By Andrew Nazdin
LONDON, Oct 19 2023 – It’s official: The World Bank officially has a mission to combat climate change. At least on paper.

This week, the World Bank governing body approved a new vision statement that clarifies that the Bank can tackle climate change as part of its mission to alleviate global poverty on “a livable planet.” Also this week, the new World Bank President Ajay Banga suggested that he’ll be consider redirecting subsidies away from fossil fuels and towards climate action.

This is not nearly enough. The World Bank is still funneling billions of dollars to the fossil fuel industry each year, through direct and indirect finance mechanisms. Urgewald estimates that they funded $3.7 billion towards oil and gas last year.

This is despite the fact that they’ve made a commitment to align with the Paris Climate Agreement and do what it takes to keep global warming under 1.5 degrees Celsius. In order to do so, experts with the International Energy Agency warned that there is ‘no room’ for new fossil fuel development if we’re going to reach this goal.

The IEA also said that fossil fuel subsidies are an inefficient way to help consumers. Yet despite this, Banga admitted he didn’t plan to “get rid of all” fossil fuel subsidies. Just that the topic “needs discussion.”

Still – it’s hard to imagine this new vision statement coming out one year ago, under the helm of former climate change-denying president David Malpass. After his climate change denial caused public outrage–and protests around the world–he stepped down, and US President Joe Biden appointed a new president.

Credit: European Press Agency for Glasgow Actions Team

Banga started with a clear societal mandate to accelerate climate action at the World Bank. He was given a 100-day plan to end fossil fuel finance, fund a just and green transition, and promote transparency.

Last week, Banga’s opportunity arrived during the World Bank Group and International Monetary Fund Annual Meetings in Marrakech. The first meetings run by Banga after months of him talking up his climate change credentials.

Organizations from around the world teamed up with local Moroccan activists to put on the pressure. It started before the meetings began, with billboards blanketing the city. They had two key demands: End Fossil Finance and Drop the Debt.

Why end fossil finance?

Because the World Bank, despite its commitments to the Paris Climate Agreement, has continued funneling billions of dollars to fossil fuel projects through direct and indirect mechanisms.

And why drop the debt?

Because global debt is at a decades-long high, with people in 54 countries currently living in debt crisis, and unless these colonial debt deals can be fixed, many developing countries can’t afford to invest in the climate solutions they so desperately need.

The action continued all week long. On the first day of the meetings, we stood outside the meeting venue to greet every World Bank delegate on their way inside. Many groups joined the meetings and delivered a petition to Banga himself, with 40,000 people calling on him to end fossil finance.

Last Thursday, hundreds marched through the streets of Marrakech. And on the final day of the conference, activists returned to the conference venue for one last rousing rally and day of action.

Meanwhile, the Bank must consider the intertwined relationship between debt relief for developing nations and environmental sustainability. Offering debt relief can free up resources, enabling these nations to explore and invest in green technologies.

This would not only aid in their fight against climate change but also propel them toward a sustainable economic trajectory. Banga has outlined a few steps to greatly increase funding that can flow through the World Bank.

But we must make sure such increased funding doesn’t continue to force developing countries into deals they can never get out of. It’s true that the world needs vastly more funding into clean energy industries if we are to transition to a sustainable economy. We need funding that helps those in need, not harms.

The World Bank acknowledging that it must do its job on a “livable planet” is the absolute bare minimum. It’s like an employee setting his printer on fire but telling his manager, “At least I didn’t burn the whole office down.”

Decades after the world’s top scientists have agreed that climate change is an existential threat, the Bank has a place for climate change in its vision statement. But what is a vision without a plan? And what is a plan on a dead planet?

The protestors have done their part, articulating a vision for a greener, fairer world economy. The ball now lies firmly in the court of institutions like the World Bank. As the drums of activism fade and the placards are put away, the world awaits their next move.

What will it be?

Andrew Nazdin is Director of Glasgow Actions Team

The Glasgow Actions Team formed around the UN Climate Conference in 2021 in Glasgow, which led to a landmark deal putting the world on the trajectory to ending financing for fossil fuels. The organization is committed to pushing the world’s climate champions to go farther, calling out the blockers, and exposing the deniers. Throughout the 2023 Annual Meetings of the World Bank Group, they ran several actions calling on the World Bank to get in line with the Paris Climate Goals — to stop funding fossil fuels, invest in renewables, and become a more transparent and democratic institution.

To learn more, follow Glasgow Actions Team on Twitter, Instagram, , or check out the website.

IPS UN Bureau

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By Zofeen Ebrahim
KARACHI, Oct 19 2023 – “Professionally, I am still where I was 23 years ago when I started working as a lady health worker (LHW),” said a disgruntled Yasmin Siddiq, 47, from Karachi. “I will probably retire in the same capacity, as a Grade 5 government servant, without any hope for upward mobility.”

The idea behind the Lady Health Worker Programme (LHWP), the brainchild of Pakistan’s late prime minister Benazir Bhutto, began in 1994 with the purpose of “training women as community health workers (CHWs) to improve the dismal maternal and child health scores of the country and build a bridge between the village woman and the formal health sector,” said Dr Talat Rizvi, a public health physician with a vast experience in Maternal and Child Health with a particular focus on community-based projects and who designed the programme.

Siddiqi’s day starts at 9 am, and she must go door-to-door, covering between 5 to 10 homes within the 1 km radius of her home. “Initially, my tasks included making married women (of reproductive age) aware of the benefits of family planning and informing and providing them assistance about contraceptives, ensuring they go for antenatal check-ups when pregnant and their tetanus shots. I had to keep an eye on under-five children of that family and get them vaccinated,” she said. Over the years, her workload has expanded.

“We were asked to help fight TB, handle refusals by parents on administration of polio drops, ensure every child under five gets immunised against childhood diseases, which have now increased to 12 vaccines, and recently during the COVID-19 pandemic, we helped with vaccinations,” said Bushra Bano Arain, chairperson of All Pakistan Lady Health Workers Union. “And as if health is not enough, we are asked to carry out our duties on election day,” disclosed Arain, an LHW supervisor.

“Over the years, the focus got diluted from primary healthcare when more and more responsibilities were added to the LHWP’s boat, and the boat sank,” said Rizvi.

“The original programme of ensuring the health of mother and child took a backseat,” agreed Dr Shershah Syed, a gynaecologist and obstetrician. “LHW was perhaps started with good intention but had become a politicised entity with many women recruited by MPAs and MNAs as ghost workers, in the Sindh province especially,” he added.

The situation is no better for the over a million Accredited Social Health Activists (ASHAs)  in India or the 52,000 Female Community Health Volunteers (FCHVs) of Nepal, who have, over the years, been lumped with more and more tasks, according to Public Services International, a global trade union federation, which helped the women CHWs in Pakistan, Nepal and India come up with a Charter of Demands to “address injustices and advocate for better working conditions”.

According to Jeni Jain Thapa, PSI’s project organiser in Nepa, the FCHVs “have no fixed working hours and must be on standby 24/7”.

The same is the case with the LHWs, said Musarrat Basharat, an LHW and the general secretary of the Punjab LHW’s Union. “Whatever time of the day or night it is, we must accompany a woman in labour to the health centre and be with her till she delivers. Same with a sick child. If the baby has diarrhoea and is dehydrated, we must rehydrate and be with the family for six hours until the child is out of danger. We are not shirking from our duty, but at least pay us for overtime or make some provision for it,” she said.

However, of the CHWs in the three countries, over 100,000 LHWs have won significant gains in getting themselves recognised as workers, securing a wage and registering their unions, Kannan Raman, secretary PSI, South Asia: “In Nepal and India, they are considered volunteers and not offered decent wages or better working conditions.”

“It took us 20 years to get ourselves noticed when the Supreme Court of Pakistan asked the government to bring us into the fold of formal work and make us permanent employees in 2014,” said Haleema Leghari, central president of All Sindh Lady Health Workers and Employees Union, working as a supervisor in the LHW programme.

But even after nine years, they continue working without a job structure or rules that go with that. “We rejected the service structure made for us as it was found to be discriminatory,” said Leghari, adding: “Recognition from the government is mere lip service.”

Even for those who started in 1994, like Arain and Leghari, who have become supervisors, their grades have been marginally improved from Grade 5 (which is for LHWs) to Grade 7 (which is for the supervisor). “While in other sections of the health departments, those who have worked as many years as us and are as educated as us have reached Grade 14; why have we not been upgraded?” Arain asked.

Although their salary was increased by 35 percent in June, Leghari said: “We do not want these ad-hoc increments; we want promotions like other government servants are promoted based on work performance, education and years of service, as these impromptu increments can also be taken back anytime.”

In addition, she said that those who have retired after attaining 60 years of age, are sick, or have died should be compensated. They or their families should be paid the pension in arrears,” she added. Today, the LHWs want the 20 years of contract work to be accounted for, which they say “everyone seems to have forgotten”.

According to Leghari, in other government departments, when an employee retires or meets with an accident, is sick or dies, a family member gets the job in that department. “We are missing out on these benefits because the rules have not been approved in the absence of a service structure,” she said.

“Their main demand is fool-proof security,” said Mir Zulfiqar Ali, executive director of Workers Education and Research Organisation. “You know so many LHWs have been killed by extremists,” he said. His organisation is working with the LHWs and training them about labour rights, health protection especially during crises and pandemics, and workplace safety and how to lobby effectively with the government to get their demands accepted, coordinating the PSI CHW project in Pakistan.

Siddiqi’s monthly payment is now Rs 44,000 from Rs 37,000 since June, but given the skyrocketing food, electricity and fuel prices, she said this was certainly not enough for a single mother with two school and college-going kids.

“The provincial health departments have time to meet all the international NGOs and donor agencies, but for holding a meeting to address our grievances, they can never find time,” said Arain.

“The invaluable work community health workers do work that has delivered immeasurable value to communities and public health, is not valued, simply because it is carried out by women, and women’s care work is routinely de-valued, even when it saves lives”, explained Kate Lappin, the Asia Pacific regional secretary for PSI.

With new climate catastrophes imminent, Lappin said Pakistan will need the services of LHWs even more, as was proved during the pandemic and the 2022 floods that disrupted the already fragile health system. “They [CHWs] are the first line of defence in a crisis.” She was in Pakistan recently and met with LHWs from some remote parts of Pakistan. “It was clear that they are often the only source of support to women in the most underserviced areas.”

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