Aleksandra Antonowicz-Cyglicka

When courts help cloak export credit agencies’ financial clout

April 19, 2021 | Read more

Operating far from the public eye, export credit agencies offer state backing worth billions of dollars every year that in too many cases have enabled both the fossil fuels industry and human rights abuses around the world. These influential public finance institutions have also been relentless in resisting civil society legal challenges to shine a light on how they use public money.

Europe’s Green and Digital Decade could be a raw deal for people and the environment in Serbia

March 17, 2021 | Read more

The European Commission walks a tightrope with the EU Green Deal. Despite the long-term objectives of achieving a circular economy and reducing resource use, it plans to increase raw materials mining to meet the demand for the clean energy, renewables, and other high-tech solutions that are at the forefront of the EU’s green development plans. A planned lithium mine in Serbia, vehemently opposed by local communities, is a poignant example of this tension.

No proper benchmark for checking European Export Credit Agencies’ compliance with EU objectives

September 4, 2020 | Read more

Despite being the biggest class of public finance institutions operating internationally, export credit agencies (ECAs) are rarely subject to any public scrutiny. European ECAs declare the compliance with the non-binding OECD Common Approaches standards, but it’s an insufficient benchmark for evaluating compliance with the EU’s External Action obligations as stated by the relevant EU Regulation.

Change for good: why we need fair, just supply chains

April 27, 2020 | Read more

Uncertainty and crisis are not uncommon to global supply chains. The present disruption sheds light on the unsustainability of production and logistics and is an opportunity for economic players like the international financial institutions to rethink the way supply chains benefit those at every stage.

Racing against the clock: Kenyan villagers under imminent threat of eviction by project under EU’s bank’s appraisal

June 19, 2019 | Read more

Today’s European Development Days forum in Brussels with its aspirational motto ‘building a world which leaves no one behind’ is an ironic backdrop to what is happening in the remote parts of Kenya, where a whole community is facing a threat of forced eviction by a project under appraisal of the EU’s own house bank. About a hundred people were demanded to abandon their homes by tomorrow – 20 June.