With a lending portfolio of over EUR 70 billion the European Investment Bank is one of the world’s biggest public lending institution – bigger even than the World Bank.
In spite of its crucial role in development finance – both within and outside the European Union – the EIB frequently neglects environmental and social aspects in its investments and has a strong aversion to share information with the public. Its staff is by far too small to monitor projects effectively.
Alternative news on the EIB
We expose the risks of international public finance and bring critical updates from the ground.
We believe that the billions of public money should work for people and the environment.
We challenge the EIB to live up to its title “EU bank” and become a transparent and accountable institution that values real benefits for people and the environment as highly as lending volume.
EIB PROJECTS WE MONITOR
Destructive hydropower in southeast Europe
International commercial and public banks have been bankrolling a wave of hydropower projects across Southeast Europe that have damaged pristine rivers, including in protected areas. These financiers need to take their share of the responsibility and stop financing projects in sensitive areas.
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Southern Gas Corridor
This system of mega-pipelines meant to bring gas from Azerbaijan to Europe, is unnecessary for Europe’s declining gas demand. But the billions in public investments will boost Azerbaijan’s dictatorial regime and cause upheaval for transit communities in Turkey, Greece, Albania and Italy.
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Nenskra hydropower plant, Georgia
The Nenskra dam is the most advanced of Georgia’s massive plans for hydropower installations in the Upper Svaneti region. It will deprive the local community, ethnic Svans, of lands and livelihoods, but potential negative impacts have not been properly assessed.
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LATEST UPDATES
The complaints mechanism at the EIB – usable but useless?
Blog entry | 8 October, 2018Nearly three years after first announcing it, the European Investment Bank (EIB) has finally presented a new vision for the bank’s complaints mechanism, the body responsible for grievances related to EIB projects and policies.
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European public banks continue financing coal bonanza
Blog entry | 1 October, 2018The EIB and EBRD have been channelling billions of euros in public money to fossil fuels dependent companies, hampering the international community’s efforts to tackle climate change.
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European development money helps sustain fossil fuels-based companies – report
Press release | 27 September, 2018Five of Europe’s biggest climate offenders continue to enjoy billions of euros in public funds, according to a Bankwatch report released today.
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This year the European Investment Bank is expected to review its 2013 ‘Screening and Assessment Criteria for Energy Projects’, also known as its Energy Lending Criteria, which governs the types of projects the bank can finance in the energy sector.
Our critique of the EIB
For decades the EIB has remained a closed and non-transparent institution, responding mainly to its clients, avoiding transparent and participatory decision-making and disregarding the views of those impacted by its actions.
In March 2016, the EIB adopted a new transparency policy that further weakened the bank’s transparency standards. It now can keep secret internal investigations into irregularities such as corruption and maladministration.
Read more:
EIB’s new transparency policy allows for more secrecy
Press release | March 11, 2017
Why transparency?
The right to information plays a crucial role in promoting participation and democratic accountability. It is an important tool to:
- better achieve lending goals,
- reduce corruption,
- identify potential social, environmental and economic benefits,
- avoid damaging communities and sensitive ecosystems.
We believe the EIB as an EU body, investing public money worldwide, needs to become truly transparent and accountable.
An adequate transparency for the EIB would include publishing all project related documents and taking stakeholders’ comments into account. It also would require the EIB to explain the reasons for supporting a particular project and how such support is related to its mission and to the goals of the European Union.
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A model transparency policy for the EIB (pdf)
Designed in 2009 by Bankwatch and Client Earth.
With a virtual elimination of its coal lending in 2013, not least thanks to Bankwatch’s campaigning, the EIB made an important contribution to limit global warming. But the bank’s energy and climate lending still undermines Europe’s ability to meet its climate targets under the Paris Agreement.
Especially in the new EU Member States where the need for climate action money is highest, only a small percentage of EIB loans support projects intended to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
In addition, the European Fund for Strategic Investment (EFSI), the guarantee mechanism rolled out by Commission President Juncker to attract private capital, failed to reach the 25 per cent climate action threshold set by the EIB. In 2016, 70 per cent of EFSI money for renewable energy projects went to a single country – Belgium – while 80 per cent of money for energy efficiency was earmarked for France, Finland and Germany.
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How Europe’s bank spends cash for climate undermines Paris commitments
Press release | May 22, 2017
EIB has been involved in some of the most destructive large-scale projects funded by international financial institutions (IFIs) in recent years. The Mopani copper mine in Zambia, the Mombasa-Mariakani road project in Kenya, Chad-Cameroon oil pipeline, the Lesotho Highlands water project, the Nam Theun II dam and other highly contentious projects have all been made possible through the provision of EIB loans.
The impacts of EIB projects outside of Europe show time and again that the bank is not equipped to safeguard the most vulnerable and uphold human rights against corporate interests.
