NGO Forum on ADB (FORUM) is an Asian-led network of non-government and community-based organizations that support each other to amplify their positions on Asian Development Bank's policies, programs, and projects affecting life forms, resources, constituents - the local communities.
THRUSTS
FORUM aims to:
(a) Stimulate public awareness and action and consequently develop closer working ties with
other Asia- Pacific people's organizations (POs), non-government Organizations (NGOs) and
other public interest groups on issues related to Asian Development Bank (ADB);
(b) Provide a venue for the network to develop a
consensus-based overall strategy on its ADB
campaign;
(c) Sharpen public debate and understanding of the ADB's program and project
activities in
Asia-Pacific region.
Forum monitors the projects, programs and policies of the ADB to ensure accountability of the Bank to the constituents of its member-countries. Forum provides a venue for exchanges of information, learnings and lobbying experiences of its partner organizations. Forum also serves as a venue for solidarity with the struggles of local peoples and indigenous communities. The Forum Secretariat does not accept funds or any other grants from the ADB. [back to top]
HISTORY
In its first 20 years, the ADB went along unchallenged. In
1987, the Asian NGO Coalition (ANGOC) and Friends of the Earth-US started
the campaign with the message that "MDB lending can never save the
environment in the long run." The long-term consequences of foreign debt is
that poor countries can only pay by extracting and exporting their natural
resources, thus, accelerating the destruction of their own environments.
In 1992, the NGO Working Group on the ADB (NGOWG-ADB) was formed by
representatives of civil society groups who attended the 1992 ADB Annual
Meeting in Hongkong. The NGOWG regional secretariat was composed of ANGOC,
Legal Rights and Natural Resources Center (LRC), Freedom from Debt Coalition
(FDC) and Philippine Rural Reconstruction Movement (PRRM). Its information
and liaison office was hosted by LRC.
From a loose network since 1992, network partners agreed in
1999 to evolve the network into an independent organization. Since then, the
NGO Working Group became known as the NGO Forum on ADB. Forum was legally
incorporated in the Philippines in May 2001.
Over the past decade and a half, the campaign has brought some modest yet
significant gains. The ADB campaign has contributed to changes in the Bank's
policy in terms of:
● improved social and environmental guidelines for projects
● new Bank-wide lending priorities
● Bank initiatives in defining sectoral
priorities on forestry, energy, population, involuntary
resettlement,
and information disclosure,
● a more open attitude to dialogue with NGOs and communities,
● and more recently, the Bank's shift to poverty reduction as its "overarching framework."
Since the NGO Working Group was created, practical lessons have been gained from the campaign experience.
Whether the ADB can match its newly-enlightened policy rhetoric, however, will depend largely on the continued vigilance, monitoring and action by NGOs, public interest groups and social movements.