When OECD export credit agencies and finance ministries sit down in Paris next week (22-23 March) to continue negotiations on new environmental standards, they may be faced with the fact that three agencies in their midst have just approved support for a controversial €1.2 billion dam in Turkey which contravenes the goals of the old standards.

Industry, private banks, international financial institutions and export credit agencies claim they have learned lessons from the errors of the past, but their environmental guidelines still fail to address these failures. Their monitoring of compliance is almost non-existent and certainly not transparent. They have done little to make affected communities and environmental groups trust their promises to do better.

German, Austrian and Swiss ECAs have placed 150 secret conditions on their support for the Ilisu dam project, which they say would bring the project into line with international standards, while the the Turkish government has demanded they release the credits by 30 March or they will open a new tendering process.

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