by Change Finance Change Finance, the network of non-profit organisations and activists that campaign for reforms of the financial sector, alongside 52 organisations has sent an open letter to the European Commission and Mairead McGuinness, the EU finance Commissioner, requesting that the upcoming Renewed Sustainable Finance Strategy includes an ambitious agenda for creating an EU […]
The Forests & Finance Blog
These are attacks on the freedom of the media and on freedom of speech; the organization will not respond to any attempt at illegal constraint By Repórter Brasil Repórter Brasil has been the target of a series of attacks in the last few days that managed to remove its website (reporterbrasil.org.br) from the air. Attackers […]
Indonesian Giant Sinar Mas Group’s Human Rights Record and the Frontline Communities Fighting Back By Fitri Arianti, RAN On a Friday afternoon in late February 2015, a young farmer named Indra Pelani was riding on the back of a friend’s motorbike through the countryside of Jambi Province, on the island of Sumatra, Indonesia. Pelani and […]
New report evaluates ten of the largest Indonesian corporate groups in the forest-risk sector and finds them all failing to ensure free, prior, and informed consent (FPIC). Financial powerhouses are urged to require their suppliers or clients to do more to prove full compliance with laws, regulations, and best practices for FPIC processes. San Francisco, […]
Industry groups representing Indonesia’s forestry and plantation sectors regularly portray their environmental impacts as trade-offs inherent in Indonesia’s economic development. Corporate tax revenues generated are frequently cited as evidence of contribution to national development, and groups like pulp & paper giant APRIL have widely publicized headline tax payments to demonstrate its positive economic impacts. A […]
…Demand UN binding treaty on business operations by the African Peoples Tribunal The African Peoples Tribunal organised in Lagos by Friends of the Earth Africa (FoEA) ended on Friday November 27, 2020, with a call on governments of 10 African countries to urgently ensure that the human rights of freedom of speech, expression, and association […]
Palm oil workers resist ongoing labor abuses from Indonesian noodle giant by Hana Heineken This month, 10 banks committed another $2.1 billion in loans to Indonesian noodle giant Indofood CBP Sukses Makmur – whose instant noodles rely on Conflict Palm Oil produced by its palm oil subsidiary London Sumatra (Lonsum). The syndicated loan was used […]
A new report by the Association of Brazil’s Indigenous Peoples (APIB) and Amazon Watch exposes international financiers – including BlackRock, Citigroup, JPMorgan Chase, Vanguard, Bank of America, and Dimensional Fund Advisors – that invested in companies complicit in Indigenous rights violations in the Amazon Brasília, Brazil and Oakland, USA – U.S.-based financial institutions play a […]
In September last year, the United Nations Environment Programme Finance Initiative (UNEP FI) and 30 ‘’founding’’ banks launched the Principles for Responsible Banking (PRBs) during the United Nations General Assembly in New York. Starting out with 132 signatories, 193 banks and counting have now adopted the six principles that comprise the PRBs. This includes a […]
KPMG “assurance” reports called into question by new findings Jakarta, Indonesia: Today a coalition of civil society organizations published a report about deforestation and peatlands degradation on the rainforest-rich island of Borneo in Southeast Asia. Based on analysis using satellite imagery, the report documents significant deforestation, including clearance of forests on peatlands, in the concession […]
