Friends Planet

This factsheet gives an overview on the MiFID and its revision including the proposal for a new Markets in Financial Intruments Regulation (MiFIR).

Full article available at:
http://www2.weed-online.org/uploads/factsheet_mifid.pdf

This factsheet gives an overview on the debate about food speculation, and the regulatory discussion.

Full article available at:
http://www2.weed-online.org/uploads/factsheet_food_speculati...

In 2010, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development convened an Informal Group on the Private Sector and Aid Effectiveness to better understand the role of aid as a catalyst in supporting effective private sector contribution to development. The Building Block (BB) on the Private Sector and the Thematic Session (TS) on Public-Private Cooperation at the High Level Forum on Aid Effectivess (HLF4) that took place in Busan, South Korea on November - December 2011, are products of this Informal Group.  The “Joint declaration on expanding and enhancing public private cooperation for development” is a product of the BB and TS. The declaration suffers from some key ommisions.  

By Oygunn Sundsbo Brynildsen Members of parliament from Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific (ACP) and Members of the European Parliament gathered at the Joint Parliamentary Assembly in Lomé, Togo, end of November, and adopted a resolution expressing strong concern about debt vulnerabilities in developing countries, and calling for policy reforms. Proposed solutions reflect key Eurodad proposals including responsible lending guidelines, non-political debt solvency and efforts to combat capital flight. With one third of ACP countries are in debt distress or at high risk of debt distress, the Joint Parliamentary Assembly (JPA) expressed  great concern about current and future debt sustainability, including access to good quality finance. “Policy reforms and new international mechanisms dealing with loan contraction and debt management and resolutions are therefore needed”, says the “Resolution on the impact of debt on development financing in ACP countries”

The Fourth High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness (HLF4) has come to a close, resulting in the new Busan Partnership for Effective Development Cooperation, which is a mixed bag in terms of the results that civil society was advocating for.Some progress has been made on the core aid effectiveness agenda, with strengthened commitments on democratic ownership, using country systems and aid untying. Furthermore, China and other BRICs hesitantly moved under the new partnership’s umbrella.However, Busan fails to deliver a framework for effective and responsible private finance, and the future of the aid and development effectiveness process post-Busan is unclear, as the modalities of a follow-up and implementation process could not be agreed. Hot issues that had to be settled last-minute in Busan were the use of country systems, the transparency of commercial flows, human-rights based approaches and the enabling environment for civil society organizations. 

Newly uncovered documents reveal that Zimbabwe’s £210 million debt to the UK includes loans from Tony Blair’s government to Zimbabwe’s police force while they were engaged in internal repression. Campaigners in Zimbabwe are calling for an audit of the country’s $7 billion debt to find out who did and did not benefit from past loans. The Zimbabwean police were loaned money in the 1990s to buy 1,500 Land Rovers, backed by UK Export Finance (then known as the Export Credits Guarantee Department), a unit of the Department for Business. These loans continue to make-up £21 million of Zimbabwe’s debt to the UK. The evidence appears in a new report published by Jubilee Debt Campaign, the Zimbabwe Europe Network and Eurodad. 

On March 11, an earthquake of magnitude 9.0 struck the north-east coast of Japan causing a major tsunami and serious damage across northern Japan. More than 8000 people are missing and 500,000 are living in temporary shelters. Friends of the Earth Japan is collecting money to assist the relief effort. Please donate what you can.

TOKYO/ AMSTERDAM, March 16, 2011 – Friends of the Earth International expresses its sincere sympathy and solidarity with the people affected by the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear disasters in Japan.

Articles on Friends of the Earth International in the media in 2011.

Articles on Friends of the Earth International in the media in 2010.

Friends of the Earth Malawi / Citizens for Justice was founded in 2005 and became an associate member of Friends of the Earth International in 2008. The group works with communities on a range of issues including mining, climate change, land grabing and agrofuels.

Friends of the Earth International statement in response to the earthquake and tsunami in Japan.

The costs of segregating genetically modified (GM) and conventional crops are much higher than originally thought, and could push up food prices, warns Friends of the Earth Europe in a new briefing.

Friends of the Earth Australia is deeply concerned about changes to planning rules for wind farms which threaten to heavily restrict where they can be located.

The friends and family of Sandra Viviana have written an open letter thanking those who have expressed solidarity with Sandra's plight. In the letter they highlight what they've been doing to try and locate her and renew their appeal for the authorities to keep up the search.