Volume IX - Issue XII - December 2007
News Affecting Projects & PM
World Bank To Offer $944 M Loans To Fund India Projects Reported by Raju Rao in Chennai, India
The World Bank will provide $600 million toward a cooperative credit project and another loan of $280 million to upgrade 400 technical training schools in the country. The Bank will also extend a $64 million loan for water management in the southern Karnataka state." [Dow Jones/Factiva]
The Economic Times writes that Finance Minister P Chidambaram said on the occasion, 'The three projects, signed today, reflect Government of India's priority in rejuvenating the rural economy.' The agreement was inked by Finance Ministry joint secretary Madhusudan Prasad and World Bank Country Director Isabel Guerrero. World Bank President Robert B. Zoellick (pictured), who is on a three-day visit to India, was also present on the occasion." [The Economic Times (India)/Factiva] PTI adds that the "World Bank Thursday assured Maharashtra government that it would consider granting loans for its various projects like transformation of Mumbai and building infrastructure in the state. Zoellick gave this assurance after the government sought financial assistance from the Bank to the tune of $6 billion for the development of Mumbai Metropolitan Region. The government has prepared a business plan of $60 billion which was presented before the World Bank group. The government made a presentation before the World Bank group outlining the vision of Mumbai in the presence of chief minister Vilasrao Deshmukh ..." [The Press Trust of India Limited/Factiva] DNA reports that "... Earlier, while inspecting the resettlement colonies at Jogeshwari, Zoellick was asked whether the Bank would pump in more money in Mumbai for such projects to come. 'Positively,' he replied, 'my Bank would try and come up with some monetary support if needed.' ..." [DNA - Daily News & Analysis (India)/Factiva]
UN calls for "Greater Global Protection against The United Nations International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (ISDR) has called on governments to better protect people against more “predictable” natural hazards, especially flooding, to reduce the risk and vulnerability of local populations. After a week in which floods brought death and destruction to the Caribbean region and to Mexico, the Director of the UN secretariat of the ISDR, Salvano Briceño (pictured), said the world needed to find better ways to reduce the impact of these recurrent disasters.. “There are many inexpensive measures that can be systematically adopted in disaster-prone countries to reduce the impact of hazards,” he said in a statement issued in Geneva, the headquarters of ISDR. “Risk assessments, early warning systems, evacuation plans, education and land use planning are a few of the many cost effective and reliable non-structural ways to avoid floods becoming disasters,” he said, pointing out that many measures are within the financial means of most communities. Floods this year have already caused four times as much devastation as last year, affecting 140 million people. This week alone Tropical Storm Noël killed at least 100 people across the Caribbean region, while heavy rains brought widespread inundations to Tabasco state in Mexico.
ISDR has stressed that floods are among the most predictable, expected and announced natural hazards, and noted that the recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report predicted that more frequent and intense tropical cyclones and hurricanes will occur because of climate change, bringing more flooding with them. Around the world poor people are often most at risk because they do not have the means to adapt their living conditions either before or after floods, and have to live in high-risk areas such as floodplains, ravines and slopes, which are more prone to floods and landslides. For more information, visit ISDR. Source: United Nations news release, November 2, 2007 Editor’s note: This news release is republished here because it supports our contention that more projects, and more project management, are needed in the general field of emergency response and disaster recovery. Just as importantly, more disaster preparedness projects are needed in communities and flood-prone regions worldwide.
White House to Demand Better Program Performance in US
According to a news article by Federal Computer Week in Washington, DC on Thursday, November 8, 2007, White House officials plan to issue an Executive Order within the next week that aims to improve program performance as a function of spending taxpayers’ money well and better every year. This is according to a statement by Clay Johnson (pictured), the Office of Management and Budget’s (OMB) deputy director for management. According to the report, the administration will implement the new order within the next 12 months. The order is expected to hold program chiefs (directors of federal programs in the USA) more accountable for the goals that affect their program performance and make their performance outcomes more visible, Johnson (pictured) said at a conference of the American Association for Budget and Program Analysis on November 7. To accomplish this, OMB will create performance assessment councils at every agency. There will be more scrutiny of program goals every year and more attention on program performance improvement plans. Senior managers will meet at least quarterly with program managers about how performance is improving. “We want to be actively seeking to become accountable for how our programs perform, formally held accountable for how they perform,” Johnson said. The goals that are detailed in the Program Assessment Rating Tool, (PART), should be the same as the budget goals and a program’s general goals for the year for performance, outcome, efficiency and performance improvement. US government agencies use the PART, which consists of a scoring system based on answers to 25 questions, to measure success of their programs. ”The key to accountability is transparency,” Johnson said. “We want attention paid at the highest level of every agency of how programs perform,” he said. For more information visit http://www.fcw.com/online/news/150739-1.html. Clay Johnson III is the Deputy Director for Management at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) at the White House. Prior to becoming OMB Deputy Director, he was the Assistant to the President for Presidential Personnel. He has served President Bush since his tenure as Governor of Texas, achieving the rank of Chief of Staff prior to leading the Bush-Cheney presidential transition.
UN Fund approves $1.1 Billion for Projects The United Nations-backed " Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria" announced on November 12 that it has approved $1.1 billion of new grants to be handed out over the next two years and agreed to allocate another $130 million to five projects it had already started supporting. This is the first time since the Fund was established in 2002 that it has passed $1 billion mark in approving new grants, the Executive Director, Michel Kazatchkine (pictured), said after a meeting of the Fund’s Board in Kunming, China.
"We all know there is a tremendous need for investments in health,” said Dr. Kazatchkine. “These new grants show that need is increasingly turned into high-quality demand for resources. This is a trend we must develop further.” Projects devoted to tackling AIDS account for 48 per cent of approved proposals this year, while malaria projects comprise 42 per cent and tuberculosis projects 10 per cent. Fund officials said they were impressed by the scope and quality of much of the proposals submitted, particularly in the area of combating malaria. Almost half of grant applications were approved this year, up from an average of 40 per cent in the previous six rounds of grants. Rajat Gupta, the Chair of the Fund’s Board, said it was looking forward to scaling up the fight against the three diseases. Nearly a fifth of the approved funding is being contributing to the large-scale strengthening of national health-care systems, such as by upgrading infrastructure and buying new equipment, he noted. In total, 73 new grants were approved and five others that had reached the end of their five-year life were renewed. More than 80 per cent of overall funding went to projects based in low-income countries, with the majority in Africa. Since its founding the Fund has now awarded over $10 billion to projects in 136 countries as it battles the three diseases of AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis, which collectively claim more than 6 million lives every year.
Programmes backed by the Fund are estimated to have averted the deaths of 2 million people by providing AIDS for 1.1 million people, tuberculosis treatment for 2.8 million people and distributing some 30 million insecticide-treated bed nets to prevent malaria. For more information about the Fund, visit http://www.theglobalfund.org/en. Source for this article: UN news release on November 12, 2007
UN Internet Governance Forum Concludes in Rio According to a United Nations (UN) news release on Friday, 16 November, the dangers and opportunities of the World Wide Web dominated discussions on the final day of the United Nations Internet Governance Forum in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. During the conference, many of the nearly 1,400 participants, ranging from sceptics to supporters, provided a glimpse of what might lie in the future.
The British writer Andrew Keen (pictured) warned “the future is not good.” Despite much talk about the profound democratic transformations wrought by the Internet, he said there were also “unintended consequences” and the technologies of what is often described as “Web 2.0” – the second generation of web-based communities and hosted services – would bring less, not more, democracy. User-generated sites like Facebook, Wikipedia and YouTube were the future of the media, Mr. Keen said. But the explosion of user-generated content was not benefiting the talented. Profit was not going to the creators of content, but to a tiny corporate minority. The Internet was also trivializing politics by helping to create a “cacophony of opinions, where one cannot sort out the truth.” The remedy was to teach young people not technology, but media literacy and a healthy scepticism. Robert Pepper of Cisco Systems pointed out the continuing trend to lower cost. For instance, local and regional Internet Exchange Points (IEPs) allowed traffic to be routed within a region, lowering global Internet costs. Vinton Cerf (pictured), sometimes described as one of the “fathers of the Internet,” said there was increasing understanding of the need for Web responsibility. “Global Internet law” would have to be developed at some point, Mr. Cerf said. “We will have to arrive at global agreements about what people can and cannot do,” as well as ways to enforce laws globally when people did infringe the law. “This will be very complicated, something like the Law of the Sea, but perhaps we will need such a matrix to sort things out.” Fatimata Seye Sylla, a leader of Senegal's civil society, said that for Africa access remained paramount, but “you cannot govern something that almost does not exist.” Africa was still at the bottom of the list in terms of infrastructure, capacity and content. Work was ongoing across the continent to build capacity and create local content, she said. There was a need to develop public-private partnerships and a regional regulatory and policy framework conducive to investment in information technology. “But until projects are fully implemented by Africans, there will be no sense of ownership,” she said, calling for more involvement by civil society and for stronger political commitment by national leaders. A total of 1,376 people from 109 countries attended the four-day Forum. The largest participation (380) was from civil society, followed by government (302), the private sector (168), the media (104) and intergovernmental organizations (67). Eighty-four events held in parallel with the main sessions included 19 events on the issue of security, 11 on openness and freedom of expression, 12 on development and capacity-building, 10 on critical Internet resources, nine on access and six on diversity. The Forum's third meeting will take place in New Delhi in December 2008.
The Internet Governance Project (IGP) is a consortium of academics with scholarly and practical expertise in international governance, Internet policy, and information and communication technology. The Project conducts research on and publishes analysis of global Internet governance. The work is intended to contribute to policy discussions in the Internet Governance Forum, ICANN, WIPO and related debates at the global, international, regional and national levels. Additional information can be found at http://www.internetgovernance.org/index.html.
Engineers Canada to Chair Global Environment Committee Engineers Canada announced in Ottawa on November 14 that it has assumed the chair of the World Federation of Engineering Organisations' (WFEO) Committee on Engineering and the Environment for the next four-year term. The position, accepted in New Delhi, India, during the World Congress on Urban Infrastructure in Developing Countries, provides Canada's engineering profession with a significant opportunity to showcase its expertise on the world stage.
Founded in 1968, the WFEO is a non-governmental international organization that brings together national engineering organizations from over 90 nations and represents some 15 million engineers around the world. It co-operates with national and other international professional institutions in developing and applying engineering to the benefit of humanity. One of six standing committees, the WFEO's Committee on Engineering and the Environment aims at developing, through appropriate activities and education, a worldwide understanding and commitment to sustainable development. "During our four-year term, we plan to address the environmental challenges facing our societies," said Committee chairman and Engineers Canada Past-President Darrel John Danyluk, P.Eng. "Working in international teams, we will identify and enhance themes such as the causes of climate change and the need to mitigate through better technologies; adaptation measures to ensure the proper operation of vital infrastructure; air pollution in third world countries; and sustainable water and wastewater infrastructure in the developing world." While the committee has the opportunity to positively influence international practices, it also benefits Canada. "Climate change is a global issue, and chairing the Committee puts Engineers Canada in a strong position to provide its constituent members with information on how environmental issues are being addressed in countries around the world," said Engineers Canada President Tony Dawe, P.Eng. "This will help our members in their ongoing discussions with provincial and territorial legislators." TD Meloche Monnex, which has partnered with Engineers Canada for over 50 years to provide Canada's professional engineers with home and auto insurance, is providing Engineers Canada with financial support to help fund this initiative. In October, Engineers Canada signed a mutual recognition agreement with Engineers Australia that enhances the international mobility of professional engineers. The relationship between the two organizations is further strengthened through the WFEO as Engineers Australia's Past National President Barry Grear AO has now assumed the office of WFEO President. Engineers Canada is the national organization of the 12 provincial and territorial associations/ordre that regulate the practice of engineering in Canada and license the country's more than 160,000 professional engineers. Engineers Canada is the business name of the Canadian Council of Professional Engineers. President-Elect of Engineers Canada is Dick Fletcher, Director-APEGBC, Principal, Urban Systems Ltd. For further information, contact
G20 Finance Ministers Stress Need for New Energy Supplies Reported by Jaycee Kruger in South Africa
Leaders of the world's 20 largest economies stressed on Sunday the need for new energy supplies as global economic growth continues to stumble over high oil prices. Winding up a two-day meeting in Kleinmond, near Cape Town, G20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank heads said the global economic outlook was unclear, with commodity price volatility threatening price stability in many countries. ...South Africa's Finance Minister Trevor Manuel (pictured) told journalists the gathering had seen a 'very deep and challenging discussion on commodity prices.' The Financial Times (FT) noted that "The G20 ... debated the weakness of the US dollar behind closed doors on Sunday but shied away from commenting publicly about its impact on world markets. Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the new International Monetary Fund (IMF) Managing Director, noted that currency imbalances were a topic of discussion but added: 'The more discreet these discussions are the more effective. 'The power structure of the IMF and the World Bank also came under increased scrutiny during the meeting. In a concluding address President Thabo Mbeki of South Africa said Ministers agreed there was 'a need to restructure the existing model of multilateralism', which has 'been dominated of the many by the few'. ..." [The Financial Times (11/19)] South African Finance Minister Trevor Manuel said the members of the G20 also all ascribe to the notion of an expansion of the G7 leading industrialized economies. Mbeki...said he welcomed a six-point framework set out by World Bank President Robert Zoellick to transform the Bank. ..." [Dow Jones (11/18)/Factiva] AP writes that "A resolution or substantial progress to developing countries' demands for a bigger voice in the International Monetary Fund could happen within months, the IMF's director said Sunday. Source: World Bank Press Review, November 19, 2007.
World Bank Offers US$250 Million to Aid Bangladesh Cyclone Recovery and Mitigation
The World Bank announced on Tuesday, 20 November, that it has offered up to US$250 million in the aftermath of Cyclone Sidr to help millions of Bangladeshis recover and to strengthen the country’s disaster mitigation systems. Cyclone Sidr struck Bangladesh on Thursday, 15 November, with 135 mile per hour (215 km/h) winds and a 15 foot wave surge. The death toll now stands at over 3,000 and continues to rise, with several millions affected. “This is a horrible shock to Bangladesh and our sympathies are with the thousands of families who have lost loved ones; with the millions who have lost livelihoods and shelter” said Xian Zhu, World Bank Country Director in Bangladesh. He said the World Bank was willing to make up to US$250 million available to the Government of Bangladesh, depending on its financing needs and what other donors brought to the table. “Of course Bangladesh is still in the rescue and relief phase but as it moves into recovery over the next few days, our commitment is a signal to government of the scale of what we can offer if needed,” said Zhu.
Bank assistance could be used to support short-term needs like food imports, the rapid procurement of medical supplies, cash grants to the poorest victims and help to get people back on their feet and recovering their sources of income and livelihood. Bank support could also help Bangladesh manage macroeconomic shocks over this period of challenge. In the longer term, Bank support would be available for infrastructure rehabilitation, especially damage to embankments and other flood mitigation and shelter infrastructure. Zhu commended Bangladesh for the progress that this disaster-prone country has made in dealing with the short and longer term impact of periodic floods and cyclones. “In 1970, over five hundred thousand people died following the impact of a cyclone,” said Zhu. “As responses to disasters have improved and as some shelter infrastructure has been put in place, death tolls have become smaller but Bangladesh remains extremely vulnerable, the more so as climate change adds to its burden.” The Bank’s assistance will also support coastal zone management to help Bangladesh face the challenge of climate change by both mitigating the inevitable impact of future storms and designing the necessary adaptations to protect people and their livestock.  The cyclone support will complement existing commitments from the World Bank in response to massive floods in August and September. The Bank provided US$75 million in quick-disbursing financing as an initial flood response and will support restoration and rehabilitation through reallocation of existing funds to support reconstruction and improvements in the areas of agriculture, health, communications, water and sanitation. For more information on the World Bank in Bangladesh, please visit: http://www.worldbank.org/bd or contact salam3@worldbank.org
News affecting projects: ASEAN leaders sign Blueprint According to the World Bank, Southeast Asian leaders on Tuesday, 20 November signed an 'economic blueprint' aimed at transforming the region into a single market with a unified production base and no tariffs by 2015.
The ASEAN Charter was signed by ASEAN Leaders at the 13th ASEAN Summit in Singapore. This is the first time that ASEAN Member States, after 40 years of regional cooperation, have codified organic Southeast Asian diplomacy, listed key principles and purposes of ASEAN. Foreign Ministers, Members of the Eminent Persons Group, Members of the High Level Task Force, and delegates to the 13th ASEAN Summit witnessed the historic occasion. After the signing, ASEAN Leaders raised a toast to the signing of the ASEAN Charter. Three other documents were signed at the same ceremony:
ASEAN Leaders also formally appointed Dr Surin Pitsuwan as the next ASEAN Secretary-General. He will assume his five-year term of office on 1st January 2008. In the face of competition from regional giants China and India, the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) is fast-tracking the integration of its economies to create a market of half a billion people. The new Economic Blueprint calls for the elimination of import duties on all products, except for some sensitive items, by 2010 for the six bigger members and by 2015 for smaller economies Cambodia, Laos, Malaysia and Vietnam. Restrictions in trade and services in the sectors of air transport, e-commerce, healthcare and tourism would also be substantially removed by 2010 and by 2013 for the services sector. According to the Associated Press (AP), while Southeast Asian leaders adopted a landmark charter Tuesday "... their vision to create an EU-style bloc faced hurdles because of concerns over Myanmar, whose military rulers have defied international calls to restore democracy. ... The ASEAN charter sets out a common set of rules for negotiations in trade, investment, environment and other fields. It aims to turn Southeast Asia into a single market and production base with a free flow of goods, services, investment and capital. One of the most significant pledges in the charter is to set up a regional human rights body. ..." [The Associated Press/Factiva]
In the declaration, ASEAN leaders declared to reduce by half of the number of ASEAN people without sustainable access to safe drinking water by 2010, and to improve the lives of slum dwellers by 2020 in ASEAN member countries. As to climate change in the world, ASEAN countries will enhance cooperation on joint research, development and deployment of low emission technologies for the cleaner use of fossil fuels, the declaration said. The document, named 'ASEAN Declaration on 13th Session of the Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and the 3rd Session of the Conference of the Parties Serving as the Meeting of the Parties to the Kyoto Protocol,' commits to 'actively and constructively participate in ensuring a successful outcome of the negotiation on a comprehensive agreement' at the two sessions. The Association of Southeast Asian Nations or ASEAN was established on 8 August 1967 in Bangkok by the five original Member Countries, namely, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand. Brunei Darussalam joined on 8 January 1984, Vietnam on 28 July 1995, Lao PDR and Myanmar on 23 July 1997, and Cambodia on 30 April 1999. The ASEAN region has a population of about 500 million, a total area of 4.5 million square kilometers, a combined gross domestic product of almost US$ 700 billion, and a total trade of about US$ 850 billion. The aims of the Association are: (1) to accelerate economic growth, social progress and cultural development in the region and (2) to promote regional peace and stability. For more information, visit http://www.aseansec.org/64.htm. Source: World Bank Press Review, November 20, 2007 and ASEAN website.
Japan Pledges US$1.8 Blllion for Green Projects in Asia Recently elected Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda (pictured) pledged 200 billion yen (US$1.83 billion) in loans over the next five years for environmental projects in Asia, officials said on Wednesday, 21 November. The projects include sewage disposal and sulphur dioxide scrubbing from power plant smoke stacks.
Tokyo also said it was ready to provide up to $10 million for a World Bank fund aimed at preserving forests, an issue Indonesia will push for at a UN meeting in Bali next month to try to find a successor to the Kyoto Protocol. ..." [Reuters/Factiva] AFP noted that "...The initiative, announced by Fukuda at a summit of Asian leaders, includes soft loans and training programs over five years, and is aimed at helping the region tackle global warming and push forward with economic development. The package 'includes loan and grant aid as well as technological training, targeting East Asian countries,' a Japanese official said, without specifying which nations would receive aid. ..." [Agence France Presse/Factiva] Kyodo News wrote that "...In the initiative, Japan also proposed launching an 'environment dialogue' between Japan and the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations, under which Japan will support operations to protect biodiversity in ASEAN and promote eco-tourism in Asia. Other areas of cooperation include supporting management of forest resources in East Asia by utilizing information gathered by Japanese satellites and setting up a cooperation network to protect coral reefs. Japan plans to launch a Greenhouse Gases Observing Satellite, GOSAT, next year to monitor from space the density of carbon dioxide and will share the data with other nations, the initiative said. With an eye on promoting education on environmental issues, Japan will establish a network for exchanges among graduate schools in East Asia. Over the next four years, Japan will also invite more than 500 graduate students from around Asia who are majoring in environment-related fields to visit Japan. ..." [Kyodo News (Japan)/Factiva] Source: World Bank Press Review, November 21, 2007
UN Forum in Bangkok spurs investment in
Representatives of more than 30 countries attended a United Nations (UN) investment forum in Bangkok in mid-November to drum up financing to complete the Asian Highway Network, an ambitious plan to crisscross the continent with 141,000 kilometers of high-quality roads. About $26 billion has already been committed to upgrading the network, according to the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP), but a shortfall estimated at $18 billion remains to upgrade another 12,000 kilometers of roads to meet the necessary standards. Twenty-eight countries signed a pact, developed in 2005 with UNESCAP’s help, undertaking to make every possible effort to comply with the minimum desirable standards both in constructing new routes and in upgrading and modernizing existing ones. When the highway upgrading is completed, the 32-country network – which will link cities as far apart as St. Petersburg and Singapore, and Seoul and Istanbul – will facilitate trade and tourism as well as access to landlocked countries. In the two years since the treaty came into force, over 10,000 kilometers of roads have been upgraded, mainly in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, China, India, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia and Tajikistan. So far, all sections of the network in only 13 countries meet the treaty’s minimum standards. The Bangkok forum was also attended by representatives of 10 international organizations and many members of the private sector.For more information on the Asian Highway Network, visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asian_Highway_Network. Source: UN Daily News Digest, November 16, 2007
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