In the "BTC Pipeline Project: Lessons of Experience," IFC environmental and social staff look back on an extremely challenging process and endeavor to extract some of the key operational lessons and good practices for the benefit of colleagues, clients, and the wider institution. While it is impossible to capture all the challenges and complexities encountered during the design and construction phase of the BTC project, this publication focuses on six thematic areas where environmental and social lessons learned were thought to be most valuable and applicable to other IFC-financed projects.
"External Monitoring of the Chad-Cameroon Pipeline Project: Lessons of Experience" provides lenders and project sponsors with an understanding of the business case for employing an external monitor, as well practical advice regarding the major steps and key issues for designing, implementing, and operating an external monitoring mechanism for complex projects. To highlight the practical challenges and value of the external monitoring mechanism, the publication draws illustrative examples from the experiences of IFC during the Chad-Cameroon Pipeline Project.
Animal Welfare in Livestock Operations is the sixth in IFC's series of Good Practice Notes on social and environmental sustainability. It aims to increase awareness among livestock operators in emerging markets on how certain well-established animal welfare principles and practices can improve their business performance and help them gain competitive advantage. It does so by providing resource information about global trends and emerging good practices in this area. It also shows how good practices in handling animals can improve the health and productivity of animals, thereby reducing costs and losses, and adding directly to the bottom line.
IFC's Banking on Sustainability report shows evidence of the potential benefits of adopting sustainability as a business strategy. It also shows a dramatic shift in banks' awareness of these benefits. Banks can tap vast benefits by reassessing their business practices and engaging in sustainability-oriented risk management and product development. IFC has pioneered new business models — for example in sustainable energy and banking to underserved groups — and is helping pave the way for other banks in emerging markets.
The ILO Convention 169 and the Private Sector publication is intended as a practical guide for IFC clients who operate in countries that have ratified Convention 169 on Indigenous and Tribal Peoples. It is the first guidance of its kind written for the private sector in relation to Convention 169 which is directed at governments. IFC prepared this publication, in close consultation with the ILO, in response to the experiences that IFC has had in recent years with private investments affecting indigenous peoples and their lands in Latin America.
The Handbook draws on IFC's own learning as well as the current thinking and practices of our client companies and other institutions to provide the good practice "essentials" for building and sustaining constructive relationships over time as a means of risk mitigation, new business identification, and enhancing development outcomes.
The Handbook offers new and detailed guidance in a number of areas, including gender, indigenous peoples, grievance mechanisms, sustainability reporting, management functions, and the integration of stakeholder engagement activities with core business processes. The publication will be made available in French, Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese, Arabic and Russian as of July 2007 to facilitate use by our regional offices and clients.
