italy: shadow cast on ocp pipeline
On April 24th, the annual stakeholders meeting of the BNL Bank was
held in Rome. In his speech, Bank President Luigi Abete acknowledged
that the OCP pipeline in Ecuador is a questionable project and
announced the Bank's willingness to promote, among the participants
in the OCP consortium, the continuous monitoring of the pipeline
operations for environmental
and social problems. In addition, BNL has decided to adopt ethical
standards for its investments. Besides subscribing to the UNEP
financial initiative and to the UN Global Compact, BNL has officially
involved the Italian Bank association ABI in a process aimed at the
development of
environmental and social standards for Italian Banks' project financing abroad.
This is the result of the strong campaign carried out for more than a
year by the main Italian environment and development NGOs and trade
unions (Amici della Terra, Attac, CRBM, CRIC, Greenpeace,
Legambiente, Terranuova, CGIL, CISL and many others) against the
participation of the Bank in the building of the pipeline. The
mobilization saw repeated sit ins many Italian towns, leaflet
distributions to Bank clients, electronic mailings, press conferences
and awareness raising workshops.
* Contact: Laura Radiconcini, FoE Italy, amiterra@amicidellaterra.it.