DEVELOPMENT POLICY KIOSK
"quis custodiet ipsos custodes"
 Decimus Junius Juvenal 50-130 A.D.

CHINESE KIOSK

Comments on Draft OP/BP 4.12: Involuntary Resettlement

* Comment was also published by the World Bank on their page

 

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Commentator  (in alphabetical order)

*Dinesh Agrawal
Deputy General Manager (R&R)
National Thermal Power Corporation Ltd.
India 4 October 1999

*Mr. Shahid Alam (Former Project Director, Resettlement, JMBP) Resettlement Specialist, Jamuna Bridge Railway Link Project Dhaka, Bangladesh

 

*Richard E. Bissell Executive Director, Policy Division National Academy of Sciences Washington, D.C

 

Peter Bosshard

Berne Declaration , 29 September

 

*Peter Bosshard
Berne Declaration
Switzerland 23 September 1999

 

*Anna Dunets
John van Nostrand Associates

 

*T. Herbert
Prerana Resource Centre

 

* Jane Hill

President of the

American Anthropological Association

 

*Ryan Hunter
Slovak National Coordinator
CEE Bankwatch Network
Center for Environmental Public Advocacy
Slovak Republic September 10, 1999

*Rohit Jain
Vice President
CADAM
Delhi, India 28 September 1999

*Manish Joshi
Rural Litigation and Entitlement Kendra
Dehradun, U.P., India September 15, 1999

 

*Monsieur Jean Roger Mercier
Responsable environnementale pour l'Afrique.
Washington September 8, 1999

 

* Jim Nations, Conservation International

 

*Dr. NDE
Executive President
Committee for the Coordination of Durable Development (CCDD)
Date of Creation: 1995
Statute: NGO    Comment of 9 September 1999

 

* Alexandra Page
Indian Law Resource Center

 

*Minar Pimple
Executive Director
Youth for Unity and Voluntary Action (YUVA)
Mumbai, India 17 September 1999

*Sam Rao, Senior Vice President KCP Associates International Chicago/Manila/Nairobi

*B. Venkat Rao
Director
Ventre for Management and Social Research
Hyderabad, India 21 September 1999

*D. Narasimha Reddy
Executive Director
Centre for Resource Education,
Hyderabad, India September 14, 1999

*Ritsumeikan University Research Group on Involuntary Resettlement
Chie GONDO,  Takako HARUYAMA, Bunpei HIROTA, Hirokatsu INOUE,
Hiroyuki  IKUTA,  Phil Hwa JO, Masao KAWAI, Nang Mya Kay Khaing , Yuji OGAWA, Akinori SEKIDO, Hiroki SHIGENO, Shigehiro TAKAGI, Naoki UEHATA, Makoto YAGUCHI

*Thayer Scudder California Institute of Technology

* Pierre Senecal
Conseiller Environment, Hydro-Quebec
Chair, EIA Technical Committee
Canadian Standards Association (CSA International)
IAIA Past-president 1996-97

Alex Wilks  Coordinator, The Brenton Woods Project

*Achyut Yagnik
Convenor
Forum 21
Ahmedabad, India 27 September 1999

 

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Peter Bosshard

Berne Declaration

29 September

 

BD Comments on the World Bank's Resettlement Policy Conversion

 

Introduction:

 

The Berne Declaration appreciates the opportunity to comment on the proposed conversion of the World Bank's resettlement and rehabilitation policy (OD 4.30/OP 4.12). The BD is a Swiss non-governmental organization with 16,000 members. It has advocated more equitable and environmentally sustainable North-South relations since 1968.

 

The BD has monitored World Bank projects such as the India NTPC Power Generation project for many years. Like many other NGOs, has often been disturbed about the failure of rehabilitation in resettlement projects. This failure has created severe problems for 100,000s of people, and has triggered some of the most important requests for investigation by the Inspection Panel. The pending policy conversion must help to improve the performance of resettlement projects. This is a test case for the World Bank's commitment to the overarching goal of poverty reduction.

 

The following comments focus on the issues of monitoring and supervision, of land-for-land vs. cash compensation, and of restoration vs. improvement of incomes. The Berne Declaration is concerned that rather than addressing the critical loopholes of OD 4.30, the proposed new policy severely weakens a core provision of the current policy. This weakening contradicts earlier claims that the ongoing conversion process would not water down the earlier operational directives.

 

Monitoring and supervision:

 

In paragraphs 5, 16 and 22, the proposed OP 4.12 attributes the responsibility for monitoring to the borrowing government, and for supervision to the Bank. This new distinction weakens the position of affected people and qualifies the Bank's commitment to project implementation. Experience indicates that an effective monitoring of resettlement projects is usually lacking, and that governments are hardly ever committed to complying with Bank policies. OED's June 1998 report on "Recent Experience with Involuntary Resettlement" refers to "the governments' disinterest in the M&E activity", which was "undisguised and tolerated by the bank" (p. 5, para. 17). With such a poor record of the past, the Bank should not disengage from its responsibility for project monitoring.

 

In footnote 20, the proposed OP 4.12 suggests that borrowers create independent advisory panels of resettlement specialists, a procedure which is now followed for environmental assessments. This idea deserves support. The proposed panels could be strengthened if they were established by the Bank and not the borrowers. Their reports should be made available toproject-affected people as a matter of principle.

 

Land-for-land vs. cash compensation

 

According to OD 4.30, "the Bank encourages 'land for land' approaches, providing replacement land at least equivalent to the lost land". This is a core provision of the current directive, which has encouraged similar provisions in the R&R policies of many borrowing governments and agencies. It is strongly qualified by the proposed new policy, which states in paragraph 9: "If sufficient land is not available, non land-based options built around opportunities for employment or self-employment should be provided in addition to cash compensation for land and other assets lost." 

 

This change of policy is completely unacceptable. Contrary to the Bank's wishful thinking, non land-based rehabilitation options - and especially the much-touted self-employment schemes - have so far almost always failed, and particularly in rural settings. While land is passed on from one generation to the next, cash compensation is typically spent within a short period, and training programs are usually not sufficient to turn farmers and peasants into successful entrepreneurs in saturated markets. The failure of non land-based rehabilitation is confirmed by OED's June 1998report (pp. 8 and 55), and by the reports of the Inspection Panel e.g. onthe NTPC project in India. OED argues that this "only means the Bank has to put many more of its best development planners onto the task" (p. 8). Yet it would be cynical to weaken the policy before the best development planners have demonstrated their ability to deliver non land-based rehabilitation. The impact of this change will be borne by affected people, who typically belong to the poorest members of society.

 

Some observers might argue that since many Bank projects have not included land-for-land rehabilitation in the past anyway, the proposed policy conversion will not change much in actual practice. Yet so far, the official preference for land-based rehabilitation has tended to discourage borrowers and task managers from engaging in difficult resettlement operations. Indirectly, the stated policy has helped to prevent the externalization of social costs, and has contributed to a certain reduction(although not minimization) of resettlement. The Berne Declaration is concerned that giving up the preference for land-based rehabilitation might open the floodgates and weaken the healthy scepticism among Bank staff and borrowers to engage in resettlement projects.

 

Land-based rehabilitation is often very difficult to achieve. Still, the Bank should not qualify its preference for this option as long as it is not capable of minimizing resettlement on the conceptual level, and as long as alternative options such as self-employment schemes have not been demonstrated to work. The Bank's new OP 4.12 should therefore stick to the preference for land-for-land rehabilitation as expressed in OD 4.30.

 

Improving vs. restoring income levels

 

A central problem of the present policy and practice is that resettlement and rehabilitation are usually not conceived as development projects, butas mere compensation efforts. In paragraph 1, draft OP 4.12 continues to accept the "restoration" of income levels which was stipulated by OD 4.30.In his comments on 27 July, 1999, Prof. Thayer Scudder convincingly argues that the restoration of pre-project income levels often means a reduction of the standards of living. The Berne Declaration agrees with Prof. Scudder in that rehabilitation should be conceived as development projects, that OP4.12 should stipulate an improvement of the living standard of affected people, and that the reference to income restoration should be deleted.

 

Thank you for your consideration of these comments.

 

Peter Bosshard

 

Berne Declaration

 

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Alex Wilks 

Coordinator, The Brenton Woods Project

[The Bretton Woods Project works on World Bank and IMF issues  with a network of 27 UK non-government organization]

 

30 September 1999

 

Resettlement policy conversion: comments and suggestions

 

 

Dear Maninder Gill,

 

Thank you for your letter of 19 July asking the Bretton Woods Project to prepare comments on the Bank's conversion of its Operational Directive on Involuntary Resettlement. The Bank's decision to circulate the proposed new documents in draft form for comments is very welcome and will I am sure improve the final products. 

In my current position, my previous work with The Ecologist, I co-wrote Evicted!, the World Bank, British Aid and Forced Resettlement, and my work over about 8 years in support of the Narmada Bachao Andolan, India and the World Commission on Dams, I have come to appreciate the importance of how resettlement policy is framed and implemented. On the documents you sent, I have the following three main comments. 

 

1)Minimising displacement: what methodology?

 

It is clear to me, especially from reading the Morse Report, the Bank's 1994 resettlement review, and my visits to some of the disgraceful resettlement sites for people displaced by the Sardar Sarovar/Narmada project, that the overriding aim of any resettlement policy should be to ensure that displacement is minimised, as there are extremely few cases where relocation and compensation of project affected people have happened successfully. 

 

Recognising this overarching aim, I would strongly recommend that you clarify what the Bank means by "exploring all viable alternative project designs" [BP, § 1, (a)]. Clarifying the Bank's project appraisal methodology is also implicitly supported by Michael Cernea in his recent book The Economics of Involuntary Resettlement (World Bank, 1999, p.21). He argues:  

 

 "The cost-benefit method can be easily manipulated or influenced by  a) excluding costs caused by the project, b) by the way in which costs and benefits are valued when direct market prices cannot be observed or are not conclusive, and c) by the choice of the discount rate to estimate the present value of a condemned asset. But the point I want to emphasize is that even at its best, without distortions, the standard cost-benefit method is incapable of answering the economic and ethical questions involved in forced displacement" [emphasis in original].   

 

Whilst I do not agree with all of the answers to this problem that are proposed later in the book, I would urge the Bank to recognise that the debate on project assessment methodologies is now far too complex to be summarised by the word "viable". This whole issue (including on multidimensional aspects of poverty and vulnerability, the difficulties of commensuration of values, the problems with using discount rates to produce net present value figures etc etc) is being explored in detail in many fora at the moment. These include the work of the World Commission on Dams and at a conference, "The Cost-Benefit Analysis Dilemma: Strategies and Alternatives" to be held at Yale University, 8-10 October 1999. Both fora are discussing how you can take account of different social groups' perspectives on valuation and viability, surely essential in an era where  the World Bank is emphasising its intentions to be participatory, equitable and holistic in its work.

 

RECOMMENDATION: that the Bank clarify in detail, with reference to recent in-depth work such as that mentioned above, how alternative project approaches and designs are to be assessed. The OP should also clarify that alternatives assessment must include the no project option. 

 

2) Land for land compensation: a substantive weakening

 

The second most important shortcoming of the draft OP and BP is the way that land for land compensation is treated. The approach adopted in the draft BP text on land for land compensation is significantly weaker than the relevant provisions of OD 4.30:  

 

 "If sufficient land is not available, land is not the preferred option of the displaced persons, or the provision of land would adversely affect the sustainability of the park or protected area, non land-based options built around opportunities for employment or self-employment should be provided in addition to cash compensation for land and other assets lost." [draft BP, §9]   

 

This rewording gives ample opportunity for officials to argue that they do not need to provide land for land. This constitutes a substantive policy shift, contradicting the assurances given in a letter from Myrna Alexander, then World Bank Director, Operations Policy Department, to the Bretton Woods Project (4 February 1997):    "It is important to reiterate that the conversion process was never conceived as the opportunity to reformulate policy .... Occasionally, we have used the conversion process to amend specific aspects of established policies, but only in a very few cases in which that part of the policy was clearly no longer applicable or when the Board has specifically asked for a precise change" [emphasis in original].  

 

My reading of the draft policy, and that of colleagues in other NGOs, is that it has deliberately been drafted far more weakly than the OD it is supposed to replace, w

 the problems of cash, rather than land, compensation were clearly recognised. 

 

RECOMMENDATION: reinstate the language in OD 4.30 emphasising that 'cash compensation alone is normally inadequate' and reword the second half of §9 to clarify that cash options will only be considered in a very clearly defined and limited set of circumstances. Any changes from the original policy on this vital matter should be discussed by the Board and clear reasons given for the Bank's new approach.

 

 3) The Resettlement Dispute Committee

 

The new resettlement dispute committee proposed by BP 4.12 is expected to rule on questions of application and scope of the policy. The composition of the Committee appears unsatisfactory as it may not include the Bank's best resettlement specialists. It is unclear under what circumstances Task Managers should ask for a committee ruling to proactively evaluate compliance,. What is its relationship to the Bank's Operations Evaluation Department and Quality Assurance Group, and to the project-specific advisory panels of independent resettlement specialists advocated in footnote 20 on page 6 of the draft OP? 

 

RECOMMENDATION: the composition and function of the committee should be reconsidered and clarified. The committee should include one or more of the Bank's best resettlement specialists, and at least one independent outside expert from academia or an NGO. The committee's deliberations should be publicly available. 

 These are the most important points which struck me on reviewing the draft OP and BP. Given the absolute importance of the first point about taking all possible steps to minimise displacement, and the fact that so much useful work is currently being done in the context of the World Commission on Dams which itself results from controversies over Bank-funded resettlement projects, I would urge you to consider suspending the final publication of your new policy until after the Commission has presented its conclusions next year. 

 

Please keep me informed about progress on this vital work. 

 

Yours sincerely,

 

 Alex Wilks  Coordinator

 

cc.            Stephen Pickford/Myles Wickstead, UKDel, World Bank        

Ian Johnson, VP ESSD, World Bank   The Clerk, International Development Committee, House of Common, Achim Steiner, Secretariat, World Commission on Dams, Interested NGOs 

 

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* Mr. Shahid Alam (Former Project Director, Resettlement, JMBP) Resettlement Specialist, Jamuna Bridge Railway Link Project Dhaka, Bangladesh

Comments on OP 4.12 of the World Bank.

In Bangladesh, we are implementing one of the largest resettlement projects of the world (Jamuna Multipurpose Bridge Project, JMBP) where about 100,000 people of different categories were affected. For resettlement and economic rehabilitation of these affected people, we prepared a detail program called 'Revised Resettlement Action Plan'. The program is under implementation for the last six years. Although there are few important issues yet to be addressed in this program, but so far this resettlement program has been proved to be fairly successfully. This could be achieved because of a total commitment and a flexible approach we took during implementation of the program. At the beginning we developed a good database generated from a comprehensive socioeconomic survey. For day to day implementation we also have a CMIS. The resettlement program being implemented by a Resettlement Unit, some government agencies and few renowned NGO.

OD 4.30 was the guiding principle for formulation and implementation of the above resettlement program for JMBP. During implementation of the resettlement program at field level it became necessary to prepare detail implementation procedure or application modalities. As a unique project we had to develop these detail procedures and modalities according to our need. In fact these are the responsibility of individual borrowing countries and may vary from project to project. For that, I do not consider it appropriate to go for another policy documentation like OP 4.12. So far our experience is concerned, we consider OD 4.30 as a complete document. For understanding the Bank Policy on Involuntary resettlement OD 4.30 is considered as a most precise, innovative and a document which is easy to follow. Although OP 4.12 has been termed as short and focused, but in actual term it has become more elaborate and lengthy.

The OP/BP 4.12 para 3 says that 'this exercise does not involve a revision of the current Bank policy on involuntary resettlement, but a conversion to the new format. However the conversion does clarify certain ambiguities, and takes into consideration -------.' I don't think there are ambiguities in OD 4.30. Well any document of this kind can always be improved and fine-tuned with events and experience.

In this regard the current exercise being undertaken to 'fine-tune' the involuntary resettlement policy of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) is worth mentioning. ADB in Nov. 1995 made a policy on 'involuntary resettlement'. The same policy being implemented in many ADB funded projects of the region. Now after 4 years, ADB wants to fine-tune its policy in the light of experience gained in implementing this policy. For that they commissioned a TA and conducted workshops on case studies in all seven countries namely PRC, Pakistan, Viet Nam, Bangladesh, Nepal, Indonesia and Philippines. Now ADB is organizing a workshop in Manila on Aug. 23-24, 1999 where experts from these seven countries will firm-uptheir recommendations. The purpose is to fine-tune the policy on involuntary resettlement of ADB. Similarly 'fine-tuning' the OD 4.30 in the light of experience gained by WB from all over the world will be more appropriate.

Lastly I would like to say that, the world's most eminent resettlement experts prepared a document like OD 4.30. I personally know many of them. Also at later stages during implementation of JMBP, I met and discussed with some of those personalities. In my opinion any major modifications at this stage may not be helpful.

Thanks and regard.

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*Thayer Scudder California Institute of Technology

CRITIQUE OF RESETTLEMENT DRAFT OP/BP 4.12:  INVOLUNTARY RESETTLEMENT

Introduction

From a position of pioneering leadership in resettlement guideline formulation the World Bank's recent guideline revisions have ignored ongoing and recent research on resettlement outcomes including research-based conclusions reported in two recent Bank publications. These are the June 1998 Report No. 17538 of the Operations Evaluation Department on Recent Experience With Involuntary Resettlement and  the Bank's March1999 The Economics of Involuntary Resettlement: Questions and Challenges edited by Michael Cernea. While the comments that follow  draw  on my own 40 years of research with large-scale river basin development projects, I believe they are also applicable to involuntary resettlement caused by other large-scale projects such as coal-burning thermal stations and urban redevelopment.

The Major Deficiency of the Current Draft Guidelines: Living Standard Restoration - A Deficiency Which in Itself causes Impoverishment

A critical and self-defeating weakness of the current policy is the often repeated statement that "Displaced persons should be assisted in their efforts to improve their livelihoods and standards of living or at least restore them" (First page of the 1999 Draft and written in the 1990 OD 4.30as "assisted in their efforts to improve their former living standards, income earning capacity, and production levels, or at least to restore them." ). While the first part of the 1999 sentence is excellent, the subsequent acceptance of restoration undercuts the Bank's emphasis on the resettlement component as a development project. For the various reasons outlined in the next section, allowing restoration as opposed to improvement tends to make a majority of those resettled worse off.

Research-based Reasons why Restoration tends to Worsen Poverty among Resettled Households and Communities

1. The Planning Process: A first reason relates to the nature of the lengthy planning process for major dams as well as for urban redevelopment projects. Though the exception, that can go on for up to forty years as in the case of China’s Three Gorges Project. However a 10 to 20 year planning horizon is not exceptional. During that time, governments, private sector entrepreneurs, NGOs and project affected people themselves are much less likely to make any investments within the rural and urban areas concerned. Hence by the time a decision is made to proceed with major feasibility studies including "base-line studies" to determine pre-project living standards of future resettles, those people's  living standards will already be worse off than those of  neighbors living outside the project area.

2. The Nature of the Resettlement Process: Another reason why mere restoration can be expected to actually lower living standards relates tithe nature of the resettlement process.

a. During the years or year immediately preceding removal income and living standards tend to drop for a number of reasons. Once people realize that relocation may be forthcoming, housing improvements are less likely to be made while local innovators and entrepreneurs are less likely to invest in new enterprises. Hence  in the case of the Swaziland-South African Maguga Dam on which construction has just begun this year, local people who wanted to start cattle coops and other business ventures over ten years ago were told by the authorities not to proceed. As for other impacts adversely affecting living standards, labor migrants are apt to return home to help their families hence those families losing access to remittances. Due to uncertainty over removal dates rural people may also be less likely to harvest good crops, having planted a smaller area or being told - as in some cases - by the authorities not to plant at all because removal, subsequently delayed, is imminent.

b. As for the period immediately following removal, adjusting to new habitats, new neighbors (the hosts), and government programs reduce time and energy for restoring whatever living standards those displaced previously had. During that time period (which seldom lasts for less than a year) living standards for the majority can be expected to drop. For that reason, mere restoration requires improvement. As for that minority who are able to obtain work during a project's construction phase, their living standards also tend to drop once the construction phase ends because longer-term development opportunities tend not to be available at the appropriate time. Even where plans include a development component, a time gap is common between people's physical removal and the implementation of development plans, as is the case, for example, today with the World Bank-assisted Lesotho Highlands Water Project.

Though dropped in the Bank's latest draft (hence weakening it) even the World Bank/IFC January 1998 draft guidelines themselves state that living standards tend to drop following removal, so that eventual restoration in fact would not compensate for whatever downturn occurred before and after removal. Hence section 5a)(vi) states that those displaced should be” provided with development assistance and measures for support  during a transition period until they have had a reasonable opportunity to establish their former production levels, income-earning capacity, and living standards."  So without the project, living standards would most likely have been higher for the majority during that period; indeed they might have even gone up in those countries with a recent positive rate of development -as in China for example.

3.      The Nature of Pre-Project Bench Mark Studies: Current guidelines are based on the inaccurate assumption that pre-project bench mark (baseline in the Bank's terminology) studies accurately reflect pre-project income and living standards; hence constitute a basis against which restoration can be measured. Yet even where pre-resettlement surveys are undertaken -- and adequate ones are rare -- there is a general tendency to underestimate people’s incomes at that time. For example, those involved can be expected to under-report income due to forgetfulness (especially common in regard to contributions of other family members) or fear of being taxed or because sources of that income may be considered unflattering, quasi-legal or illegal.

The World Bank's own evaluations refer to the inadequacy of such studies as a baseline against which to measure subsequent restoration. Thailand's PakMun Dam - one of the World Commission on Dams' focal studies -- is a good example since the Bank considers resettlement outcomes there as one of its most successful (in part, in my opinion, because the project authority "was actually committed to exceed the World Bank resettlement policy"[World Bank, 1998: 4]). Yet in that case, "There is no true baseline study, only preliminary surveys in 1982 and 1983, too early to serve as a baseline"(page 19)

The Pak Mun preliminary surveys considered only income, and that incompletely since income from fishing was excluded; and they dealt only with households requiring physical removal. Completed 7-8 years before construction began, results were considered so inadequate that a second survey was carried out. Though considered a baseline study by the project authorities that survey was actually done four months after the dam had been completed and resettlers had moved into their new houses. While it dealt with activities over the past 12 months, including eight months before reservoir inundation, surveys undertaken during the year of removal can not be expected to provide a reliable record for the reasons noted in the previous point dealing with the nature of the resettlement process. Moreover, "the baseline data on fishing income was inadequate" (page 6).

4.      Loss of Arable Land: Especially where farm land and access to common property resources are lost or reduced, household expenses following resettlement are apt to be greater than before. Increased costs are especially a problem for resettlers who have to purchase food supplies that previously they were able to produce, or where less fertile soils require the purchase of such inputs as improved seed and fertilizers, or where new production techniques require loans that lead to indebtedness. Another reason why loss of arable land is apt to leave households worse off, is that such land usually is passed on from generation to generation. The same is not the case where cash compensation is provided or where first generation resettlers obtain jobs.

5.      Cultural and Health Impacts: Draft OP 4.12 only covers direct economic and social impacts (page 1). It does not cover the wide range of negative cultural impacts reported in study after study that relate to loss of home, burial grounds, religious sites, and ideological and political control over a familiar habitat. Nor does it cover the public health implications of such psychological impacts as "grieving for a lost home" and” anxiety for the future" which are especially serious for indigenous people, and for many ethnic minorities and peasant communities, with strong ties to the land and limited mobility, as well as for low income urban communities.

There is no way that social cost benefit analyses can accurately reflect the hardships involved; hence the need for resettlement components to be planned and implemented as development projects to offset such costs by helping resettlers become project beneficiaries.

To sum up the above five points, even restoration of living standards requires an emphasis on improvement during the resettlement process. The failure of the World Bank Guidelines to recognize the further impoverishing impacts of mere restoration not only causes its own guidelines to be inadequate, but also encourages borrower countries to emulate those guidelines. That is the case even in countries with improved national policies for resettlement. China is a case in point. According to Article 3of the January 25, 1991 regulation on 'Land Acquisition and Resettlement Regulation for the Construction of Large and Medium-Sized Water Conservancy Projects,' "The Government advocates and supports resettlement with development." Yet the next article follows the World Bank's guidelines when it states, "all resettlers shall be assisted to improve or at least restore their former living standard in steps."  Note that the comment on” in steps" shows that the authorities expect living standards to be worse off during the transition period.

Mere restoration of living standards gives a government a fallback positioning spite of  increasing evidence that implementation of that position further impoverishes the majority. That is a conclusion, incidentally, that Chinese researchers have also reached.  Founded in 1992, the National Research Centre for Resettlement at Hohai University has been studying dam-related resettlement since the mid-1980s. Like myself, they have evolved a four stage framework for describing the resettlement process. During their first stage labeled 'Moving', they note that "the standard of living and production of most displaced persons declines;" hence the need to improve living standards merely to restore them.

The Current Status of the Ongoing Restoration versus Improvement Controversy within the World Bank

According to ICOLD (International Commission on Large Dams)'s May 1997Position Paper on Dams and the Environment "For the population involved, resettlement must result in a clear improvement of their living standards, because the people directly affected by a project should always be the first to benefit" (pp. 11-13). In the World Bank's latest publication on resettlement issues ("The Economics of Involuntary Resettlement: Questions and Challenges"), the editor and initiator of the Bank's 1980 Guidelines states "The primary goal of any involuntary resettlement process is to prevent impoverishment and to improve the livelihood of resettlers" (Cernea,1999: 6). In the latest resettlement review by the Bank's Operations Evaluation Department, the authors state "The emphasis should shift from restoring income levels, which suggest stagnation at pre-dam lifestyles, to improving income levels, which brings the displaces into the development process along with the project's primary beneficiaries" (World Bank 1998: 7).

Granted such opinions of the World Bank's resettlement experts, why is it that the current redrafting of the Bank's resettlement guidelines continues to allow restoration as the goal of its policy? The question is also perplexing because the header at the top of the latest policy draft states” The World Bank Group   A World Free of Poverty." Yet the policy which follows allows borrowers to replicate poverty. That is because almost invariably people required to resettle are poor. Frequently as in the United States, India and Brazil dam-resettlers, for example, are tribal people who are the poorest of the poor. Yet where involving what are frequently the largest development projects in a county's development plan, the Bank’s resettlement policy allows such projects to merely replicate pre-existing poverty among those who are the main losers and risk-takers.

Resettlement experts within the World Bank's Social Development Department explain this paradox in terms of strong resistance within the World Bank to revising the guidelines to require improvement. In commenting on the OED belief that "there is strong case for strengthening" the current OP 4.12resettlement draft (1998: 10), the Bank Management response to the recommendation "to change the policy benchmark from restoration of incomes of affected people to improvement" was that "Bank policies already establish high standards for dealing with involuntary resettlement" and "Management sees the implementation of existing policy as the key priority" (1998: 16).

Two other reasons are also mentioned for not altering the "restoration” stance. One is that in shifting from the Bank’s Operational Directives to the new OP/BP format, those involved are instructed to convert not revise the directives. That argument is not convincing, at least with the resettlement guidelines, since in fact they have been revised to include a wider range of resettlement situations. They have also been weakened in that some previously mandated requirements have now been weakened  to the status of suggested "Best Practice."

The second reason relates to the wider range of resettlement situations that the Guidelines now cover, including removal of people from new biosphere another reserves and from national parks, or restriction of access to such reserves and parks.  If mere restoration is acceptable in some such cases, and I do not accept that it is, then a single uniform policy for all types of involuntary resettlement is no longer acceptable. Moreover, at a time when the World Commission on Dams has the responsibility to develop guidelines and criteria, it is inappropriate for the Bank to preempt the WCD process by not only drafting new guidelines for one of the most controversial issues relating to dams, but also to draft guidelines which allow the replication of poverty.

The main argument, however, by opponents within the Bank to shifting from restoration to improvement relates to the failure of the existing guidelines to even achieve their goal of restoration.   Why revise goals upward to require improvement, they argue, when "The Bank has acknowledged that the record on restoring - let alone improving - incomes has been unsatisfactory"(World Bank, 1998:2).

I reject that argument for two major reasons. The first, for the four reasons already noted, is that a major reason for the failure of the Bank’s guidelines to restore income and living standards is the emphasis in the guidelines on compensation and restoration as opposed to development. Because of that emphasis, potential development opportunities are not emphasized during the planning process. Indeed, as the 1998 OED study notes,” the weakest part of planning is on economic rehabilitation" (page 6). No wonder the Bank's guidelines fail to achieve results since development planning and implementation, as we have seen above, is necessary even for income and living standard restoration.

The second reason why I reject the argument that failure to restore in itself is reason enough not to seek the goal of improvement is that, according to the Bank's own studies, the most successful cases of dam-induced resettlement are cases where the policy of the implementing agency or the national government is to improve living standards. Two such cases recently analyzed by the Bank are Thailand's Pak Mun Project and China’s Shuikou Project.

Benchmark (Baseline) Studies and Monitoring and Evaluation.

Yet another problem that the World Bank faces with the current guidelines is the difficulty of determining when income and living standards have been restored. Partly that is due to the inadequacy of the baseline studies themselves and to the inadequacy of the subsequent monitoring process. Partly it is due to the difficulty of determining the meaning of restoration granted the less tangible public health and cultural costs of resettlement. Where the goal is improvement, it becomes easier for monitors to decide whether or not living standards are going up, staying the same or dropping. Through the use of a range of indicators,  Wimaladharma and I, for example, could make such determinations within a matter of minutes during our long-term monitoring of the same households in Sri Lanka's Accelerated Mahaweli Project.

Other Issues

Merely omitting the phrase "and restore" would go a long ways toward making the Bank's resettlement guidelines State of the Art. My further comments relate to changes that could embellish that result but that would still encourage failure among burrowers whose policy remains a "restoration one."

Cash Compensation. While Section 9 of OP 4.12 is an improvement over earlier drafts, Section 10is still worrisome since loss of access to arable land and communal natural resources can jeopardize resettlers during national/international periods of economic downturn even where "markets for land, housing and labor exist" and where "displaced persons use such markets." Pak Mun, considered one of the Bank’s most successful cases, is an example. There approximately two thirds of compensation offered was cash. Though cash compensation for arable land was higher than replacement value, many resettlers opted not  to use that compensation for purchasing replacement land, but rather for investing in savings, children's welfare, housing and consumer goods. In OED's 1998 case study, the authors explained this 1996 result in terms of the increasing importance of nonfarm activities and employment, including employment in Bangkok. However, only several years later such households no longer have the natural resource base to fall back on after employment opportunities for wage laborers were adversely affected by the Asian downturn. Those households are now hurting.

Loss of Land (and Protection of Customary Land Tenure OD 4.30 emphasizes that "The objective is to treat customary and formal rights as equally as possible in devising compensation rules and procedures."  Section 13 of OP 4.12 weakens that statement by referring to” customary and traditional rights recognized under the laws of the country.” Where land is owned by the State, that phrase puts communities with such rights at risk, especially in countries like Mauritania and Somalia that have passed legislation favoring individual rights at the expense of customary rights, and countries like Zambia which have been considering similar legislation.

Section 31 on land acquisition. While the World Bank family has always tried to avoid financing land acquisition, OD 4.30 (1990) at least qualifies that stance by stating that” normally" the Bank does not "disburse against land acquisition."  In this section OP 4.12 drops the word "normally," hence precluding any exceptions (such as providing loans for land purchase) to a now rigid policy.

Footnote 20 of OP 4.12For contentious projects, an international advisory panel of experts should be required not merely recommended as is the case here.

Section 11 of OP 4.12 Annex. Under resettlement measures the wording should be "compensation and development measures" rather than "compensation and other resettlement measures." One worrisome thing about the Bank policy as well as the Overview of the June 1998 OED review of involuntary dam resettlement is the ease with which the Bank, after emphasizing that resettlement projects should be development projects, thereafter emphasizes compensation and rehabilitation rather than compensation and development. Compensation and rehabilitation are at best mitigation measures that do not even restore living standards. Emphasis on compensation and other mitigation methods, as opposed to improvement of living standards, is apt to bias borrowers away from dealing with project affected people as beneficiaries.

Section 21 on Monitoring and Evaluation. This is inadequate since too much emphasis is placed on the implementing agency doing its own monitoring. It is not sufficient to merely state” supplemented by independent monitors as appropriate." Who decides what is” appropriate?"

*************************************

Sam Rao, Senior Vice President KCP Associates International Chicago/Manila/Nairobi

 Comments on Draft OP 4.12, Draft OP 4.12 Annex and Draft BP 4.12 are provided below:

The World Bank should be commended for undertaking  to expand the 1990 operational policy (OP) on Involuntary Resettlement (OP no. 4.30 of about 6pages) into OP 4.12 (about 10 pages), OP 4.12 Annex describing the elements of a resettlement plan, an abbreviated resettlement plan and a resettlement policy  framework (about 7 pages) and BP (Bank procedures) 4.12 (about 5 pages). We hope that the Source Book on Good Practices (GP 4.12) will also be shared with civil society before finalization.

Draft OP 4.12: Reaffirmation of Key Policy Points

 It would be helpful to further delineate the policy  objectives under paragraph 1, as follows:

a) Involuntary resettlement should be avoided, where  feasible, exploring all viable alternatives

b) Where involuntary resettlement is unavoidable, it  should be minimized through appropriate adjustments  in project design (for example, road realignment,  adjusting dam height, etc.).

c) Resttlement activities should be conceived and executed…..

d) Displaced persons ....


 The Bank and its borrowers seemed to have largely  focused on technical design aspects first and saw  involuntary resettlement as an unavoidable  consequence. It is necessary to shift the emphasis  to avoidance of involuntary resettlement in the first  place by exploring all viable options. Also, the  examples of road realignment and dam height  adjustment should stay in the text (and not lost in footnote) to remind Bank Task Teams (TTs) and borrowers to explore project design avenues to minimize  involuntary resettlement.

 Draft OP 4.12: Harmonizing Policy Requirements with  Bank Instruments

 Under Section IV. Resettlement Instruments, it is  desirable to also cover structural adjustment  loans (SALs), Sector Adjustment Loans (SECALs),  Adjustable Program Loans (APLs) and Learning and  innovation Loans (LILs) which together constitute  more than half the Bank's lending operations. In many  cases, the direct adverse economic and social  impacts of SALs, SECALs, etc. may be evident only during implementation. Accordingly, a process approach  analogous to that proposed to be adopted in projects  involving restriction of access to legally  designated parks and protected areas may be appropriate to mitigate them.

 Draft OP 4.12 Annex


 An outline of an action plan (mentioned in para 15  of BP 4.12) with the essential elements needs to be  prepared and included in this Annex to help  borrowers, executing and implementing agencies, and Bank TTs and TTLs. This should cover not only the involuntary restriction of access to legally designated parks and protected areas, but also the adverse impacts of SALs, SECALs, etc. It may be desirable to prepare separate action plan outlines for each of the above lending instruments.


 Draft BP 4.12: Avoidance of Involuntary Resettlement

 The draft is silent on avoidance of involuntary  resettlement. The first step (Bank procedure) at the  project identification stage should be to explore  alternatives to avoid involuntary resettlement. This  would help address the very first policy objective  of avoidance of involuntary resettlement.


 Draft BP 4:12: Coverage of SALs, SECALs, etc.

The Bank's procedures to address the direct adverse  effects of SALs, SECALs, etc. during their  identification, preparation, appraisal and  implementation should be included in this section to  guide the borrowers and Bank teams.

 For consideration and action as appropriate.

*************************************


Sam Rao, Senior Vice President  KCP Associates International  Chicago/Manila/Nairobi

Some clarifications on the types of direct adverse impacts of SALs and SECALs that may be suitable for coverage under this Policy:

(i) involuntary displacement of people,

(ii) loss or significant restriction of access to livelihood opportunities, and

(iii) Reduction or loss of access to public services including food, primary education and basic healthcare.

For your consideration and use as appropriate.

Sam Rao

* Richard E. Bissell Executive Director, Policy Division National Academy of Sciences Washington, D.C

As a former member of the Inspection Panel, I was provided the draft OP/BP by the Executive Secretary at your suggestion for any comments I might have.

I have very few comments to make substantively except to say that the reformatting has helped considerably in clarifying some of the ambiguities of the current policy.  Without being an expert in resettlement, it was clear to me that many of the Bank staff found the current policy to be unclear with regard to many concrete situations on the ground, and this new approach has clearly moved in the right direction.

My only concern relates to the "Cover Note for Posting," where in paragraph 10you have stated that the planned sourcebook for the GP 4.12 "will provide detailed interpretation of various aspects of the policy."   This may create a problem for the Bank in the case of projects that become subject to a request for inspection.  The Inspection Panel bases its reviews of projects only on OPs and BPs, by decision of the Executive Directors, and not on GPs.  GPs are supposed to provide only guidance to staff and because they are not binding they are out of the purview of the Panel.  If the GP is providing not examples of application of policies but an authoritative interpretation thereof, the GP would be binding for the staff and for the Panel which would then have” jurisdiction" over it.  In such a case, the sourcebook would become more of a constraint instead of being a helpful resource to staff.

Thank you for the opportunity to comment.

*************************************

September 8, 1999

Monsieur Jean Roger Mercier
Responsable environnementale pour l'Afrique.
Washington


Objet: Réponse à la lettre à propos du projet
OP/BP 4.12 sur les réinstallations involontaires

Faisant suite à votre lettre à propos de l'OP/BP 4.12, nous vous sommes reconnaissant de solliciter notre avis sur une question aussi délicate .toutefois nous nous excusons du retard qu'accuse notre réponse. Cet état de chose est en partie dû au fait que la Directive Opérationnelle 4.30 sur les réinstallations involontaires du 29 juin 1990 telle que revue et mise à jour à l'issue de sa transformation en OP/BP/BE 4.12 sur les réinstallation involontaires traite de la question avec beaucoup de clairvoyance, d'esprit d'anticipation et de précision. Les seules suggestions que nous avons à faire porte sur le volet supervision des réinstallations involontaires.

A l'effet nous pensons que sur ce point en plus du suivi étroit mené par le vice président en cheville avec le Directeur - Pays concerné, la B.M:

a. Devrait faire mention de manière formelle et expresse d'un dispositif coercitif à mettre en ouvre contre tout emprunteur défaillant.

b. Intégrer ce dispositif à tout contrat de mise à disposition du prêt et en faire la condition d'octroi dudit prêt.

En espérant accrocher votre attention sur ce point

Veuillez agréer, Monsieur le Responsable de l'évaluation environnementale pour l'Afrique, l'expression de notre profond respect.

NAPI KAMAHA Julien Omer

*************************************
September 9, 1999

Comments from:

Dr. NDE
Executive President
Committee for the Coordination of Durable Development (CCDD)

Date of Creation: 1995
Statute: NGO

CCDD BACKGROUND INFORMATION

MAIN OBJECTIVES:

- Promotion of sustainable management of natural resources
- Fight against poverty and misery
- Environment protection
- Community development

MAIN DOMAINS OF EXPERTISE :

- Environmental and social impact assessment
- Forestry and agro-forestry
- Numerized cartography and GIS (Geographical Information System)
- Follow-up and evaluation


REMARKS ON THE DRAFT OP/BP 4.12 ON INVOLUNTARY RESETTLEMENT

Introduction:

CCDD is a Cameroon environmental NGO. We are member of GCA/Group for Concentration and Action, a Cameroon NGO network which has been fighting for three years for the mitigation of negative environmental and social impacts in the framework of the Chad - Cameroon Oil and Pipeline Project. Last July 1999, I was invited and took part in a training seminar on the Safeguard Policies of the Word Bank organized in Yaounde by the Cameroon Residence Mission. That seminar was very successful, as it helped the participants have a broader view and more detail of the Work Bank environmental safeguard policies, the Work Bank spirit and philosophy, and other aspects of that institution.

All that puts us on a better position to comment on the Draft OP /BP 4.12 on involuntary resettlements.

GENERAL REMARKS

Unlike certain complex Work Bank documents, this draft version looks simple, clear and straight to the point . The main document is divided into seven sections, and the annex into three, and the sections are further more divided into paragraphs. The advantage of that presentation is that it makes it easier for the Borrower's experts to understand and comply with.

As far as the content of the Directive is concerned, we appreciate the effort of the Word Bank aimed at reducing the sufferings and losses of the population affected by a project. But we believe that those sufferings and losses can only be reduced, "mitigated", but never cancelled, for,, truly speaking, nothing can replace your home or your homeland. Displacement has two types of impacts: material and visible impact, and moral and invisible impact. The former can be mitigated and even completely corrected, but the latter is impossible to really mitigate and correct, as it damages the intricate life web that ties a man to his home, his family, his land, the surrounding hills , streams, mountains, rivers, villages, etc, to his youth, his past, his history and that of his family, of his ancestors, his tribe... Can you pay for all that? It is unevaluable . Can you resettle all that? Is untransferable...

Thus I believe that the true objective of the Directive is, let's say, to console the affected population for their loss by trying at least to mitigate the material and physical impacts. Yet to me it is a very positive attitude, I mean to solve the problems that can be solved, to mitigate what can be mitigated, to make the affected population feel that their situation is being seriously taken into consideration.

Basing on all those considerations, CCDD agrees with the form and content of this Directive. Nevertheless I have a few remarks concerning the document. The methodology I will apply is to follow the plan of the Draft and go point by point.

SPECIFIC REMARKS

1. Title: "involuntary resettlements"

Starting with the title, I would have preferred compulsory or obligatory to involuntary, in order to stress the compulsory or obligatory nature of the displacement and resettlement: Indeed, people are obliged, are forced to leave their land and resettle somewhere else. The problem with involuntary is that it means much more
unintentional... So, compulsory displacement, obligatory displacement, compulsory resettlement, obligatory resettlement are more accurate and appropriate phrases in the context of the affected population.

2. §(1a ). This sub-paragraph looks incomplete in the French version I got. The second and last sentence ends with a comma..., so I do not know what comes next.

3. §(1 c ). The foot note (5) at the end of this sub-paragraph seems to have been put at a wrong place. Since it relates to 2(b), its best place is normally just after this 2(b), where it would become 2(c) instead of the foot note position.

4. §(1d) (to be added ). I have the sad impression that the Word Bank is not insisting enough on training and capacity building. It is as if the Bank wants farmers to remain farmers from generation to generation. Yet the Bank speaks all the time of "improving the living conditions of the affected people". Is that not a kind of contradiction?

I think that right in the first paragraph, just after (1c ) the Bank should add a fourth point on training. Thus I suggest:

(d) "In the framework of the efforts aimed at improving their living conditions, the displaced should have the possibility to learn a profession of their choice, so that they can practise it where they are or in the new resettlement site or elsewhere".

5. §(2a iii). This point is very important; as like in many places in the document, it stresses clearly that even if the concerned people are not physically displaced and resettled, they will still be eligible for resettlement advantages.

6. § (5c). Concerning the notion of "replacement cost", I would like to draw your attention on something that you may have overlooked. Lost properties include houses, plants and so on. But there two types of plants: annual plants (maize, rice, cassava, ground-nuts etc.), and everlasting plants (fruit trees, coffee trees, cacao trees, palm trees, etc.). When an adult everlasting plant is destroyed the farmer loses not only the plant itself but also the revenue of that year and the coming years. If he is paid just the replacement cost, he will plant new seeds, but will have to wait for several years (two to five, if not more) before they grow adult and start full production. So if that transition period is not taken into account and added to the "replacement cost", the farmer will surely get poorer than before the resettlement. That is why, basing on that point that we have been defending for two years in CCDD as well as in GCA, I suggest the following:

·        At the level of (5c) you should add "...for the loss of properties and revenues"

·        At the level of foot note (12), immediately after "transaction costs", you should add: "as well as annual revenues lost during the transition period, i.e. while waiting for the new plants to grow adult and start full production".

·        Just after ( c ), you should add a new sub-paragraph stating: "In case of the creation of a replacement plantation - even if there no physical resettlement - in addition to replacement cost, annual lost revenues must be taken into account, so as to cover the whole transition period".


7. § ( 9). I am very happy with this paragraph, especially as it mentions the "non-land options ". But please, add "training" as one of those options.

Thus the last section of the last sentence should read"... non-land options such as training, employment and self-employment opportunities..."

What makes me also happy is the "en plus" in the French version on which I am working. If the displaced, especially the young ones, could undergo some training, or even attend school "en plus de la compensation", it would not be a passing but a lasting profit.

8. §(12). Concerning eligibility, I would like to point out that there are actually two categories of displacements and resettlements:

1° Displacement and resettlement for material reasons: That is when the farmer has lost his properties (houses, farms, etc.) and is therefore obliged to leave the place and resettle somewhere else.

2° Displacement and resettlement for moral and social reasons: When almost the whole family is displaced or almost the whole tribal group, the farmer is also obliged to leave the place and join the others. This category of farmers should also be eligible, because they also are affected by the project in the sense that they have decided to go because of the project that has caused the displacement of their family or tribal group.

9. §(14). We must not forget that in Third World countries, most rural people have not attended school and are therefore ignorant of law provisions. That is why I suggest that this foot note be added at the level of the phrase "national legislation":

"Provided information on that legislation has been broadly disseminated in the region and local population warned of a possible displacement action in a delay acceptable to the Work Bank."

10. Footnote (19). The information should not be widely spread only in the demarcated area, but also in surrounding zone, where people may come from and invade the demarcated area. So that also should be added to the note.

11. Annex, §10. The foot note to this paragraph provides an interesting methodology as to the evaluation of replacement costs for lands, houses and others.

But I think a second foot note should be added on agricultural products , and even a third one on natural plants (forest products). Working on the Chad-Cameroon Oil and Pipeline Project, GCA experts have elaborated a pertinent methodology on how best to evaluate those two types of products. I will send you a copy of our document if you ask for.

12. Annex, § 21. I suggest that you add local NGOs as one of the follow-up and evaluation institutions.

13. Annex, § 22. The Bank seems not to pay enough attention to that category of projects. Yet some of them can have serious and large scale impacts on a large population. Let's consider for instance the Chad-Cameroon Oil and Pipeline Project: The pipeline corridor will be 1050 km long and 30 to 60 m bride! There will be no physical displacement and resettlement - as it is said - but because of the length of the of the pipe, many social groups will be affected.

So I think that the five aspects mentioned are not enough, even though they are said to be the "minimum" aspects.

I suggest you add Paragraphs 7, 8, 10, 11, 17, 18 and 21 of the Annex.


 
Comments from:

Ryan Hunter
Slovak National Coordinator
CEE Bankwatch Network
Center for Environmental Public Advocacy
Slovak Republic
September 10, 1999


RESPONSE TO RESETTLEMENT DRAFT OP/BP 4.12: INVOLUNTARY RESETTLEMENT

The Center for Environmental Public Advocacy strongly recommends that the World Bank Group not implement or plan any resettlement projects until the report from the World Commission on Dams (WCD) (due out Summer 2000) is published and fully reviewed by the Bank.

Furthermore, we propose the following five points, which were submitted for the WCD report, as fundamental for the preparation of any resettlement policy.

·         To elaborate a thorough evaluation of the social impacts of projects involving resettlement implemented to date at national and international levels, inclusive of the proposal for recommendations of a substantive and procedural nature for the future decision-making and planning of such projects. Such evaluations must be elaborated independently of organizations profiting from such projects, and also must ensure the effective participation of relocated inhabitants and civil organizations dealing with this matter. All relevant information necessary for comprehensive analysis of the social effects of such projects, must be made accessible to the entity elaborating the evaluation. Evaluations must be made public to the full extent, with recommendations forming the basis for revision of policies regulating project funding, the mechanism, at both national and international levels.

·         To ensure effective participation of the affected public in the decision-making process of any further project involving resettlement at both the national and international levels, inclusive of the timely access to all significant economic, social and environmental information. Governments must ensure reform of such processes that so far have been implemented in contradiction to the law. Governments and international institutions must ensure a fully independent evaluation of the preparation of any new projects involving resettlement, as well as the progressive monitoring and auditing of its implementation. This is to be carried out by persons independent of such institutions and organizations that have a vested interest in the preparation and implementation of the evaluated project.

·         To set up funds for the compensation of damages and loss of property for those affected by the projects who have not yet been justly identified for such. These funds must be administrated independently of the investor and organizations that partook in the projects. Furthermore, their transparency must be ensured and reports on the activities and use of funds regularly made public. The funds must provide assistance to all those who were subjected to property damage or loss due to the projects, in the preparation of their claims for reparation.

·         Governments and international institutions must provide a guarantee that in the future they shall not finance any project for which it was not made clear sufficiently in advance of the decision to proceed with the project, that the investor shall provide equitable compensation for all those to be displaced or otherwise affected. Likewise, the investor shall ensure prompt and complete information for them, together with effective participation of citizens in the whole decision-making process. This also applies to projects where affected persons do not express their qualified consent prior to the realization of such projects. International financial institutions must guarantee that they shall not finance any projects whatsoever that presupposes involuntary relocation, in such countries where legislation does not cater for the aforementioned conditions.

·         International financial institutions must cancel debts from loans for such projects in so called developing and post-communist countries, for which economic, environmental and social costs outweigh real benefits.


Finally, we express our full support for the recommendations submitted to the World Bank Group both by Mr. Thayer Scudder of the California Institute of Technology (July 27) as well as the Bank Information Center.

Sincerely,

Ryan Hunter

-*************************************--

 

D. Narasimha Reddy
Executive Director
Centre for Resource Education,
Hyderabad, India 14 September 1999


This is with reference to the letter by Mr. Mohammad Hasan, social Development Specialist, the World Bank, India, dated 22nd July, 1999, seeking review and comments on draft Operational Policy 4.12 & Bank Procedures 4.12.

The policy and procedures look comprehensive, on paper at least. however, as with any policy, it tries to juggle between the vocabulary. the intention of helping the people, to be resettled or to be affected by resettlement does not come out clearly. policy objectives which constitute the heart of the matter falls far short of the expectations, though it is more than what we have been monitoring.

Firstly, policy objectives do not highlight the purpose of resettlement, which has been the most basic contention. This is important considering questions like these:

·         is resettlement necessary?

·         is it in common/national interests? what is the definition of national interest, at least in the context of the project?

·         what is public purpose? who defines this?


OP 4.12 should have a objective of accepting resettlement only

a. when there are public projects, no to private sector projects

b. when public purpose is defined/explained in the project proposal

c. the borrower/project proposer/applicant (whether it is a national
government, or

Ministry, or department) has a resettlement policy complete with the definition and

explanation of the purpose and necessary legal framework, or

should develop a policy as such by the time the project is taken up for implementation

Policy objective does not mention the disruption of social networking and social supportive systems in resettlement projects. in fact, apart from the loss of assets, means of livelihood and other physical properties, the trauma of losing these social links is at the core of the resettlement issue. this is especially true for women, children, destitute, poor, old and crippled. efforts should be more on rebuilding these links.

Resettlement policies, plans, projects or programmes should be tailored to the political and economic contexts, and should be dynamic enough to adjust to the changes therein.

OP 4.12 Criteria for Eligibility page 5 of 8

These criteria exclude the people who are using the land or other assets, or surviving on the land and other assets, without legal rights. for instance, this includes:

1. agricultural labour
2. tribals dependent on forest resources/minor forest produce
3. leasehold farmers, or farmers who survive on `rented' land
4. poor people living in slums/squatter settlements in urban areas

OP 4.12 should include a provision to insist on the development of Resettlement Fund, possibly at different levels, national to project-level, to be financed from taxes/levies from project beneficiaries, and project implementing agencies (public or private). this is important because most resettlement projects have to be implemented beyond the main project period. This is also necessary as safeguard against fund diversions, for whatever reasons.

OP 4.12 should insist that the Resettlement Plan/project should specify the quantum of assistance in monetary terms, and this assistance should be made accessible to the people affected by resettlement, through necessary legal and institutional framework. This will be one form of check against diversions by higher-level administration, and corruption.

These are some of my initial reactions. I hope to come up with more, after detailed review.

D. Narasimha Reddy


*************************************

Comments from:
Manish Joshi
Rural Litigation and Entitlement Kendra

Dehradun, U.P., India 15 September 1999


With reference to your letter dated 30 August, 1999 from the World Bank, New Delhi Office, India, I am enclosing my Comments on the revised resettlement policy of the World Bank as were desired by you.

Comments on the revised resettlement policy of the World Bank

The Operational manual of the resettlement policy drafted by the World bank seems to be quite adequate and it covers all the necessary measures required for the Involuntary Resettlement because of the developmental projects. The policy draft has considered all the aspects required for the same. The draft also looks into all the aspects related to the impacts which may occur because of the Involuntary Resettlement i.e. from socio-economic, socio-cultural, socio-political to the environmental aspects.

The planning for Involuntary Resettlement seems to be good and interesting. It is a good part on its behalf that the bank ensures all the pros and cons of the project and resettlement before funding is granted. The bank's procedures are quite extensive and in my opinion should be quite effective and the rehabilitated community would not feel the pain of resettlement. The idea of a Task Team for the monitoring and evaluation of the rehabilitation is excellent, as this will ensure safe and excepted rehabilitation.

Although the development projects in the developing countries like India has already displaced 50% tribals out of the total population of 68 million, but they have not been rehabilitated properly. As in the case of the Narmada River Valley project where nearly 2,97,000 people in the three districts are involuntarily being displaced without adequate rehabilitation. Not only this but the declaration of many India's Protected Areas have also displaced millions of people, belonging to the poor and marginalised community, as is being done in the proposed Raja ji N.P., in the Dehradun district, in the State of Uttar Pradesh, India. Here the indigenous Van gujjar tribe is being forced to leave the forest areas and settle in an unfriendly environment.

So, it is my personal opinion that instead of going for very big development projects small projects should be initiated this will not debar the poor from their basic human rights and thus will ensure the development in the real sense. As far as the case for conserving the natural resources is concerned the local inhabitants should be involved in its conservation and management. This will ensure effective management, as these people have been the inseparable part of that ecology.

In an encouraging news published in an Indian daily 'The Hindustan Times', where the bank struck down 56 cr eco-development project from the Ministry of Environment and Forest, Government of India at the Rajiv Gandhi N.P. in Nagarhole, India, for not ensuring the proper rehabilitation of the 6000 tribals. This kind of initiations taken by the bank will surely help in proper functioning of the drafts framed by the World Bank.

Manish Joshi

*************************************

Comments from :

Minar Pimple
Executive Director
Youth for Unity and Voluntary Action (YUVA
)
Mumbai, India 17 September 1999


Comments on the Draft Operational Policy 4.12

Overall comments :

·        The definition of the project needs to clearly outline, the affected and the beneficiaries and the cost benefit analysis - human, environmental, social, cultural - of such projects where the beneficiaries and the affected are not the same needs to be looked at critically, e.g. the Sardar Sarovar project, India, where the project affected are completely different from those expected at the very outset to benefit from the project.

·        Resettlement and rehabilitation (R&R) is part of the development continuum and treated as such. It should not be seen as an add on to a project/investment. While the policy document talks about resettlement, and takes initiatives of proposing rehabilitation measures, rehabilitation of displaced persons, has to be a stated objective of the Bank Policy and an inviolable part of the project. It is necessary then to review the definition of the "project".

·        The impact of the project should not be seen in the narrow definition of the immediate impact. The primary, secondary and tertiary impacts need to be considered in assessing the complete and true impact of the project.

·        By treating resettlement and rehabilitation as different from the project, there is an inherent subsidy provided to the project (as defined in the OP) and the borrower. What is considered the "hard costs" of the project are typically financed at IBRD rates of interest, whereas what is seen as the "soft" components are financed through IDA. The interest differential is a substantial hidden subsidy.



Specific comments :

The same format as that followed in OP 4.12 is adopted.

I. Objectives

The viability of all projects should be assessed on the basis of costs which include the costs of all social, economic and environmental risks, the costs of dismantling of production systems, loss of assets and income sources.
It is assumed that the guidelines for costing these are laid out in Bank policies OP 4.01, 4.12, , 4.04, 4.11 and 4.20 and any other policies as may be relevant.
The market values associated with the risks caused by the primary, secondary and tertiary impacts of the project, R&R and replacement need to be factored in while appraising the returns on the project.

Para 1 (b) Displaced person should have opportunities -
The policy should lay down clear institutional mechanisms whereby the "opportunity" is converted into planning and implementation methodologies, which are completely participatory, transparent and accountable.


II. Impacts covered :

Ø Para 2 :
This policy covers direct economic and social impacts - Project create primary, secondary and tertiary impacts. This leads to the primary, secondary and tertiary project affected. In this comment, it is assumed that the "direct" impact referred to deals only with the primary project affected.
It is not sufficient to identify, resettle and rehabilitate only those "directly" affected by the project. The indirectly affected are most often as badly in need of rehabilitation as the directly affected. Loss of livelihood of those servicing the settlement in the pre-displacement phase, also needs to be considered an impact of the project.
For example -the pollution impact of chemical factories is well over the prescribed perimeter of operation, and there is an erosion in the air quality over a larger area. This may affect the health of future generations. Specific guidelines for these cases needs to be worked at.

Ø Footnote 6 :
It should not just be deemed good practice to undertake a social assessment, but should be made decreed in this policy as mandatory.

Ø Para 3.
Needs to be commended.


III. Required Measures :

Ø Definition of replacement cost :

The contribution of the displaced to the development of the project site particularly in urban scenarios needs to be acknowledged and valued. Dharavi, Mumbai, India, is a prime example of a settlement, which has sprung up on marshy, land. The entire settlement has been reclaimed by the material, human and financial resources of the settlers. Projects that displace and resettle people from this often totally ignore this.

The material, financial and human investment in building the settlement, that are lost in the resettlement process, should be costed at inflation factored market values and this should decide the basis of the replacement cost.


Ø Institutional arrangements :

Stress needs to be laid on formal and legal institutional arrangements and mechanisms that are created to:

·        ensure information about their rights and options

·        ensure participation in decision making and arriving at feasible alternatives

·        lay down the charter of relocation as agreeable to the displaced persons as well as the implementing agency.

·        ensure grievance redressal systems

The institutional mechanisms so created, need to be representative of all stakeholders involved in the project, particularly, the displaced persons - local governance structures, CBOs, NGOs, implementing agency etc.

Ø Identification and preparation of resettlement site :

The policy document identifies this as one of the pre-requisites for the take over of land and other assets. While this works in theory, in practice this has often been neglected.
The appraisal procedure must include the identification, the title search and the process of take over/conveyance of ownership of the site by the borrower. Investment /project/sub project or component lending should be tied to the satisfactory resettlement site identification and preparation.

Ø Granting of tenurial rights to resettled property :

The policy document needs to incorporate the granting of appropriate tenurial rights, either in the form of leaseholding or ownership to be granted to the resettled persons regardless of the status of ownership/legal right/leaseholding prior to the displacement in the same context of declaring eligibility to be resettled.

Ø Loss of livelihood :

One of the largest casualties of displacement is livelihood - particularly where the livelihood is linked to the land. In urban scenarios, the place of stay is closely linked to the livelihood of the person.

Loss of skills :
Skills lost in the process of resettlement need to be costed onto the project; particularly where the skill lost is linked to traditional or cultural occupation.
There is a need for reconciliation of skills required and skills lost in the process of re-employment. Skills required for employability can be enhanced or built through training, which has been identified in the policy document but the skills lost need to be costed.

Indirect impact
Loss of livelihood may also accrue due to secondary impacts of the project. for example, the movement of markets due to resettlement, may cause a loss of livelihood to those who were servicing those markets in the pre-project period. These persons will not fall under the category of the "project affected". The definition of project affected needs to be broadened and rehabilitation measures made applicable to them.

Ø Designated parks and restricted areas :

The approach followed here should be similar to that followed in the joint forest management of forests by the indigenous populations.
For the enhanced protection of the restricted and protected areas, joint protected area management should be undertaken with very clear resource planning for the protection and conservation of the wildlife and natural resources within the protected areas.

IV. Eligibility for benefits :

Ø Identifying the project affected :
Para 13 of the policy identifies 3 frames of reference for setting the criteria for eligibility. Most marginalised groups who are the most adversely affected by the projects, do not fall under the narrow definition of project affected adopted by most projects. At the very outset, the primary, secondary and tertiary project affected need to be detailed and identified.

Ø Methodology for setting criteria, identification :
The nature of the methodology has to be inherently participatory, transparent and accountable to all the stakeholders in the project. This is again reflected in the legal, procedural and process mechanisms instated for the planning, monitoring and implementation of the project.

Ø Dealing with those deemed ineligible :
Clear provisions need to be laid out in the resettlement plan for those deemed ineligible in meeting the criteria set for the resettlement. Measures to ensure that this is done in a humane and participatory manner need to be ensured.


V. Resettlement Planning, Monitoring and implementation

Ø Para 17 - Resettlement Planning -
Once again, we wish to stress the importance of multi stakeholder institutional arrangements for arriving at the scope and level of detail of the resettlement instruments - arrangements that ensure the democratic representation of those affected by the project.

Ø Para 18 - The full costs of the project :
The policy document includes the full cost of resettlement activities to be treated as a charge against the economic benefits of the project.

It is also imperative that the social, cultural and environmental and human opportunity costs be charged against the economic benefits of the project, just as the net benefits are to be charged to the benefits stream of the project. While, it is not clear whether this is covered under other operational policy manuals/ documents we wish to stress that the true viability of a project can only be ascertained when all of the above are included in the project economic streams and at commercial rates of borrowing.
This would entail a policy change in appraising a project; but with far reaching consequences for development and growth with equity.

Ø Para - 22 - The borrower is responsible for adequate monitoring and evaluation
In projects and investments where involuntary resettlement is an issue, it is typically seen as a by-product of the main investment or project and is most time not given adequate attention.

The setting up of an independent multi stakeholder monitoring and evaluation mechanism which works with the borrower but with some level of accountability to the affected population with organisations representing them, the appropriate government and the bank is imperative.

Resettlement Policy Framework

Ø Para 27 - Multiple subprojects

Whereas the resettlement policy framework is submitted at the time of appraisal, certain tranches of disbursement for sub project financing should be linked to the submission of the detailed resettlement plan for the displaced within the sub project. This will ensure that the borrower is held to the commitments laid down in the policy frame work.

VII. Assistance to the Borrower :

This has been covered under general comment no. 4.

It is essential that difference between financing the "soft" and "hard" costs and therefore the interest differential be negated. The resettlement and rehabilitation (R&R) be treated as and financed as a "hard" component of the project. The viability of the project then needs to be appraised on this commercial basis.

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B. Venkat Rao, Director
Ventre for Management and Social Research

Hyderabad, India 21 September 1999


Review of Draft Operational Policy 4.12 and Bank Procedures 4.12

The Bank's attempt to revise the OD 4.30 is contextual and positive move towards attaining effective R&R results in a period with demand for more and more development projects which may result in displacement and consequent adverse socio economic impacts. The following are the comments on the OP 4.12:

General

·        The change in the title from Operational Directive to Operational Policy reflects the current thinking in various government and non-governmental agencies.

·        The script needs to be attended on page setting. In almost all the pages the text continues beyond the footnote in the same page resulting in confusion in reading.


Specific

·        Even though the issue of income restoration has adequately been identified, it needs some more dealing. The text mostly covers the issues of resettlement and its handling. All the three parts of Annex contains the issues related to only resettlement. In the same way what has to be done in case of severe income losses and what the RAP and Policy should contain on income restoration, should also be dealt in Annex. Probably a paragraph on income restoration in all three parts of Annex would be appropriate.

·        The definition of displaced person includes 2(a) and 2(b), which refers to both, displaced and affected but not necessarily displaced. In this case why not it be called 'Directly Affected Persons' which includes both displaced and undispalced and conveys the meaning directly, instead Displaced Persons which mainly represents displaced only.

·        The principle of compensation at replacement cost is just and appropriate. As per the definition it is the cost at market value and so on... Our experience shows the assessment of real market value is cumbersome and difficult to arrive at because the affected person invariably tries to project at higher side and the project authorities at lower side. Appointment of any independent valuation experts generally does not materialise for reasons of low / no interest on the part of implementing agencies. The element of injustice will be higher if we leave it open to be defined by the concerned. For all practical purposes the following can be a midway:

A range of incremental percentage could be proposed over and above the registered value of land depending upon the place (state, country). Suppose in case of country X it can be 10 to 30% or 200% above the government registered value because of low government registered rates. In case of country Y it can be 0% because market price is always equivalent to registered price. This should be left to the local staff who will fix the range of percentage from time to time depending upon the local conditions.

·        Paragraph 2 (b) and its explanation in point 11 of footnote is not clear. Why it is being confined to just legally designated parks and protected areas. It is something moving from general to specific. Needs some more clarity.

·        Paragraph 3 can be sub titled as 'Coverage' for giving more clarity.

·        In section VI Resettlement Instruments, Resettlement Policy Framework (b) can be preceded by Resettlement Plan (a) for the reasons of order.

·        Paragraph 24 (a) ...... 'Annex cannot be prepared by project appraisal;' is some thing not clear. May be it is.... 'can be prepared'.

·        Paragraph 24(e), in this at the end of the sentence the following may be added ...'and the proposed entitlements'

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Peter Bosshard
Berne Declaration

Switzerland 23 September 1999


BD Comments on the World Bank's Resettlement Policy Conversion

Introduction:

The Berne Declaration appreciates the opportunity to comment on the proposed conversion of the World Bank's resettlement and rehabilitation policy (OD 4.30/OP 4.12). The BD is a Swiss non-governmental organization with 16,000 members. It has advocated more equitable and environmentally sustainable North-South relations since 1968.

The BD has monitored World Bank projects such as the India NTPC Power Generation project for many years. Like many other NGOs, has often been disturbed about the failure of rehabilitation in resettlement projects. This failure has created severe problems for 100,000s of people, and has triggered some of the most important requests for investigation by the Inspection Panel. The pending policy conversion must help to improve the performance of resettlement projects. This is a test case for the World Bank's commitment to the overarching goal of poverty reduction.

The following comments focus on the issues of monitoring and supervision, of land-for-land vs. cash compensation, and of restoration vs. improvement of incomes. The Berne Declaration is concerned that rather than addressing the critical loopholes of OD 4.30, the proposed new policy severely weakens a core provision of the current policy. This weakening contradicts earlier claims that the ongoing conversion process would not water down the earlier operational directives.

Monitoring and supervision:

In paragraphs 5, 16 and 22, the proposed OP 4.12 attributes the responsibility for monitoring to the borrowing government, and for supervision to the Bank. This new distinction weakens the position of affected people and qualifies the Bank's commitment to project implementation. Experience indicates that an effective monitoring of resettlement projects is usually lacking, and that governments are hardly ever committed to complying with Bank policies. OED's June 1998 report on "Recent Experience with Involuntary Resettlement" refers to "the governments' disinterest in the M&E activity", which was "undisguised and tolerated by the bank" (p. 5, para. 17). With such a poor record of the past, the Bank should not disengage from its responsibility for project monitoring.

In footnote 20, the proposed OP 4.12 suggests that borrowers create independent advisory panels of resettlement specialists, a procedure which is now followed for environmental assessments. This idea deserves support. The proposed panels could be strengthened if they were established by the Bank and not the borrowers. Their reports should be made available to project-affected people as a matter of principle.

Land-for-land vs. cash compensation

According to OD 4.30, "the Bank encourages 'land for land' approaches, providing replacement land at least equivalent to the lost land". This is a core provision of the current directive, which has encouraged similar provisions in the R&R policies of many borrowing governments and agencies. It is strongly qualified by the proposed new policy, which states in paragraph 9: "If sufficient land is not available, non land-based options built around opportunities for employment or self-employment should be provided in addition to cash compensation for land and other assets lost."

This change of policy is completely unacceptable. Contrary to the Bank's wishful thinking, non land-based rehabilitation options - and especially the much-touted self-employment schemes - have so far almost always failed, and particularly in rural settings. While land is passed on from one generation to the next, cash compensation is typically spent within a short period, and training programs are usually not sufficient to turn farmers and peasants into successful entrepreneurs in saturated markets. The failure of non land-based rehabilitation is confirmed by OED's June 1998 report (pp. 8 and 55), and by the reports of the Inspection Panel e.g. on the NTPC project in India. OED argues that this "only means the Bank has to put many more of its best development planners onto the task" (p. 8). Yet it would be cynical to weaken the policy before the best development planners have demonstrated their ability to deliver non land-based rehabilitation. The impact of this change will be borne by affected people, who typically belong to the poorest members of society.

Some observers might argue that since many Bank projects have not included land-for-land rehabilitation in the past anyway, the proposed policy conversion will not change much in actual practice. Yet so far, the official preference for land-based rehabilitation has tended to discourage borrowers and task managers from engaging in difficult resettlement operations. Indirectly, the stated policy has helped to prevent the externalization of social costs, and has contributed to a certain reduction (although not minimization) of resettlement. The Berne Declaration is concerned that giving up the preference for land-based rehabilitation might open the floodgates and weaken the healthy skepticism among Bank staff and borrowers to engage in resettlement projects.

Land-based rehabilitation is often very difficult to achieve. Still, the Bank should not qualify its preference for this option as long as it is not capable of minimizing resettlement on the conceptual level, and as long as alternative options such as self-employment schemes have not been demonstrated to work. The Bank's new OP 4.12 should therefore stick to the preference for land-for-land rehabilitation as expressed in OD 4.30.

Improving vs. restoring income levels

A central problem of the present policy and practice is that resettlement and rehabilitation are usually not conceived as development projects, but as mere compensation efforts. In paragraph 1, draft OP 4.12 continues to accept the "restoration" of income levels which was stipulated by OD 4.30. In his comments on 27 July, 1999, Prof. Thayer Scudder convincingly argues that the restoration of pre-project income levels often means a reduction of the standards of living. The Berne Declaration agrees with Prof. Scudder in that rehabilitation should be conceived as development projects, that OP 4.12 should stipulate an improvement of the living standard of affected people, and that the reference to income restoration should be deleted.

Thank you for your consideration of these comments.

Peter Bosshard
Berne Declaration

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Achyut Yagnik
Convenor

Forum 21
Ahmedabad, India 27 September 1999


CRITIQUE OF DRAFT OP/BP 4.12: INVOLUNTARY RESETTLEMENT

Preface

Draft OP 4.12 has been drafted in a way that does not place sufficient emphasis on the entire debate around "development paradigms", whether the Bank and borrower can negate local community consent in the design and implementation of a project is a moot question. Till now, most of the States who have borrowed from the Bank have assumed ultimate power to decide development plans and programmes and the Bank has directly or indirectly strengthened this tendency.

It appears that in the drafting of OP 4.12, the Bank has virtually ignored debates centering on the doctrine of Public Trust wherein the State is Trustee of all the basic resources and not the owner. At this stage it is noteworthy that the United States Courts as well as the Supreme Court of India have emphasized the doctrine of Public Trust in recent times. Keeping in mind our collective commitment to sustainable development, it has become imperative not only to uphold but to expand the scope of the doctrine of Public Trust.

The tone and tenor of the Draft 4.12 indicates that the Bank is further strengthening the "eminent domain" of the State in favour of the established sections of society.

Detailed Comments

At the outset, we would like to emphasise that the phrase "involuntary resettlement" is nothing but a euphemism for "resettlement of forced evictees". Such forced eviction is contrary to the spirit of the United Nation Declaration of Human Rights.

1b) Where voluntary resettlement...

Projects themselves should be conceived and executed as sustainable development programmes. For this to happen, local communities should have the opportunities to participate in the planning and implementation of the project itself and not just the resettlement programmes. This participation should not be just in the form of consultations but must include their informed consent for the project.
We agree with Mr Sam Rao's comments of August 13 where he observes that it is necessary to shift the emphasis to avoidance of involuntary resettlement in the first place.
Instead of the term "Displaced persons" we suggest the term "Project Affected Persons (PAPs)" be used. This is a wider term encompassing persons:

1. Displaced due to taking over of land and house

2. Partially displaced due to loss of either land and house

3. Persons affected due to loss of work and wages, loss of income from the collection of non-woo forest produce and loss of place of work by local traders, hawkers and artisans in the acquired area.

4. Persons of neighbouring communities who are adversely affected sometimes during the course of the project or as a consequence of the project.

1c) Displaced persons should be assisted in their efforts....

The restoration of livelihoods to pre displacement level is a retrograde step. The standard of living after displacement must be much higher than pre-displacement levels. Our experience shows that displaced people are languishing even after many years of displacement and they are nowhere near the standards of living they enjoyed prior to displacement. Mr Thayer Scudder has rightly pointed this out in his critique of July 27.

2b) involuntary restriction of access to legally designated parks and protected areas...

This Policy directly contradicts the Ecodevelopment Project funded by the World Bank in India. The Staff Appraisal report of this project (World Bank Document: Report No 14914-IN), in its Chapter on Project Impacts and Justification (C 5.8) clearly states:
"Planning would take place in the context of options that would not involve relocation. .. The forest department would not cause or carry out involuntary relocation in the project areas."

We would also like to point out that all over the world, there is a move towards the concept of Joint Forest Management and Joint Protected Areas Management, where forest ecosystems are protected in a sustainable manner with the active participation of people. Central to this concept is the recognition of the fact that human are also part of the forest ecosystem.

5a) informed about their options...

The USA has the Right to Information as a basic right but in many countries of the Third World, like India, the Right to Information is not granted as a basic right by the Constitution. Instead the colonial legacy of the Official Secrets Act has percolated through the rank and file of the bureaucracy. As a result, PAPs rarely receive complete information about projects or their rights as oustees. Our comments on I1b where we insisted on a participatory process in project formulation must be viewed in this context as well.

5b) Consulted on, offered choices among and provided technically and economically feasible resettlement alternatives

Resettlement packages must be technically and economically feasible to the PAPs and not only to the Bank and borrowers. Resettlement packages must also be socially and culturally acceptable to the PAPs. In this context we would like to cite the example of the Gir Sanctuary experience in Gujarat, India where pastoral communities were given good land based resettlement packages. Yet, PAPs were not able to make the transition from pastoralism to agriculture and were forced to abandon the land. Therefore, it is of utmost importance that resettlement packages are social and cultural acceptable.

5c) provided prompt and effective compensation at full replacement cost...

The definition of replacement costs provided in footnote 13 related to this clause cannot be implemented. We believe that people's habitats, forests, the cultural practices associated with them can never be replaced and certainly not monetarily.

5f) after displacement, offered support... for a reasonable transition period, as appropriate...

Who is to decide what is reasonable and appropriate? We believe that all such decisions must be taken with the participation and informed consent of the PAPs.

9) Land-based resettlement options should be offered to displaced persons whose livelihoods are land based.

Here we would like to emphasise that in addition to the qualities mentioned in the clause, land thus offered must be irrigated. Without a reliable water supply, compensation with good quality of land is worthless.

13) Criteria for Eligibility...

This clause has homogenised the categories of PAPs, without any recognition of the socio-cultural plurality among them. This results in resettlement packages which do not take into account the specific needs of communities, reducing them into categories of "those with formal legal rights to land" and "those without formal legal rights to land".
We suggest that Draft OP/BP 4.12 make it mandatory that the findings of socio-economic studies recommended therein must be reflected in the design of resettlement options and be translated into action.

16) The borrower is responsible for preparing, implementing and monitoring...

With this clause, it seems that the Bank wants to distance itself from taking any responsibility for any aspect or process related to resettlement. There is no indication of what is to happen in the case of non-compliance on the part of the borrower. Yet phrases in the present Draft such as "to the extent possible", "technically and economically feasible" are essentially escape clauses which help the borrower rationalise non-compliance. Thus, it would be an exaggeration to say that the Bank prefers to be a mute spectator to violations of the basic human right to life and livelihood with dignity.

Terms such as "acceptable to the Bank" (Clause 6 relating to access to parks and protected areas, Clause 14 relating to establishing "cut off" date) and "satisfactory to the Bank" (Clause 12 relating to procedures for establishing criteria for eligibility for compensation) occur throughout the Draft. We suggest that the acceptance and satisfaction of the people, particularly PAPs must be paramount. This acceptance and satisfaction must be not merely recommendatory but mandatory.

Conclusion

Draft OP/BP 4.12: Involuntary Resettlement only relates to displacement of people due to projects directly funded by the Bank. We think that the larger question pertains to displacement as a result of Structural Adjustment throughout the Third World in which the Bank is playing pivotal role. The entire process of globalisation, liberalisation and privatisation set in motion by SAP, directly and indirectly, uproots a number of vulnerable communities who become silent sufferers, struggling for their very survival.

It is paradoxical that the process of globalisation undermines the "eminent" status of the State. Yet, at the local level the same State, for liberalisation and privatisation, acquires natural resources like land, forest and water under the doctrine of "eminent domain". We feel that the Bank plays a cardinal role in facilitating both these processes.

As a forum devoted to the protection of the lives and livelihood of vulnerable communities, we wonder how the Bank proposes to address these issues.


Achyut Yagnik

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Rohit Jain
Vice President
CADAM

Delhi, India 28 September 1999


Critique of the Draft World Bank Policy on
Involuntary Resettlement (Draft Operational Policy 4.12 and
Bank Procedures 4.12)

PREFACE

Involuntary displacement in India has registered an increase in the last 50 years and more so in the last 10-15 years with the onset of the Structural Adjustment Policies and the New Economic Policies by the Indian State. In an effort to revive the Indian Economy at the behest of many International Donors like the World Bank and the IDB, the Indian State has followed a path of deregulating the economy from the clutches of the State, privatising the social sector and its services and washing its hands off the welfare of the poor and the vulnerable. As part of the above policies, to give a boost to the industrial sector, land laws are being changed and need for land has increased manifold. The Indian State, in collusion with the private sector has been acquiring land from the people using antiquated dictatorial laws to further the interest of the private companies\multinational companies at the expense of the poor and the vulnerable. The impact of these processes are now visible as people have started opposing their planned dispossession by the State and other vested interests largely aided by funds and loans from International donors like the World Bank.

Till date no satisfactory resettlement of the displaced people have taken place. The oustees of the large dams like the Hirakud, Bhakra Nangal, Damodar Valley Corporation built in the 50's and the 60's are still languishing. In the case of the the Sardar Sarovar Dam, which was funded by the World Bank and had one of the best resettlement packages, the oustees face innumerous difficulties and slow death. The World Bank had to pull out of this project as the respective state governments refused to comply with the various agreements on resettlement. But pulling out did not stop the eviction and the extensive damage which had been inflicted on the people, their lands and livelihood by the Indian States aided by the World Bank. Inspite of having a reasonable good rehabilitation and resettlement package on paper, the impoverisation and pauperisation of the displaced people could not be prevented.

Thus by having model policy guidelines, like OP 4.12, for the borrowers there is no guarantee and assurance that the displaced people will be better off. OP 4.12 will be just another instrument in the hands of the government and borrowers to involuntarily and ruthlessly displace people especially vulnerable and ethnic communities from their habitat, in the name of development. By showing the carrot of model resettlement guidelines etc, the respective governments and the borrowers only take people for a ride and try to deflect the debate on whether the project is really needed and whose interests the project will eventually serve. The World Bank to expand its operation and lend more money in the name of developing the third world countries, can demand good practices and implementation of resettlement policies by the borrowers, but not necessarily get them implemented properly and adequately. Even if the World Bank withdraws, it has already initiated irreversible processes of destruction and dispossession of the vulnerable and ethnic communities.

The World Bank funds\loans to borrowers, to a large extent goes to finance huge infrastructures of the borrowers, fat pay packages and remuneration to the bureaucrats\employees\consultants, at the expense of the nation and its people who have to repay the loans. The common man is already saddled with the huge burden of repayment of international loans and if not repaid, the nations will slip into a debt trap. Thus loans now tied with OP 4.12 will increase this debt. OP 4.12 is only a license for the borrowers to further displace people. In the final analysis it is the borrowers and the bank which benefit for they have nothing to lose.


Comments on the Policy

1. Who decides Involuntary displacement?

In the Policy Objectives of OP 4.12, clause 1b of I, it is stated that the displaced persons should have opportunities to participate in planning & implementing resettlement programs. But before this stage is reached, why the 'Public Purpose' of the particular project to be executed, resulting in involuntary displacement is not debated in public. Is the 'Public Purpose' really public? The current draconian land acquisition law in India does not provide any space to question and challenge the 'public purpose' of the project for which the land is to be acquired. The 'Public Purpose' is decided by a nexus of a few individuals-politicians-bureaucrats-specialists-industrialists-contractors, who do not even consider that it is their duty and responsibility to share the information with the people. OP 4.12 only further strengthens the eminent domain of the 'State' in favour of the private companies & multinational companies, in forcefully and involuntarily acquiring and using the private & common\community resources of a particular nation.

The principle of 'Eminent Domain of the 'State' is now slowly giving way to the trusteeship principle where the 'State' is a custodian on behalf of the people and not the owner of common\community resources. The American law has defined this in many cases and the Supreme Court of India has given path breaking judgements on the 'trusteeship' principle. Thus the 'State' cannot act in contradiction to this basic principle. The 'Trusteeship' principle is thus equally applicable in deciding the public purpose of a particular project. Until and unless this basic principle is not followed in deciding the 'Public Purpose' of a project, simply ensuring participation of the displaced people in planning their own resettlement is a farce and goes against the principle of natural justice. It is just like asking the displaced people to write their own epitaph. The Bank should not be funding any project in which the people have no right to decide the necessity of the project. Otherwise it will only increase the existing inequity and dispossession, in the name of development. Clear cut guidelines on deciding the 'public purpose' of any project for which land is required and decision making by the people are needed. Only this can ensure whether displacement is necessary or not.

2. Restoration of livelihoods to pre-displacement levels not acceptable.

Under clause 1c of I of OP 4.12, restoration of livelihoods to pre-displacement levels is a retrograde step. The standard of living after displacement has to be much higher than pre-displacements level. By providing the clause of restoration, the bank has provided an escape mechanism for the borrowers. Our experiences show that displaced people are languishing even after many years of displacement and they are no where near the standards of living, which they had prior to displacement. Thayer Scudder has rightly pointed out this in his critique to the Draft OP/BP 4.12. The restoration concept should be scrapped.

3. Involuntary displacement from Sanctuaries & Parks.

Under clause 2 (a) & (b) of II of the policy it is stated very clearly that this policy does not apply to restrictions of access to natural resources. This is a dual policy of the Bank. Under the Eco-development project funded by the World Bank in India, it is very clearly stated that there will be no involuntary displacement and restrictions on the people residing in sanctuaries and parks. Then how is it that the Bank is not applying this policy to sanctuaries and parks? In other words the World Bank is promoting involuntary displacement by giving the government officials an escape clause. Also the process of declaring certain area of the forests as sanctuaries and parks and restricting access to the natural resources is itself anti-people and does not fulfill the clause of 'public purpose'.

4. Elements of 'Replacement costs' non implementable.

The definition of replacement costs provided in footnotes of clause 5c of III of the policy is non implementable. It only sounds good on paper but how does one put it to practice. Can people habitats be replaced? Can forests be replaced? Can people's culture and environment be replaced? And there are many more elements, which just cannot be replaced. The definition is mere words and deflects the issue of compensation. One cannot compensate for destruction of habitats & livelihood, however one may try. Thus involuntary resettlement can never replace people's livelihood and habitat. Therefore funding any development (displacement) project will bring about misery and destruction to the displaced.

5. Land for Land a must

Under section III of the policy, Land for Land does not find any mention. In fact the Bank offers much less in terms of resettlement package than what the Narmada Package offered to the displaced people or even some resettlement law offers. It is a known fact that other measures than land for land are not long lasting and are of short duration. For the landless, many resettlement packages offer land as compensation. The Bank policy does not find any mention on this. Land for Land is a must in any resettlement package. The ownership of the replaced means of production should remain with the affected individual/population/communities. Past experiences have shown that the Land Acquisition and displacement has only accelerated the transfer of peoples sources of livelihood and their means of production into fewer hands, thus increasing the inequality within society and increased dependence of poor people for employment on the unstable market forces and privately controlled industrial units. To do away with it, basically means diluting the complete resettlement package.

6. Homogenisation of categories of displaced people not acceptable

Under clause 13 of IV, the policy has homogenised the categories of the displaced people thus conveniently doing away with the heterogeneity among the displaced people. As heterogeneous groups like tribals, fisherfolk, pastoralists, etc are increasingly threatened by displacement, the resettlement packages will need to take care of their traditional occupations in replacing their livelihoods. Numerous examples bear testimony to this fact that by simply giving lands to pastoralists or fisherfolk, would not necessarily replace their livelihood. Any resettlement efforts have to be specific to the communities being threatened by involuntary displacement. Infact involuntary displacement destroys the social and economic fabric of the vulnerable communities ushering a social, economic and an environmental crisis. No resettlement package can mitigate this crisis.

7. Monitoring and evaluation by the borrower not acceptable

The provision of monitoring and evaluation by the borrowers themselves, goes against the principle of natural justice. The borrowers are interested in early completion of the project. The resettlement process becomes secondary and is seen to be delaying the project. The borrowers use the provisions of resettlement to get loans\funds and social acceptance for the project, but are not interested in the actual implementation. The World Bank, beyond threatening to withhold further instalments or withdraw, also cannot do much.

8. Involuntary resettlement due to non irrigation projects on the increase and resettlement extremely difficult.

Involuntary displacement due to non irrigation projects is on the increase in India. The concept of sharing benefits from the project is a far cry. In India, large tracts of land are being acquired by the State for developing Industrial Estates. After developing the plots, they are then offered to different groups to set up industries. The gestation period between acquisition of land and setting up of the industry is very large going up to 10-15 years. Thus any benefit from this project to the displaced people is out of the question. It is also not binding on the industries coming up to recruit labour from the displaced people and even if they do it is mostly as temporary labour who do not have any security of employment. In fact the condition of such displaced people is worse than what they were before displacement. Direct employment cannot replace the permanent nature of livelihood provided by land, forest and water.

The Bank should really take a serious review of this policy. Under the cover of this policy the Bank is pushing the Structural Adjustment Programme in many developing nations, which is directly responsible for involuntary displacement. Instead of creating a 'World free of Poverty' the World Bank is creating a 'World full of Poverty'.


Rohit Jain

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Dinesh Agrawal
Deputy General Manager (R&R)
National Thermal Power Corporation Ltd.

India 4 October1999


The comments expressed below are the personal views of Dinesh Agrawal and do not reflect the views of his organisation.


I. Background

1. The resettlement policy of the World Bank is in vogue since 1980 and has been applicable to many projects all over the world during the last 20 years. I have often put up one question to a large number of the Bank staff i.e. tell me a project where resettlement has been found satisfactory to the Bank according to it's own policy. Surprisingly, I never got a straight forward answer. While the objective of such a policy is unexceptionable, the process of application gives a blurred vision. What has gone wrong?

2. The policy (OP 4.12) and the operational guidelines (GP 4.12) are mutually inseparable. The GP will be basis to assure operationalisation of OP, based on which, there may be need for changes in drafting OP. This is not being followed.

3. Extensive consultations have been held within the Bank (the staff who also consider about their comfort level in dealing with resettlement issues) and the NGOs (whose role, like opposition in the government, is to oppose whatever is being done), but little with the borrower who have the prime responsibility of operationalising this policy.

4. The role and responsibilities of the Bank, the NGOs and the DPs is not covered at all. Giving the rights without responsibilities is always fraught with unforeseen complications.

5. The web site of the World Bank reflects the comments of only three persons, one of which is a borrower. What does it indicate? Why NGOs are shy of commenting on this draft policy? I expected many more comments particularly in view of the increased awareness of the public and experience of borrower. This point is worth pondering. The draft policy need to be intensely debated particularly with the borrower to make it practical and operationable.

6. The Anthropologist and people working in the field of social development have cited that it often take months to understand the social behaviour of one community and to bring in change may take years. Notwithstanding the above, the approach of the Bank is very sterile and mechanical, always expecting a quick fix solution.

7. The comments given below are primarily based on the feed back provided by the R&R staff, DPs and NGOs at site. It may be agreed that many of the comments are too specific and cannot be covered under a policy. But, if the policy is unable to address these issues, then it becomes an impractical and non-operational entity as has often been experienced during the last 20 years.

II. General Comments

8. It is generally believed that the raison-de-etre for bank loans is the overall development of the country which is why Bank is keen to invest in infrastructural sector. However, in actual practice, the sector and project specific loans lose the overall focus and tend to concentrate on the DPs alone rather than on the entire community, thus missing the woods for the trees. The policy has thus a reductionistic approach having a telescopic view towards DPs.

9. One of the reason is that it ignores the situational analysis of the prevailing socio-cultural behaviour and need of the country. The less developed countries (LDCs) do face a plethora of socio-economic problems including lack of education, health, economic security etc. This raises two basic issues which do not find even a mention in the policy.

(a) Is it just, equitable and plausible to raise the standard of living of certain under-priviledged/marginalised classes overnight, without adequate enabling mechanism, thus creating and perpetuating dependency syndrome?

(b) Can these under-privileged/marginalised people have adequate capability and understanding to ensure adequate and transparent consultation and participation or such provisions are incorporated only with the intention to provide livelihood to national and international activist NGOs who have their own agenda.

10. The process of transition from that of exploitation to that of participation has to be smooth and cordial lest it deteriorates into what is commonly known as 'reverse exploitation'. The spectre of such 'reverse exploitation' will continue to loom large over the big industries unless the policy has adequate inbuilt safeguards to prevent the occurrence of such a phenomenon. The present approach gives a perception of threat to all direct stakeholder rather than that of an opportunity for sustainable development and building of nation.

11. According to the World Bank Guidelines, all involuntary resettlement should be conceived and executed as development programmes. 'Development' in real sense is about quality of lives of people. When we talk of developments, it goes beyond any relief or welfare measure and means improvement and enrichment of peoples' quality of lives. In this context, restoring the previous standard of living has little relevance. The thrust then becomes a sort of relief measure of restoring their previous lifestyle, whatever it was and not making efforts to improve it.

12. Though any change has its own resistance, some change is inevitable and positive change is conducive to development. It must be believed and followed as a principle that every individual is capable of change, wants change to improve his life and should change to contribute to country's development. However, change requires learning and unlearning. Here the change is about the entire lifestyle of people which must be followed by change in people's attitudes. Thus when we talk of a broader term like 'development' - the effort should be to mobilize people to adjust to their new life styles.

13. Though PAP's right to be rehabilitated cannot be questioned but the fact remains that responsibility can never be totally transferred. It has to be 'shared'. It is people's responsibility as well to develop themselves. Development imposed from outside is neither sustaining nor sustainable. That is the reason, a dependency syndrome develops and people shirk from their responsibility of making adequate efforts for their own rehabilitation develop dependency syndrome and put the whole burden on the borrower.

III. Specific Comments on Draft OP 4.12

14. Para. 3 - The policy states that it applies to all displaced persons regardless of the severity of impact. The policy is silent on the issue whether each person is to be given the same benefit or the benefit is to be based on severity. In practice, the DPs aspire to achieve the standard of living comparable to employees of borrower without making adequate efforts, rendering the concept of attaining previous standard of living as null and void. The Bank staff also pamper such demands of DPs rather than assessing whether previous standard of living has been restored or not. In the developing country, where many people live in abysmal poverty without any access to basic human need like water, electricity, medical and educational facility, the concept of restoring previous standard of living become meaningless.

15. Para. 5(a) - Refers to information to displaced persons about their options and rights pertaining to resettlement. This, however, raises some questions which need to be addressed. Do the displaced person have the right to negotiate these options and such rights? Who will decide the options and rights?

16. Para. 5(e) - It is not clear from the policy whether the residential housing or housing sites and/or agricultural sites that are to be provided, are to be free i.e. in addition to compensation or in lieu of earlier assets i.e. by adjusting the cost from compensation.

17. Para. 5(f) - The concept of reasonable transition period is vague and limitless. Further, it not clear who will decide about the reasonability of fixing a transition period.

18. Para. 5(g) - Like (f) the provision of development assistance is vague and limitless both in terms of time and monetary resources. While the full responsibility of giving such assistance lies with the borrower, it does not impose a corresponding duty on the DPs for making efforts to improve or at least restore their livelihood and standards of living. Such provisions are conducive for creating dependency syndrome. Another unaddressed issue remains as to who will certify whether the livelihood and standard of living has been restored or improved? This issue gains criticality particularly in view of notion that the past is always rosy than present.

19. Para. 7- The identification of displaced persons is normally based on the land records wherein all family members particularly women and children may not be categorised as displaced person whereas this para includes all women and children. Does it mean that each displaced persons irrespective of records or the loss of livelihood has to be treated as separate entity and entitled for R&R benefit? Does it also mean that minors or for that matter even infants are entitled for R&R benefit?

20. Para. 8 - The provision of measures for resettlement is a dynamic process and should not be made a pre condition for relocation. There have been numerous instances when the DP did not shift to a well developed resettlement site or avoided receiving full compensation in order to pressurise the borrower to yield to their additional demands. The responsibility of the Bank or DPs is such situation is not stated.

21. Para. 9 - The implementation of land based option has a conceptual flaw. The compensation for the land acquired is to be paid at the first instance as per the law of many countries and also as per the policy of the bank. This compensation amount is often said to have been spent by the DP before the borrower could start the implementation of "Land for Land". As a result, the DP shows its inability to return the compensation for implementing "Land for Land", thus putting the borrower in a dilemma. It is also not made clear, whether a DP will be considered rehabilitated if he buys land on his own or has enough of remaining land to sustain his family.

22. Further, it s not clear whether such options are to be provided only to land owners or also to other categories of DPs as well. Also, since land holdings are still on a family basis whether land based resettlement options are to be provided on a family basis or an individual basis. What about wives, infants etc. who though not necessarily may be having a share but might be dependent on the land ? Have they to be treated separately for land based options.

23. Opportunities for employment so as to meet the objectives of restoring their original standard of living may restrict the option available only for the richer and influential lot, since they are bigger land owner and, therefore, bigger land loser as compared to marginal land owner/landless DPs. Is it justifiable? Shouldn't the criterion be based on impoverishment risk rather than that of loss of incomes?

24. Para. 10 - The statement that "the land taken for the project is a small fraction of the affected asset and the residual is economically viable" is left open for interpretation and need to be specific both in terms of percentage loss or in terms of absolute value. The fraction specified as 20% in the notes at 16 need to be incorporated in the main document and not in post script, particularly when the proposition of 20% had already been provided in other documents earlier, but not accepted by the Bank staff in most of the cases. In the absence of such specifics, people buy or fragment the land into decimals of a hectare of land to claim R&R benefits.

25. Para. 11 - (a) It is not clear why the "Host" communities are to be consulted on resettlement option and in planning, implementation and monitoring of resettlement. Will it not raise their expectation and further complicate the process of implementation?

26. Para 11 - (b) The policy is silent on the issue of maintenance of such infrastructure and public services, in the absence of which the borrower often remains at receiving end and forced to maintain such infrastructure and public services. Should DPs not have explicit responsibility to maintain such infrastructure and public services?

27. Para. 12 - When the draft policy is so explicit on the eligibility criteria of DP for extension of resettlement assistance, it is not clear, why in this para., the responsibility for establishing the criteria is left to borrower. This concept is self contradictory.

28. The process of conducting the socio-economic and the census survey is also left open in the absence of any specific qualifying criteria for the institute/agency who has to conduct the same or it's accreditation by the World Bank or other agencies. The land records are often not updated. Depending on the outcome of such survey and the reaction of the interested parties, or vested interests the report could be termed as unacceptable by the concerned staff of the World Bank. In certain cases, a particular survey report while accepted and praised by one staff is dubbed as rubbish by another staff. It is essential that adequate provisions are incorporated in the draft policy to avoid the personal interpretation by the Bank staff.

29. The socio-economic survey normally highlights the severity of economic impact without considering the capacity and capability of the DP towards self rehabilitation and resettlement. As a result the knowledgeable, educated and resourceful DPs corner the available opportunities. It would therefore be worth considering the concept of "Impoverishment Risk Analysis" in place of traditional socio-economic and census survey to enable the most vulnerable and impoverished DP getting the priority for R&R benefits. This is more important in developing countries where feudalistic system is still prevalent in many interior parts of the country.

30. Para. 13(b) - The policy does not specify the process by which such DPs will be identified and certified. The absence of such provisions will open the flood gate to demands for R&R benefits by one and all.

31. Para. 14 - This para. is apparently wrongly worded and structured, particularly the third line "However, they are entitled to resettlement assistance in lieu of compensation for land". This gives the impression that where the compensation for land is given, no R&R assistance is to be provided, thus negating the basic concept of this policy. The most important question on which policy is silent is as to who will authenticate such list.

32. Para. 17 - The policy is silent about the process of giving information about the resettlement aspect of the project to DPs and taking their view into account. Who will certify that information has been given. What is to be done, if a small group or even one DP claims about lack of information. In highly risky and contentions projects involving significant and complex resettlement activities, too much consultations may back fire by raising the expectations of the DPs which is further fuelled by certain vested interests.

33. Para. 22 - The performance indicator for assessing the R&R component should be specific and part of this policy rather than leaving it open to the perception of individual staff of Bank.

34. Para. 28 - The ex-post review by the Bank will serve little purpose to the suffering of DPs already caused and hence the Bank can not abdicate it's responsibility by leaving the review to any other agency.

35. Para. 30 - The assistance envisaged in the policy should rather be mandatory instead of optional to enable the concerned staff of borrower to understand and adopt the Bank policy.

36. Para. 32 - In addition to what is written in this para., the Bank also does not take any responsibility during the implementation of the R&R component of a project, like the agreement to the survey reports or the census data or the list of eligible DPs. Even when, the R&R options and benefits are finalised and agreed by the Bank, in case of a claim by a person for R&R benefit, Bank conveniently takes the borrower to task. The Bank also interfere too much on other issues which though are the prevalent social issues in a specific country or area but certainly are not covered under this policy. Rather than stating what the Bank does not do, the responsibility of Bank should also be clearly delineated in the policy. This will avoid the personal and often contradictory stand and perception of different staff of the Bank who work on a project over different time periods.

IV. Specific comments on Draft OP 4.12 Annex

37. Para. 6 0 - The annex. does not mention about the qualifying requirement or accreditation of the agencies who can carry out the census and socio-economic survey and establish the income level, loss of income and the standard of living of all individual DPs. The experience shows that these survey are primarily based on the response of DPs rather than the evaluation of the surveyor. It is also observed that often the acceptance of these reports by the Bank staff is based on the reactions of the interested parties, which is sometimes rejected after a long time gap, thus necessitating fresh surveys. The experience shows that there is a direct co-relation in the number of studies and complexity of the issues. The Bank staff find it convenient to institute fresh studies each time they are under pressure. The objectivity becomes the victim under such circumstances. It is, therefore, necessary that the Bank should be involved and should own up the responsibility (since they have the requisite experience and expertise) in selection of consultants and also the results of these studies.

38. Para. 12(b) - It is also a known fact that during the planning of a project, the unscrupulous rich, knowledgeable outsiders and also creamy layer of DPs buy small fragments of land or fragment their land among the family members/outsiders to become eligible DPs and usurp the limited available opportunities quickly. While, this para. provides theoretical ideology, the practical aspects are ignored and remain unaddressed.

39. Para. 16(d) - This para. reflects the reductionistic approach of Bank. In the developing countries, where many people living in abysmal poverty without any access to basic human need like water, electricity, medical and educational facilities, the thrust has to be on certain minimum level of amenities rather than providing 'at least comparable to services available to resettlers".

V. Specific comments on Draft B.P. 4.12

40. Para. 16 - It is wrong to put the whole burden of achieving the objective on the borrower alone even though it has fully implemented the agreed measures. If the Bank is so particular on achieving the objective, then it also has a moral obligation to accept it's failure and extend the free grant (not loan) for implementing future course of action.

End of comments

Dinesh Agrawal

*************************************

October 26, 1999

James D. Nations
Vice President
Mexico and Central American Programs
Conservation International

Washington, DC
USA


World Bank Resettlement Policy Draft OP 4.12

We appreciate the opportunity to comment on the Draft OP/BP 4.12 concerning the World Bank's resettlement policy. Our interest in this issue results from Conservation International's direct experience with the resettlement issue in a protected area in Central America.

On November 25, 1997, Conservation International-Guatemala submitted a project concept paper to the World Bank for a GEF Medium-Sized Grant for the management and protection of the Laguna del Tigre National Park and Biotope (LTNP). Located in the 1.6 million ha. Maya Biosphere Reserve in the northern Petén region of Guatemala, Laguna del Tigre National Park (292,575 ha.) and Laguna del Tigre Biotope (45,427 ha.) occupy about 20% of the Reserve. The park and reserve together are larger than Yosemite National Park in California and form the largest protected area core zone in Central America. This area includes Mesoamerica's largest freshwater wetland and is recognized as a wetland of global importance under the Ramsar Treaty.

Because of the many issues surrounding the protection of LTNP--squatter communities and oil operations in the park among them--the time and effort to obtain approval for this grant from the Guatemalan government were considerable. Nonetheless, after exhaustive consultation with relevant stakeholders and numerous meetings with government officials, we obtained final approval from the Guatemalan Government on May 19, 1999, 18 months after the original concept paper was submitted to World Bank/GEF. Upon receiving government approval, CI-Guatemala submitted the Project Brief to the World Bank for review. Because we had worked closely with the Bank's contact personnel in putting the Brief together, we anticipated no major obstacles in obtaining final approval from the Bank. Indeed, by mid-June, the World Bank Secretariat had approved the Brief, leaving approval from the Legal Department as the final step for the agreement to be signed.

At this point, however, varying interpretations of the Draft OP/BP 4.12 within the Bank made final approval of the Project Brief uncertain. Specifically, some members of the Legal Department were concerned about the possibility of future involuntary resettlement of illegal colonists from the LTNP. This concern came despite the fact that no resettlement project of any kind was planned as part of the CI-Guatemala Project Brief, and the Guatemalan Government had only a voluntary resettlement plan in place. The Government has pledged not to use involuntary resettlement of current residents as a means to protect LTNP.

Despite this situation, members of the Legal Department asked that final approval of the Project Brief be contingent upon CI-Guatemala obtaining written guarantees from relevant government agencies indicating that they would not carry out forced resettlements. CI-Guatemala pointed out that the sometimes complex bureaucracy of the Guatemalan Government and possible resistance to attempts by foreign entities to dictate official behavior would delay implementation of the Project Brief for at least another six months and possibly halt the project altogether.

During July, 1999, considerable consultation took place with and within the World Bank. Ultimately, the Legal Department noted that its request might hinder CI-Guatemala's ability to effectively implement the GEF project in a timely manner. By August 25, 1999, with some revisions made to the wording of the Brief's text, the Legal Department gave final approval for the Project Brief. On September 21, 1999, CI-Guatemala Director Carlos Soza and World Bank Central America Department Director Donna Dowsett-Coirolo signed the final agreement for the GEF Medium-Size Project.

Among the key elements of this brief history are the fact that the project was carefully designed to include a range of sustainable development activities aimed at incorporating occupying farm families into park management decisions and improving their livelihoods. Also, although the Government of Guatemala had implemented a voluntary resettlement plan for the LTNP, there were, and are, no plans for involuntary resettlement.

Conservation International is strongly supportive of the most stringent social guidelines at the World Bank and other international financial institutions, but we would caution that the World Bank's resettlement policy should not be interpreted in a way that would invalidate conservation and sustainable development activities. In the case of Guatemala's Laguna del Tigre National Park, preventing the approval of a project that seeks to improve environmental and social conditions for families within Laguna del Tigre National Park because of hypothetical future violations of World Bank policies would have had a perverse and unnecessary effect.

On a more general topic, we strongly support the World Bank's work to protect human rights. We also know that one of the ultimate human rights is a nation's natural resource base, providing clean air, water, and healthy, renewable biological resources to all of a nation's citizens. One of the obligations of the state is to protect these resources for the benefit of all citizens, not for a select few. We also know that it is the intention of the World Bank to protect this natural resource base within the countries where the Bank operates.

Any global policy carries the risk of creating unintended effects. We trust that in revising Draft OP/BP 4.12, World Bank staff will be careful to word the document to prevent the possibility of supporting speculative land grabs by a few citizens within legal protected areas as a way to obtain land of equal or better value in a non-protected area.


James D. Nations
Vice President
Mexico and Central America Programs
*************************************

October 29, 1999

Anna Dunets
John van Nostrand Associates

Planners/Human Settlements/Community Development
Toronto, Ontario
Canada


Comments on Draft Operational Policy 4.12

a) Baseline Studies and Replacement Costs

Section iv, Socioeconomic Studies of the Resettlement Plan (Draft OP 4.12, Annex) states that a census survey is required to: identify current occupants; to provide an inventory of assets; and to provide a mechanism to update this information so that the latest information is available at the time of their displacement. Section viii, Valuation and Compensation for Losses, states that replacement cost for houses and other structures is the market cost of the materials to build a replacement structure and for urban land it is the pre-displacement market value [as opposed to pre-project market value] of land of equal size and use.

This task is only briefly referred to in Section v (a), Legal Framework. The wording of Sections iv and viii seem to imply that valuation and compensation are assessed on the day before displacement. This is impractical because the number of affected persons and the value of their assets will increase from the day that any compensation opportunity is made public knowledge. The OD 4.30 did include under Resettlement Planning, Section vi (d), Valuation of and Compensation for Lost Assets, a statement requiring "mechanisms to prevent illegal encroachers and squatters, including an influx of nonresidents entering to take advantage of such benefits, from participating in the compensation arrangements, by an early recording of the numbers and names of the affected populations entitled to compensation/rehabilitation." This seems to have been omitted from the Draft OP 4.12.

The identification of the affected persons and their assets and the valuation of their assets, is a critical event in the resettlement process. It has to be clearly decided when this is done and it has to be part of, and preferably the first order of business of, the consultation/negotiation process with the affected persons. The methodology for identification and valuation has to be established. This involves considerable work by the Proponent.

This comment ties in with the one made by Thayer Scudder of the CIT, to the effect that once the prospect of relocation is broached, people change their plans. He states that people stop increasing their assets, possibly because of laws and enforcement requiring them to do so, and thus become worse off than they would have been. In our experience in Ghana, perhaps because the framework for establishing the date of valuation was not well worked out, or because the enforcement for the same was not in place, people increased their assets, at least initially, by building or planting new crops. Either way, the point is that the methodology and the timing of the concept of identification and valuation for compensation, is critical and complex and can sideline the whole process and/or leave the resettled persons in a worse position than before, and is not sufficiently emphasized in the OP 4.12.

b) Community Consultation

Section xiii, Community Participation, requires a description of (amongst other things) the strategy for consultation and participation of resettlers and hosts, and the identification of procedures for grievance mechanisms.

The emphasis should be not just on information, participation and consultation, but on the recognition that communities are part of a negotiation for resettlement between the Proponent and the community; that is, what may start as an involuntary resettlement process, should, after successful negotiations, be seen as a voluntary resettlement process. The alternative to failed negotiations should be that no resettlement takes place (or another attempt is made with new personnel). The establishment of a negotiating forum and the membership of this forum is central to the Resettlement Plan. Community negotiation implies a much more active and central role for communities than what appears to be put forward in the OP 4.12.




October 30, 1999

T. Herbert
Prerana Resource Centre

Hazaribag, Bihar
India


Comments on Draft OP 4.12 dt. June 22 1999.

In this submission, by "OD 4.30" we mean the former Operation Directive, by "Draft" the triple Draft OP/BP/GP as released over a year ago, by "Present Text" the draft Operational Policy/Annex/Bank Procedures of June 22 1999 which is before us now.

We highlight a few points:

1. INCOME RESTORATION:

TEXT: OD 4.30 no 18 dealt with alternative income strategies. Also, the Draft Text OP 6 "strategy for improving or at least restoring the incomes and living standards..." and Draft BP 6 "plans for restoration of incomes..." and Draft Annex 2 K "alternative employment strategies and training..." also deal with it.

In the Present Text, its need is mentioned in policy objectives 1 c, in Required Measures 5 g, but here it becomes the more general "livelihood" and "development assistance".

Most strangely these points have been dropped from the Annex.

Also most noticeable is the change of "(for vulnerable groups) to include acceptable alternative income-earning strategies to protect the livelihood of these people" (OD 4.30 No.16) to "information on vulnerable groups".

COMMENT

a) These are changes pointing to a change of policy.

b) Income Restoration must be explicated as the most crucial issue in the Policy. THIS CANNOT BE STRESSED STRONGLY ENOUGH. In the rehabilitation of displacees, economic rehabilitation (income restoration) is the touch stone which divides those resettlers whose living standard is raised, and those who are thrown into a downward spiral of poverty. To destroy the whole economic base of a village, of whole areas of villages, and not to have clear norms and strategies for economic rehabilitation is not acceptable. We witness this happening because this issue is not treated explicitly enough.

SUGGEST

a) In Present Text Annex 11 to "compensation and other resettlement measures" be added "and income restoration"

b) In Present Text 7 the words of OD 4.30 No.16 (as above) be included.

c) In the Present Text Annex a separate paragraph containing the explicitation of income restoration strategies be included in the way it was in Draft Annex 2 (k). Such strategies which should be mentioned are:

* existing PAP skills, expressed preferences of PAPs for IR options, a feasibility analysis of each IR option, plans to set up effective training programmes, the number and eligibility criteria of company jobs to be offered to PAPs, timetable and budget for training and other IR activities, institutional responsibilities for design and implementation, identification of suitable local training institutions, assurance that for every displaced adult person there is a potential and sustainable source of income restoration, benchmarks for monitoring the same.

2. TRAINING:

This has been given importance in OD.4.30 no 18, now there is no reference to it. Our experience shows that training for economic opportunities can do a lot to help displacees "share in the benefits of a project", and this is a serious omission (change of policy).

SUGGEST: In Annex, training must be included as it was previously in OD 4.30 and Draft Texts.

3. SOCIO-ECONOMIC SURVEY AND COMMON PROPERTY RESOURCES

TEXT: OD 4.30 no.11 says Socio-economic surveys should contain "information on the full resource base, including informal sector, non farm activities and from common property." Draft Annex 2 c (ii) had "access to and use of common property.." Now in Present Text Annex 6 b(i) it has become "common property systems".

COMMENT:

a) This is a change of text - systems are different from itemizing and valuating actual property.

b) The lens through which all is seen is legal ownership, there is little recognition that these natural resources are not "terra nullius" or greenfields, but actually are often in the possession of communities apart from, and prior to, any legal recognition. Yet with so many of our people, these natural resources which are a major part of their survival base which are forcibly appropriated, and replacement cost is not made. The basis of this is a narrow stress on formal legal ownership. Their ownership is not recognized because it is not in formal legal terms which are universally applied.

SUGGEST:

In Annex 6 (b) (i) the brief mention of "including common property" be expanded to "including a full inventory of common property natural resources (especially fuel and water), from which people derive their livelihood and on which they survival is based..."

b) Also add "interrelationship of current land use patterns with the environment".

4. CUSTOMARY HELD LAND:

TEXT: Comment: OD 4.30 no 17 clearly asserted "common property and non title based usufruct systems governed by locally recognized land allocation mechanisms. The objective is to treat customary and formal rights as equally as possible in devising rules and procedures". Cf also OD 4.20 no 15 (c).

In Present Text 13 (b) and Annex 7 (c), these are now subordinate to "provided such claims are recognized under the laws of the country".

COMMENT: This is a) a change of text, b) it is precisely this fact that State law does not recognize tribal land allocation mechanisms (they often existed before the present State existed) and that they are genuine land rights, hence Bank Policy has to recognize and uphold them.

SUGGEST: The above policy objective statement from OD 4.30 be included in OP4.12 no 13.

5. HOST POPULATIONS

TEXT: OD 4.30 no 9 "the plan should address and mitigate resettlement impact on host populations" becomes in Draft OP 5 (d) "minimize adverse impacts". In the Present Text this need to mitigate/minimize has been omitted.

SUGGEST: In Present Text this sentence be included in OP 6 (a).


OTHER CHANGES:

6. TEXT: Present Text no 7 omits vulnerable groups who "may not be protected through national land compensation legislation" (WB OD 4.30 no 16).

COMMENT: It is precisely to address this failure in legislation that has to be explicitated.

SUGGEST: This sentence be included in Present Text no 7.


7. TEXT OD 4.30 no 6. "The responsibility for resettlement...

COMMENT: In Bank sponsored projects, there are 3 parties involved: the DPs, the borrower, and the Bank. If responsibility is not mandatory on either the borrower or the Bank, who precisely is to take responsible for the involuntary displacement of the DPs?
Submission: OD 6 should be included in an appropriate place.

8. TEXT: OD 4.30 had "consulted... about their options and rights" this should be included in Present Text 11 (a).

9. General Comment:

While the need for brevity and lack of repetition is appreciated, we see a down-sizing and abbreviation that, if not making changes, diminishes the force of statements. The changes seem to come from computer cutting and pasting, not from understanding of needs on the ground.

Example: OD4.30 paras 8 (with fn) and 9 dealt with integration of resettlers and host communities. It went into Draft GP para. 2, and now in O 16 c - it is a mere 13 words. It is an important issue: resettlers moving into a host village is a source of economic deprivation of already short natural resources and a source of social conflict not easily resolved. Although in seminal form in 16 c, it fails to effectively deal with the issue. ******




October 31, 1999


To: President James Wolfenson

The World Bank Group
Washington, DC.

Submitted via Resettlement_Help_Desk@worldbank.org


From: The Ritsumeikan University Research Group on

Involuntary Resettlement (RURG)
Kyoto, Japan

56-1 Tohjiin-Kita-machi, Kitaku, Kyoto 604-8437 JAPAN
Tel: +81 (0)75-465-1111

Contact to: Miss. JO, Phil Hwa, The graduate school of Policy Science

Mail to: rurgir@anet.ne.jp


RURG Comments on The World Bank Group Draft Involuntary Resettlement Policy 4.12

We are most pleased to have the opportunity to comment on the World Bank pioneering efforts to clarify the rights of people who are involuntarily displaced. We are grateful for the opportunity to submit our comments on The World Bank's Draft Involuntary Resettlement Policy 4.12. We are M.A. and Ph.D. graduate students at Ritsumeikan University, Kyoto, Japan, majoring in Policy Science, International Relations, and Socio-history who have been analyzing involuntary resettlement. We are concerned about the socio-economic assumptions underlying the policy; the need for better resolution, in the policy, of potential conflicts of interests; resolution of conflicts between stakeholders; some ambiguities and lack of definitions of key words in the policy, and the need for more clearly defined disclosure process to stakeholders.

1. Definitions and Ambiguities

(1) We found considerable ambiguity key words accompanying the value-judgment in the draft, such as "appropriate" (para. 1, 12 and 17), "effective" (para. 6), and "sufficient" (para. 9). These words are used from the viewpoint of the Bank in this policy. It may be true that such a Bank-based policy was one of the factors leading some negative impacts on people and social and natural environment, partly because the policy is one-sided. Moreover, unless these key words can be clearly defined, we see the likelihood of increased conflicts between the different stakeholders in an involuntary resettlement. This struggle would be a product of an ambiguous policy and standard.Therefore, the Bank needs to insert stronger language into the policy to assure feedback from the bottom to avoid and reduce the conflicts of interests (COI) among the actors related to the project. In this sense, people's participation can be a possible solution for bottom-up feedback. Although there is reference to participation (See para. 1 & 6) in this draft, but it does not have clear meaning. The participation, in the draft, explains only the stages in the project process, as in planning, implementing and monitoring. However, virtually, it is not saying how participation is carried out in each step. Therefore, when the Bank makes the policy, it should offer the "table" that all actors can be seated and each claim is at least heard.

(2) It is better to reflect Project-Affected People's (PAP) opinions into the Bank Policy. The present draft policy does recognize the severe economic, social and environmental risks and damages on the resettled community due to the involuntary resettlement. And the policy does not build on the extensive experience found in its own reviews. In order to reduce and mitigate such damages, the Bank proposed "appropriate" policy. However, in that policy, "appropriate" only represents the position of the Bank and, unfortunately, it does not seem to bring the PAP's ideas of appropriateness into the policy. Because both the Bank and PAP will have different standard of value-judgment, the Bank should identify this differences, and reflect PAP's values into the policy.

2. Social Perspective

(3) We are concerned about the lack of social perspective in the present draft, which is consistent with resettlement research, the Bank reviews and the Bank experience. Possible impoverishment risks of resettlement, identified by the Bank experience and research and mentioned in footnote 1, have determined that "community* institutions and social networks are weakened; kin groups are dispersed; and cultural identity, traditional authority, and the potential for mutual help are diminished or lost." Apart from the economic loss of assets, the social and other risks are not addressed by the policy, even though they are regularly observed to be a part of involuntary resettlement. These damages are done to communities, not only simply individuals.

*When using the word "community," the Bank should point out which community the Bank supposes. In this comment, we note there are potentially several communities, all of which may have different risks: host community, resettled community, new community composed by host and resettled community, kin groups, ex-neighboring community, and community which shared any interests.

(4) We propose the policy include the following provisions.

a) Risk Assessment and Evaluation (RAE): Risks mentioned in footnote 1 should be assessed and evaluated not only quantitatively but also qualitatively to reduce COI occurred by the economic compensation. Each PAP should have opportunity to participate in the RAE and have full access to the information of the risk assessment and evaluation by the Bank. Estimation of compensation should include development actions, not simply replacement of assets or cash, necessary to mitigate each risk that is identified. The PAP should participate in the process to estimate their compensation for reducing COI.

b) Explicit steps to permit the community to preserve their culture and identity, which are threatened by resettlement: Culture is a dynamic method to meet the problems for the community and if the culture of a group is damaged, their ability to cope with future economic and social problems will be reduced. Preservation of their culture and identity should not be limited to recording or protecting the tradition such as the knowledge and the ceremony because the culture of the community could be a dynamic method to meet the problems. The focus should be on increasing the community's and individual capacity to preserve and protect their way of life.

c) Community-based compensation and development: We are concerned that financial and institutional arrangements are not called for in the policy to protect community and social organizations, which are disrupted by involuntary resettlement. Provisions should be made in the policy to support self-reliance and autonomy of the community, and compensation should not be limited to individual and/or financial compensation. This is not simply a matter of paying, but should address the development and action plans to avoid or mitigate social disruption such as those identified in the research of Professors Downing (http://www.azstarnet.com/~downing/DIDI1/didi1frames.htm), Professor Scudder, Mr. Cernea, and others. Organization arrangements should be included not simply financial arrangements. In cases where the community lacks the capacity to deal with the disruptions of involuntary resettlement, we feel that financial arrangements should be made to provide them with a professional, legal advisor who could play a major role in redistributing the compensation to the community and mediating COI. Organization capacity building, including the representatives of stakeholders, provision for and financing of independent legal assistance, and professional resettlement specialist advisors, play a major role in assisting the PAP interact with the Bank and borrower, mediating COI, reducing conflict, and improving overall project performance.

3. Conflicts of Interests (COI)

(5) The struggle for power should be mitigated in any project. The right and responsibility should be defined clearly and the project framework should be constructed simply and transparently. Since social, economic and environmental risk continue beyond the construction phase of a project, the policy should make provisions for financial and organizational activities, project activity, evaluation and monitoring until an independent evaluator determines that all risks have been mitigated and the policy objectives have been achieved.

(6) Where involuntary resettlement is unavoidable, PAP should be well informed about the project, the necessity and importance of the project, the reason why they have to be resettled, detailed planning of resettlement, and compensation they could be provided. And the draft should be revised to assure that PAP should have access to policy-making process.

(7) The Bank mentioned "minimize the scale and impacts of resettlement (footnote 3)" and "Involuntary resettlement should be avoided where feasible, or minimized, exploring all viable alternative project designs (para 1 (a))." We are concerned about legitimacy of the decision to resettle or not, and the lack of definite plan of minimized involuntary resettlement. We propose that the Bank policy should require disclosure of the information about the feasibility study and planning of the project to be monitored by the public before the project is carried out. This should not be a summary, since PAP should be given the right to examine the scientific and engineering work used to arrive at this decision.

4. Transparency and Monitoring

(8) There is a huge information gap between the implementation agency and PAP. On the ground, an information gap translates into a power gap. We are concerned that the policy makes no provision to provide the PAP with independent legal assistance and precisely the time they need it the most. This may quickly lead to unacceptable violations by the borrower and the Bank of the human rights of the PAP. Transparency and disclosure are minimal steps to avoid this problem. This is particularly true of the need for the PAP to not only understand the options, but also the risks that the options address. Without this information, PAP's opinion is difficult to reflect in the developing project plan. This problem is so serious that we feel the need for a Neutral Mediator (NM) to incorporate into the policy.

(9) Development is held under NM that stands between PAP and implementing agency. NM should view the both comments and take the responsibility. The Bank recognizes the responsible person. The language, community society, information infrastructure of PAP is in various ways. In the view of this fact, NM should choice the suitable method of communication with PAP.

(10) Apart from the NM, independent monitoring is needed to judge whether the project is progressing under the objective of policy. However, in the present draft, the implementing agency is supervising and independent monitor is only playing supplementary role. Besides, there is no clear specification on the structure, role and authority of independent monitor (See para. 21). Accordingly, independent monitor must have an authority to control the effectiveness of the project. Independent monitor must be autonomous organization.

(11) A cut-off date established by the borrower and it is acceptable to the Bank. The persons who encroach the area after the above "cut-off" date are not entitled to compensation or any other form of resettlement assistance (See para. 14). When the progress of project delayed or the project changed the way unexpectedly, cut-off date should be reexamined along with the project situation.

(12) The budget of the Bank will be shown in a public and checked by independent outer-organization.

5. Overall Recommendations

(13) Specifically, we note that despite the strong participation of Japan in Bank financing, the policy was not translated into Japanese. Furthermore, we do not feel the present draft received the full range of comments and wisdom that might have been available. We would like assurances, form Bank management, that in the future, policies for public comment will be made available in more languages, including those of the principal donors and PAP, to enable people living in non-English-speaking areas to catch the information and to participate in the process of improving the Involuntary Resettlement policy.

(14) In the policy, there should be a statement on offering opportunities for all actors to intercommunicate and create mutual relationship. The lack of mutual understanding has risks to cause the delay of projects and weaken its effectiveness. All actors, such as the Bank, PAP, and borrowers, have their own values. Even among PAP, COI may exist since the community consists of various people. In this case, the opinions of minority and the weak, like women, children, the elderly and the poor, tend to be ignored. It is important to resolve COI, but more weight should be put on avoiding COI before projects start.

(15) It seemed that in this draft the Bank did not sufficiently show a principle of policy making on involuntary resettlement. Accordingly, we could not find the destination where the Bank aimed by Involuntary Resettlement policy. Analyzing the draft, we concluded that the Bank should have explicit policy for making policy.
Hopefully, we will contribute to improve the draft.

Ritsumeikan University Research Group on Involuntary Resettlement

GONDO, Chie
HARUYAMA, Takako
HIROTA, Bunpei
INOUE, Hirokatsu
IKUTA, Hiroyuki
JO, Phil Hwa
KAWAI, Masao
Nang Mya Kay Khaing
OGAWA, Yuji
SEKIDO, Akinori
SHIGENO, Hiroki
TAKAGI, Shigehiro
UEHATA, Naoki
YAGUCHI, Makoto

Pc. Ian Johnson, ESSP Vice President, The World Bank

Policy Kiosk www.policykiosk.com




October 31, 1999

Alexandra Page
Indian Law Resource Center

Washington, DC
USA


Comments on the Draft OP/BP 4.12: Involuntary Resettlement

In response to the World Bank's request for input on OP/BP 4.12, the proposed conversion of OD 4.30, "Involuntary Resettlement," the Indian Law Resource Center respectfully submits the following comments. For more than 20 years, the Center has helped indigenous peoples of the Americas to secure their rights and protect their cultures. Our intention is to aid the Bank in crafting policies and procedures that respect the rights of indigenous peoples and ensure that Bank-supported projects will benefit rather than harm indigenous communities.

The special relationship between indigenous peoples and their traditional lands makes involuntary resettlement particularly devastating to them. The Bank has recognized this relationship in OD 4.20 ("Indigenous Peoples"), which states that indigenous peoples often have "a close attachment to ancestral territories and to the natural resources in the[] areas" they use and occupy. (OD 4.20 para. 5(a)). Just months ago, in a statement delivered at the United Nations, a Bank spokesperson emphasized the Bank's recognition that "there is a very sacred, spiritual and unique relationship between the land and [indigenous] people" and that "addressing land access, use and management must be done within the context and the fundamental dimensions of the cosmovision that define the future of indigenous societies." (Statement of Alfredo Sfeir-Younis, Special World Bank Representative to the United Nations, ECOSOC, Geneva, July 28, 1999).

Given this unique relationship, the Bank should guard against any changes in its policies, procedures, and advocated practices that might indicate increased tolerance of or support for involuntary resettlement, particularly where indigenous peoples are concerned. For this reason, the strong language of OD 4.30 para. 2 outlining the expected adverse impacts of resettlement should be restored. OP/BP 4.12 retains only a watered-down version of this text in the Notes, weakening restraints on resettlement.

To adequately protect the lands of indigenous peoples, OP/BP 4.12 must apply to the broad range of situations in which project-affected people are effectively resettled. This includes displacement from traditional lands not officially recognized by a borrower's domestic legal regime and displacement from lands traditionally used and occupied, whether or not permanent residences have not been established on such lands. For example, the OP must recognize the importance of traditional subsistence activities and sacred sites to indigenous communities.

OD 4.30 emphasized that "[l]and, housing, infrastructure, and other compensation should be provided to the adversely affected... indigenous groups... who may have usufruct or customary rights to the land or other resources taken for the project" and stated that "[resettlement] plans should contain provisions for conducting land surveys and regularizing land tenure in the earliest stages of project development." (OD 4.30 paras. 3, 17). OP/BP 4.12 contains no such protections against inadequate domestic land tenure standards and expressly excludes from its protections those displaced persons who have neither formal legal rights nor "a claim" to such rights under domestic law. (OP/BP 4.12 para. 13). The domestic indigenous rights laws of many countries fail to meet international legal standards in this regard.

In addition, the OP creates a separate and inferior set of protections for peoples displaced by the creation of parks and protected areas. Many of the world's pristine environments remain ecologically vibrant precisely because indigenous peoples have occupied them, used them sustainably, and fought to keep national governments, extractive industries, and others from despoiling them. For this reason, the adverse effects of park and protected area projects will in many instances fall upon indigenous peoples, who in many cases have both preserved and relied on the land and resources sought to be "protected." The OP should not allow borrowers to threaten the rights of such peoples merely because the project at issue is a park or protected area.

Thus, for example, OP 4.12 para. 8 should be revised to provide the same degree of advance protection to persons displaced by parks and protected area projects (i.e. those defined in para. 2(b)) as is provided to other project affected persons (i.e. those defined in para. 2(a)). In addition, OP/BP 4.12 para. 9 should not release borrowers from the responsibility of providing land-based resettlement options to displaced persons with land-based livelihoods where "the provision of land would adversely affect the sustainability of the park or protected area."

Increasingly, international law recognizes and affirms the right of indigenous peoples to the lands they traditionally use and occupy. This law must be respected regardless of whether domestic legal regimes properly protect such rights. (See ILO Convention 169 on Indigenous and Tribal Peoples, 1989, Arts. 7, 13-19). Instead of recognizing and embracing these international advances, OP/BP 4.12 diminishes the extent to which indigenous land rights will be recognized and protected by the Bank when domestic legal regimes fail to do so. This must be corrected to offer higher, not lower, standards of protection for indigenous peoples' lands. Language to this effect from OD 4.30 should be strengthened and added to OP/BP 4.12, and language expressly denying these rights should be removed.

Similarly, the OP should carry forward the Bank policy favoring land for land exchanges over cash compensation for displaced persons. Land is a vital resource for indigenous cultures, and cash, in most cases, cannot sufficiently compensate indigenous peoples for the damage done when traditional lands are expropriated. Indeed, in the United States and many other countries, confiscatory land "purchases" have been undertaken as a mechanism to destroy indigenous cultures and assimilate indigenous peoples. Moreover, few countries have laws and legal mechanisms in place to guarantee that compensation for takings of indigenous lands is truly fair and in keeping with a non-discriminatory public purpose. For these reasons, OP/BP 4.12 should be revised to emphasize a preference for land-based compensation and to require that cash compensation be offered as a substitute only in exceptional cases.

Finally, the OP should be revised to strengthen the Bank's role in monitoring and evaluating resettlement plans. The Bank must be able to step in and provide practical remedies when resettlement projects go awry. As numerous commentators have noted, reliance on borrowers to monitor and evaluate resettlement planning and implementation adversely impacts project-affected people.

We appreciate the opportunity to comment on OP/BP 4.12 and urge the Bank to commit to further review of the OP and consultation with indigenous peoples, NGOs and other stakeholders.

Alexandra Page
Indian Law Resource Center




November 1, 1999

Pierre Senecal
Conseiller Environment, Hydro-Quebec
Chair, EIA Technical Committee
Canadian Standards Association (CSA International)
IAIA Past-president 1996-97
Montreal, Quebec
Canada


Comments on Draft OP/BP 4.12 - Involuntary Resettlement

Based on my personal experience in resettlement projects in North America, Asia and the Middle East, I have found Draft OP 4.12 clear, in conformity with the results of recent resettlement follow-ups, focused on the pitfalls which have turned out as the most frequent factors of resettlement failures and forceful in its attempts to address these issues. The draft has obviously involved a considerable amount of work undertaken by many people. Although not perfect, it does represent a very significant improvement in regard to OD 4.30.

The following remarks should be viewed as constructive attempts to improve the current draft:

1) Paragraph 2 -- The definition of "resettlement" and the scope of the policy seem far too inclusive. According to the clauses of sub-paragraph (a), and as confirmed by note 22, the policy would be applied even in situations where no relocation occurs and only a marginal portion of the resource base is lost. I personnally believe that these types of situations, which are quite frequent, should be addressed by other OP.s. A resettlement policy should be restricted to situations which either involve physical relocation or the loss of a portion of the resource base large or significant enough to force residents to relocate either on a short on long term basis. In other words, a line should be drawn between actual resettlements and other types of social impacts which do not involve resettlement but which can turn out nonetheless as significant or severe. Another possible solution would be to rename the policy (by adding "loss of the resource base" for example).

2) Paragraphs 12 (first phrase), 15 (clause a) and 17 (first phrase) -- The draft OP seems to have been primarily designed for the assessment of resettlement-related issues at the full feasibility (or detailed EIA phase) when -- among other data requirements -- a census of people who would be resettled has been carried out, as spelled out in Paragraph 12, or is generally expected to have been carried out. For this reason, the draft OP offers little guidance for the growing number of prefeasibility or preliminary analyses which are being conducted today. At that early stage, these census have often not been carried out yet and other key information or data is often missing. How should the assessment of a resettlement project should be done at that stage? What kinds of information should be collected and for what purposes? And in those contexts where data is much less abundant, what are the criteria which should be used in order to assess whether resettlement is feasable according to the policy, the project should go on and a much larger investment should be made in a more detailed study?

3) More globally, the interface with other social impacts which do not involve any resettlement but which are often generated by the same projects -- and with the OPs requiring other kinds of social assessments -- should be clarified (they are only mentioned briefly in note 6). A common problem is the status which should be given to resettlement issues and reports in regard to the other types of social isues and assessments which should be analyzed or conducted.

I should also mention a larger issue regarding World Bank Guidelines. They have de facto evolved in international standards which are often used in contexts where the World Bank is not involved in any way. The number of projects in which this situation is being faced has recently grown and is likely to increase very much in the coming years. In these contexts, among many other issues, the leeway or bargaining power of those who are being asked to apply the WB guidelines is obviously very different from contexts in which the Bank can implement its policies and follow up on them. The statutory role of WB guidelines in non-Bank financed or related projects opens all sorts of avenues which are not addressed, for understandable reasons, in current drafts or OPs Should the World Bank guidelines be "adapted" to these contexts and if so, because they are so needed, how should they be adapted (and how could they be)? Or should new guidelines be developed?

P.S. These views do not necessarily reflect those of Hydro-Québec, CSA or IAIA

*************************************

November 2, 1999

Jane H. Hill, Ph.D.
President
American Anthropological Association

Arlington, Virginia
USA


The American Anthropological Association and its Committee for Human Rights thank you for the opportunity to review and comment on proposed changes in the World Bank's policy on involuntary resettlement (Draft OP 4.12: Involuntary Resettlement). We appreciate your efforts to make this a participatory process, especially the translation of the draft into many different languages (Bangla, Spanish, Portuguese, Hindi, Urdu, Chinese, Vietnamese, Indonesian, Croatian, and Russian) and the extension of the deadline by which to provide comments.

We encourage the Bank to further develop this participatory process by developing and distributing a response to all comments received, including illustration of Bank efforts to adequately respond to the substantive nature of those comments.

World Bank guidelines on social and environmental impact assessment are an essential component of the development planning process, and have influenced the approach and shape of every bank-funded development project for the past decade. World Bank guidelines, policies, and procedures have been adopted or adapted for use by other regional banks and aid agencies of host countries (OECD countries, the Asian Development Bank, and others), and represent an example of customary practice in assessing potential impacts, valuing losses, and devising socially and culturally appropriate mechanisms to compensate for damages experienced by indigenous and displaced peoples. Thus, changes in social and environmental principles, policies and procedures have repercussions far outside of the range of projects funded by the World Bank.

Our comments on the proposed policies regarding involuntary resettlement include concerns over what may prove to be a significant weakening of right-protective policies -- tossing out language now framed a World Bank-mandated Directive, and presenting more succinct, yet potentially less protective language as World Bank Policy.

In the preamble to Draft OP/BP 4.12, the Bank notes that converting the Operational Directive on Involuntary Resettlement to an Operational Policy does not involve a revision of current Bank policy, merely a conversion to a new format. We are concerned that this conversion, while clarifying certain ambiguities, also weakens both the mandate and the guiding principles that determine what is relevant and what is significant in a decision making process.

Policies are not legally binding obligations, they are guidelines selectively employed within a political context. In an increasingly privatized world, where more and more development aide is funneled through public/private ventures (such as those funded by the International Finance Corporation), obligations to clients and shareholders may supersede, or even render irrelevant, the rights-protective social policies contained in OP 4.12. Multinational corporations are not signatories to international treaties and conventions, and while they do have the obligation to comply with the laws of the countries where they do business, it is that state's responsibility to insure compliance. Yet, the monitoring and enforcement of state laws in a private/multilateral development process is particularly difficult given the peripheral location of many development projects, the lack of funds to allow regular and intensive scrutiny, and the peripheral or nonexistent role in negotiating forums. Thus, culpability for ensuing social and environmental crises is difficult to assign, and given the availability of private investment capital, when the state or multilateral funders attempt to apply leverage and renegotiation agreements or actions, private corporations can simply refinance their loan (as illustrated in the IFC/ENDESA Chilean hydroelectric dam partnership). When projects are funded completely by private capital (investment banks, hedge funds, and so forth) contractual relationships between the private funder and the private corporation are confined to a specific set of obligations, and while developer has the legal duty to meet the terms of those contracted obligations, they are very rarely obligated to insure that goals are actually met. Given the trends in global financing of large scale development projects, especially those requiring involuntary relocation, it is all the more critical to insure that adequate social impact analysis is conducted at the earliest possible stage, that assessment and decision making processes are equitable and transparent, and that projects development decisions are made in ways that prioritize the human rights of affected peoples.

We are strongly concerned that converting World Bank "Directive" to "Policy" weakens the impact -- from a regulatory mandate to selectively employed guidance on particular issues, and this action may prove counter-productive to the goals of long-term sustainable development.

Our second major concern lies with the rearticulation of compensatory principles. World Bank Operational Directive 4.30 recognizes that "development projects that displace people involuntarily generally give rise to severe economic, social and environmental problems: production systems are dismantled; productive assets and income sources are lost; people are relocated to environments where their productive skills may be less applicable and competition for resources greater; community structures and social networks are weakened; kin groups are dispersed; and cultural identity, traditional authority, and the potential for mutual help are diminished. Involuntary resettlement may cause severe long-term hardship, impoverishment, and environmental damage unless appropriate measures are carefully planned and carried out" (World Bank OP 4.30.2). Thus, the major objectives of this directive are to insure that the population displaced by a project receives benefits from it and that involuntary resettlement is avoided or minimized when feasible.

Where displacement is unavoidable, resettlement plans are to be developed with displaced persons compensated for their losses at full replacement cost. The Operational Directive also notes that "Land, housing, infrastructure and other compensation should be provided to the adversely affected population, indigenous groups, ethnic minorities, and pastoralists who may have usufruct or customary rights to the land or other resources taken for the project. The absence of legal title to land by such groups should not be a bar to compensation" (World Bank OP 4.30.3e). Valuation of lost assets are typically made at direct replacement cost, and it is recognized that "some types of loss, such as access to (a) public services; (b) customers and suppliers; and (c) fishing, grazing, or forest areas, cannot be easily evaluated or compensated for in monetary terms. Attempts should therefore be made to establish access to equivalent and culturally acceptable resources and earning opportunities" (OD 4.30.15). In cases where the compensation policy of direct resource replacement does not work, for example where access to natural resources cannot be maintained because of the inability to acquire a similar designated host area, compensation for the loss of access to natural resources is provided based on an assessment of the value of natural resource use for each homestead per annum. In short, the principles around which compensation plans are based include a development strategy and package aimed at improving, or at least, restoring the economic based for those relocated, and compensatory policies stipulate the active awareness, engagement, and direct participation of affected peoples in experiencing the benefits of development.

World Bank reviews of projects developed under Operational Directive 4.30 clearly demonstrate the need for stronger mandates insuring that compensatory actions that not only replace or restore lost "assets," but significantly improve the ability of people to lead meaningful, self-sufficient, sustainable lives.

Work by World Bank Senior Advisor for Sociology and Social Policy Michael Cernea illustrates the considerable damages incurred by local populations when resettlement projects are poorly planned (1). The long-term socioeconomic and environmental consequences of an inadequate development project can more than outweigh the benefits generated by the development itself as clearly illustrated in Cernea's "Risks and Reconstruction Model for Resettling Displaced Populations." This model examines the relationships between forced displacement and poverty, with the specific goal of identifying an analytical framework for recognizing, assessing, and developing meaningful responses to adverse socioeconomic consequences. The analytical framework recognizes eight socioeconomic consequences, including:

Landlessness -- expropriation of land removes the main foundation upon which people's productive systems, commercial activities, and livelihoods are constructed. Unless the land basis of people's productive systems is reconstructed elsewhere, or replaced with steady income-generating employment, landlessness sets in and the affected families become impoverished.

Joblessness -- loss of wage employment occurs both in urban and rural displacements. Those losing jobs include landless laborers, enterprise or service workers, artisans, or small businessmen. Creating new jobs is difficult and requires substantial investments. Unemployment or underemployment among resettlers often endures long after physical relocation has been completed. For several categories of people whose livelihoods depend on jobs-including landless laborers - job loss due to displacement causes lasting painful economic and psychological effects. The previously employed may lose in three ways: in urban areas, they lose jobs in industry and services, or other job opportunities; in rural areas, they lose access to work on land owned by others (leased or share-cropped) and the use of assets under common property regimes).

Homelessness -- loss of housing and shelter is a severe drop in living standards. In a broader cultural sense, loss of a family's individual home embodies also the loss of a group's cultural space, resulting in alienation and deprivation.

Marginalization -- when families lose economic power and go on a "downward mobility" path, middle-income farm households do not become landless, they become small landholders; small shopkeepers and craftsmen downsize and slip below poverty thresholds, individuals cannot use their previously acquired skills at the new location and human capital is lost or rendered inactive, useless. The coerciveness of displacement tends to depreciate the image of self. Marginalization materializes also in a drop in social status and in a psychological downward slide of resettlers' confidence in society and self, a sense of injustice, a premise of anomic behavior. Psychological marginalization and behavioral impairments, anxiety and decline in self-esteem, have been widely reported from many areas (2).
Governments and project agencies also tacitly accept lasting marginalization of resettlers when they consider it" a matter of course" that the displaced cannot regain their prior social standard of living.

Increased morbidity and mortality -- serious declines in health result from displacement-caused social stress, insecurity, psychological trauma, and the outbreak of relocation-related illnesses, particularly parasitic and vector-born diseases such as malaria and schistosomiasis. Unsafe water supply and poor sewerage systems increase vulnerability to epidemics and chronic diarrhea, dysentery, etc. The weakest segments of the demographic spectrum-infants, children, and the elderly-are affected most strongly. People forced to relocate increase their exposure and vulnerability to illness, and to comparatively more severe diseases, than those who are not. Exposure to "social stress" has differential consequences on mental health across age, gender, marital and occupational status (3). Overall, direct and secondary effects of involuntary dislocation in the absence of preventive health measures include psychosomatic
diseases, diseases of poor hygiene (such as diarrhea and dysentery), and outbreaks of parasitic and vector-borne diseases (such as malaria and schistosomiasis) caused by unsafe and insufficient water supplies and inadequate sanitary waste systems.

Food insecurity -- forced uprooting increases the risk that people will fall into chronic undernourishment, defined as calorie-protein intake levels below the minimum necessary for normal growth and work, and food insecurity. Undernourishment is both a symptom and result of inadequate resettlement. Sudden drops in food crop availability and/or incomes are predictable during physical relocation, and hunger or undernourishment tend to become lingering long term effects. Forced uprooting increases the risk that people will fall into chronic food insecurity, as rebuilding regular food production capacity at the relocation site may take years.

Loss of access to common property and services -- for poor people, particularly for the landless and assetless, loss of access to common (non-individual) property assets that belong to relocated communities (forested lands, water bodies, grazing lands, burial grounds, etc.) results in significant deterioration in income and livelihood. After losing the use of natural resources under common property, displaced people tend either to encroach on reserved forests or to increase the pressure on common property resources of the host area population (4). This is a source of both social tension and increased environmental deterioration.

Social disarticulation -- forced displacement tears apart the existing social fabric and induces powerlessness, it disperses and fragments communities, dismantles patterns of social organization and interpersonal ties; kinship groups become scattered as well. Life-sustaining informal networks of reciprocal help, local voluntary associations, and self-organized mutual service arrangements are dismantled. The destabilization of community life is apt to generate a typical state of anomie, crisis-laden insecurity, and loss of sense of cultural identity, tending to transform displacement zones into what has been termed as "anomic regions" or "anomie-ridden areas" (5). The unraveling of spatially-based patterns of self-organization, interaction and reciprocity is a net loss of valuable "social capital," that compounds the loss of natural and man-made capital. The social capital lost through social disarticulation remains unperceived and uncompensated by planners, and this real loss will reverberate long and detrimentally during subsequent periods. "The people may physically persist, but the community that was-is no more" because its spatial, temporal, and cultural determinants are gone (6).

These eight basic impoverishment risks affect various categories of vulnerable people differentially. Certain population groups are hurt more than others. For instance, recent research revealed that women suffer more severe impacts and there are cases of clear-cut discrimination against women in compensation criteria (7). Tribal groups are more vulnerable than the general population to the impoverishment hazards discussed above. Children, as an age category, are subjected to particularly perverse consequences.

Reconstructing and improving the livelihood of those displaced requires understanding the socioeconomic content of displacement, and designing equitable risk-reversal strategies that are backed up by adequate financing. The underlying principle of this model is recognition that meaningful resettlement plans require more than statements to justify and "compensate" property losses, but plans that pursue the actual restoration and enhancement of the income-generating capacity and livelihoods of the displaced people. Application of the risks and reconstruction model as a tool for planning resettlement with recovery requires using the risks matrix to assess problems and develop an action-matrix for reconstructing the livelihoods and incomes of those displaced. This requires carrying out a risk assessment in the field, tailored to the situation at hand; designing targeted responses for decision makers/planners to reduce predicted risks; encouraging pro-active responses and participation of the population directly at risk; establishing transparent information and communication between decision makers/planners and the populations at risk. The cost of reestablishing a family and a community is generally bound to exceed the strict market value of the physical losses imposed on that family or community.

Despite considerable evidence accumulated by World Bank staff and others that involuntary resettlement projects have typically led to significant socioeconomic disintegration, affected peoples are commonly excluded from the benefits of the development process, and issues of participation and transparency are key contributing factors-- the proposed Operational Policy 4.12 places responsibility for developing a resettlement plan is in the hands of the borrower, and involvement of affected peoples occurs after development project approval has occurred. Participatory involvement is recommended in choosing alternatives or options, not in shaping those options, or even participating in the development decision making process itself. Furthermore, compensatory principles are limited to replacement for costs of assets directly attributable to the project; replacement of comparable housing or housing sites, or agricultural sites; short-term "transition" economic assistance; and development assistance with the objective to "improve or at least restore in real terms their livelihoods and standards of living to pre-displacement levels or to levels prior to beginning of project implementation, which ever is higher" (Draft OP 4.12.5g).

This language implies that life-ways can be reduced to a system of valued assets, and adequate and meaningful compensation can be achieved by replacing the list of lost goods, property, and related income. Damages associated with the loss of communal space and place involves much more than tangible assets defined and valued via market interactions. Displaced communities lose natural and cultural resources, human environmental experiences, and the social meanings of those interactions. Market-based valuations, especially those based on pre-project estimates- do not reflect actual resource replacement cost. Furthermore, land-for-land replacement does not equate the total content of natural and cultural resources, communal resources, or the social interactions with those resources. Meaningful compensatory principles must reflect this broader range of damages, so as to allow social reconstruction that not only replaces what has been lost, but does so in ways that respect and reinvigorate the sociocultural integrity of the community.

In preparing our comments, we considered the proposed Operational Policy 4.12 within the broader context of World Bank and the broader social science literature. Compensatory principles contained in Operational Policy 4.12 do not strengthen meaningful participation and transparency, and do not insure a commitment to social reconstruction based on principles of long term self sufficiency and sustainability. In our view, World Bank Operational Policy 4.12 does not reflect the lessons learned from past resettlement project failures, and ignores many of valuable social science recommendations of its' own staff.

To state the recommendations generated from our review, we urge the World Bank to:

(1). Reconsider the decision to drop the terminology of "Directive" from World Bank review procedures.

(2). Incorporate language that mandates the consistent use of transparent, participatory processes in the impact assessments and resettlement plans associated with in all Bank-funded projects (including those funded through the International Finance Corporation).

(3). lncorporate language that requires meaningful involvement in the development planning and decision making process by affected peoples at the earliest stages possible-- before project funding approval is given.

(4). Incorporate language that establishes internal World Bank AND external independent monitoring, review, grievance, and response mechanisms in all project phases (planning, implementation, and post-project). Bank staff, bank and development project consultants, and project participants should all have the obligation, means, and opportunity to assess the efficacy of their efforts to create sustainable and rights-protective development projects.

(5). Incorporate language that addresses obligations and meaningful responses when resettlement plans and other mitigating measures fail to meet their stated objectives. When mitigation measures fail to meet intended social and environmental objectives, structural mechanisms should allow the identification of these failures, the restructuring of development activities to address these failures, and the opportunity for meaningful response by culpable parties-- including the project funders.

(6). Restore and strengthen the language of OD 4.30, remove language endorsing cash compensation as the preferred mode of compensation, and reframe compensatory principles and procedures in ways that acknowledge impacted peoples as members of a broader community.

To conclude, we endorse compensatory principles that reflect the goals of social reconstruction, reflect the needs of displaced and host communities, and encourage compensatory action that not only reflects a commitment to not only replace lost resources, but fosters the development of self-sufficient, sustainable, and meaningful ways of life for displaced communities.


NOTES

1. See World Bank (1994/1996) Resettlement and Development: The Bankwide Review of Projects Involving Involuntary Resettlement 1986-1993, The World Bank, Washington, DC. This large scale study reviewed all 1986-93 World Bank-financed projects that involved involuntary population displacement and was written by Michael Cernea and Scott Guggenheim. See also, Michael M. Cernea (1986), Involuntary Resettlement in Bank-Assisted Projects, A Review of the Application of Bank Policies and Procedures in FY79-85 Projects, Agriculture and Rural Development Department, World Bank, Washington, DC; Michael M. Cernea (1988) Involuntary Resettlement in Development Projects: Policy Guidelines in World Bank-Financed Projects, World Bank Technical Paper No. 80, The World Bank, Washington, DC; and Michael M. Cernea (1995) Social integration and population displacement: The contribution of social science, International Social Science Journal, 143 (1), 91-112.

2. Appell, C. N. (1985) Resettlement of people in Indonesian Borneo: The social anthropology of administered peoples. Borneo Research Bulletin, 17(1). Also, see Appell, C. N. (1986) The health consequences of social change: A set of postulates for developing general adaptation theory. Sarawak Museum Journal, 36:43-74.

3. See for example, Turner, R. Jay, Wheaton, B., Lloyd, D.A. (1995) The epidemiology of social stress. In American Sociological Review. 60, 104-125.

4. deWet, Chris (1988) Stress and environmental change in the analysis of community relocation, Human Organization, 47 (2).

5. Atteslander, Peter (1995a) Social Destabilization and the Development of Early Warning System, Special issue on Anomie. International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy. 15 (8/9/10), 9-23; and, (1995b) Global development and the meaning of local culture-reflections on structural anomie, International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy. 15 (8/9/10), 221-242.

6. Downing, Theodore E. (1996a) Mitigating social impoverishment when people are involuntarily displaced. In Understanding Impoverishment: The Consequences of Development-Induced Displacement, ed. C. McDowell, p. 203-215. Berghahn Books, Oxford and Providence.

7. See for example, Patricia Feeney (1995) Displacement and the Rights of Women. Oxfam, Policy Department, Oxford; and Anita Agnihotri (1996) The Orissa resettlement and rehabilitation of project-affected-persons policy 1994: An analysis of its robustness with reference to the impoverishment risks Model. In Involuntary Resettlement in Dam Projects, A.B. Ota and A. Agnihotri eds, p.19-42, Prachi Prakashan, New Delhi.

 

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