Publications

Here we go again. Having been called upon to ramp up its investments in 2009 and 2010 as part of Europe’s initial financial crisis fire-fighting, and then in 2012 been a central cog in the EU’s ambitious but ultimately lacklustre ‘Growth Compact’, the European Investment Ban…

In July 2013, the much-hyped joint European commission/EIB ‘Project Bond Initiative’ (PBI) had scarcely got off the ground – in its pilot phase at least – when unusual natural events took over. Work at the EUR 1.7 billion Castor underground gas storage plant off the coast of…

An unprecedented ruling and serious tough talking emanated from the European Ombudsman at the end of October following an investigation into the EIB’s involvement with a bridge construction project in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Describing the approach taken by the EIB in the ca…

Operational transparency standards at the European Investment Bank and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development continue to deteriorate, according to the 2014 Aid Transparency Index (ATI) published in October by aid watchdog Publish What You Fund (PWYF).

The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) has revealed, in a letter of late October to Bankwatch’s Slovak member group Friends of the Earth-CEPA, that the EnerCap Power Fund, a private equity investor, has pulled out of the controversial COGEN gas power pla…

In October this year, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) approved an up to EUR 50 million loan to a Belarusian subsidiary of the Austrian company Kronospan for the expansion of a particleboard facility at Smorgon in the Grodno region of Belarus. Bela…

Road construction in Poland can be a cause for great controversy, particularly when incomprehensible road designs clash with nature.

Bankwatch and Polish Green Network analysed the final drafts of the Regional Operational Programmes of Poland’s voivodeships. The report “Green energy for all” shows how ambitious (or not) the Polish regions are to invest in a low-carbon economy, in particularly when it come…

In the last four years, Bankwatch has invested significant efforts in building the capacity of CSOs in the Western Balkans on various topics, particularly on the funding mechanism Instrument for Pre-Accession (IPA). This compilation is intended to serve CSOs in IPA beneficia…

Land, forests, water and raw materials are valuable resources that increasingly interest the major players of the economy of our planet. This report collects 16 case studies from around the world in order to better understand the impacts of natural resource grabbing on the l…

The Boskov Most hydropower plant includes an accumulation dam 33 metres in height and a power plant with a total capacity of 68MW, Around 80 per cent of the project falls within the territory of the Mavrovo national park, the largest and richest national park in Macedonia. T…