World Bank approved a plan to redress community grievances over inadequate compensation and sexual harassment at Liberia’s Salala Rubber Corporation, a progress report provides little evidence that any of its key commitments have been implemented.

Un piano d’azione per il risarcimento delle comunità i cui diritti terrieri e umani sono stati violati dai gestori della piantagione di gomma Salala in Liberia sembra essere bloccato.

The project dreamt of transforming dunes of Cholistan into farmlands by contracting out vast tracts to private companies who were supposed to vanguard a corporate farming revolution. But the companies involved are disillusioned, with one foot already out the door.

Ghana's finance minister says large-scale agricultural transformation requires patient capital, and that is why his government is working closely with the World Bank, IFC, and other development partners to mobilise financing and catalyse private sector participation.

The World Bank's IFC is set to expand its agriculture-focused investing with two proposed commitments targeting early-stage agri-tech in Africa and a timber and nature-based carbon removal fund managed by Patria Investments in Brazil.

The World Bank Group’s Compliance Advisor Ombudsman found that the IFC failed to follow its own safeguards, enabling widespread harm to land rights, community health, cultural heritage and women by the Salala Rubber Corporation.

Bloomberg's Big Take podcast looks at an investigation into allegations of sexual coercion at plantations run by Socfin, a rubber company supplying top tiremakers.

Hubert Fabri and Vincent Bolloré own plantations accused of land appropriation and labor abuses. Their company says it has taken steps to improve matters, but a trip to West Africa shows sexual coercion claims remain widespread.

On April 3, 89 civil society organizations signed a joint statement calling on the IFC and the EBRD to ensure remedy and accountability, for the severe and systemic violations at Indorama Agro cotton project, Uzbekistan. In 2019, a presidential decree allocating 50,000 hectares of land to Indorama Agro resulted in the arbitrary termination of thousands of farmers’ land leases without free, prior and informed consent.

Advocates for 22 communities affected by the problems told ICIJ the sale allowed Socfin and the IFC to minimize their responsibility for addressing harm done to workers and plantation residents, adding to longstanding criticisms of the World Bank's handling of damages caused by projects it finances.

The World Bank unit's "action plan" is an attempt to respond to its own compliance advisor's recommendations on issues ranging from land grabs to sexual exploitation on the plantation.