As world financial leaders gather in Washington for the annual joint strategy meetings of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, Christian Aid is calling for an urgent rethink of the World Bank's approach to tackling energy poverty.
Finance ministers, bankers and businessmen gathered in Washington last week for the annual fall meetings of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank. As is customary, the IMF presented its analysis of the world economy, and this year it released some research that was sure to cause controversy and provide fuel for its critics.
Because it did not come amidst a sex scandal and because the outgoing leader was not one of the architects of the Iraq War, the surprise June resignation of the International Monetary Fund's Managing Director Rodrigo de Rato did not garner the gleeful, gossipy headlines surrounding Paul Wolfowitz's disgraceful exit from the World Bank.
By insisting that the International Monetary Fund (IMF) promotes an extreme form of free enterprise capitalism, some commentators believe it should be closed down. But considering the IMF’s record, one has to be hooked on hallucinogenic drugs to believe it holds a corporate view in support of economic fundamentalism.
Every year, the World Bank (Bank) channels US$ 18-20 billion to developing countries in the form of loans and grants with the ostensible aim of reducing poverty and promoting economic growth. The Bank always acts in tandem with its sibling agency, the International Monetary Fund (Fund), even in countries that no longer borrow from the Fund. Not all Bank financing and support goes to governments. A significant amount goes directly to the private sector, especially large corporations, in the form of loans, technical assistance and mitigation of investment risks.
Popular resistance to neoliberal “reform” was the underlying cause of Peru’s July general strike. On July 5, public schoolteachers walked off the job over government plans to privatise education. Within days, discontented workers from other industries joined the embattled teachers. Before long, schools, mines, factories and construction sites were shut down as tens of thousands of striking protesters took to the streets of every major city demanding higher pay, improved conditions and revisions to the US-Peru free-trade agreement. Peasant farmers joined the mass mobilisation, closing roads and paralysing transport networks.
