Source:
IFIs Latin American Monitor
Fri Feb 22 2008
The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) is preparing its 49th Annual Meeting of the Board of Governors, from April 4 to 8, in Miami, USA. It is the Bank's foremost event, which congregates official delegations, businesspeople and civil society organizations. The latter will bring their queries about the Integration of Regional Infrastructure in South America (IIRSA) initiative, biofuels and the carbon trade markets, among others. In a context of growing changes in matters of financing, the IDB will do its best to change so that everything remains the same.
The role and relevance of the IDB en Latin America and the Caribbean, and in South America in particular, has been questioned over the last few years. The regional context in financing matters has changed and today the IDB shares its field of influence with other actors. The Banco Nacional de Desarrollo Económico y Social (BNDES) from Brazil has doubled and regionalized its disbursement, going from USD 12 billion to USD 24 billion. By way of example, it can be pointed out that the World Bank Group's financial commitments for 2006 reached USD 33 billion, while during the same year the IDB granted loans and guarantees for USD 6.9 billion. ("How to be relevant in Latin America: the latest in the IDB realignment", Vince McElhinny, 2007)
More recently, as part of the distancing of Latin American countries from the politics of the traditional financial institutions (IMF and World Bank), seven countries (Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia, Ecuador, Paraguay, Venezuela and Uruguay) signed the founding charter of the Banco del Sur (Southern Bank). It is foreseen that the institution will open in the first semester of 2008, although the statutes of the Bank have still not been written. It is hoped, however, that the institution will become a new regional actor with the ability to grant loans without the alert eyes of the United States and the European countries upon it.
This is the reason why the Southern Bank has created expectations in the region, although publicly it is not be the centre of attention among IDB staff, who do not want to give it much relevance. In March 2007, on occasion of the last meeting of Governors in Guatemala, the Southern Bank was still in its early stages and yet it produced different reactions among the participants.
In this new context, the IDB is working since April 2006 on an internal reorganization or "realignment" and on changes to its financing policy, which has provoked differences among its staff. The final stage of realignment was put into practice in July 2007 and since then there have been many changes.
In financing matters, it is clear that the Bank today is giving priority to infrastructure projects and biofuels, reaffirming the tendency expressed at the last meeting in Guatemala (in 2007 the IDB launched its "biofuel initiative", and its president, Luis Alberto Moreno, is also co-chair of the Inter-American Ethanol Commission). Furthermore, in tune with international concerns, the IDB has added climate change to its agenda ("Climate change en the current political agenda" is the title of one of the seminars the Bank is organizing in Miami).
The United States and the IDB
The Miami meeting will be the fourth held in the United States. The earlier meetings took place in New Orleans in 2000, in Miami in 1987 and in Washington D.C. in 1967. This should come as no surprise, since the United States owns 30 per cent of the stock of the institution, and its relationship to it has always been very close.
Since its founding the Bank has gone along with the US programs, Alliance for Progress in the 60s and the Baker Plan and Brady Plan in the 80s. Today, almost 50 years after the creation of the IDB, the Bank provides technical and organizational assistance to draw up and strengthen many of the free trade agreements that the countries in the region sign with the United States, among them the free trade agreement between Central America, the Dominican Republic and the United States (CAFTA-DR).
The concerns of civil society
In 2007 the IDB organized for the seventh year running in San José, Costa Rica, a meeting with civil society organizations to discuss topics of common interest. This consultative event is regularly organized prior to the annual meeting, but in 2008 it is not on the Bank's agenda.
Social organizations are preparing for the Miami meeting in order to communicate their concern over the politics and running of the Bank. Although the IDB lines of work have not changed, many staff, directors y governors have changed as a consequence of its realignment.
The agenda of social organizations includes topics such as: carbon trade markets, environment (Strategic Environmental Evaluation), energy policies (biofuels), impact on indigenous peoples, the Bank's realignment, and the follow-up to the Camisea project, a symbol of the IDB's shortcomings. The financing of the projects within the IIRSA is also at the centre of social concerns.
Related Information:
* 2008 IDB Annual Meeting - Official website
* How to become relevant in Latin America: the latest on the IDB realignment, by Vince McElhinny, Bank Informatio Center, July 2007
* Tensions rise within the Inter-American Development Bank, Bank Informatio Center, July 2007
* IDB Realignment, July 2007 (Official website)
* 2007 IDB Annual Meetings, Choike's coverage
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