[NYTr] World Bank, IMF Charged with Short-Changing Women

Tue Nov 20 18:01:06 EST 2007

Womens eNews - Nov 20, 2007
http://www.womensenews.org

World Bank, IMF Charged With Short-Changing Women

By Allison Stevens
Washington Bureau Chief

WASHINGTON (WOMENSENEWS)--After working inside the World Bank as an
economist earlier in her career, Elaine Zuckerman is now on the outside
glaring in.

During three days last month timed to the anti-globalization protests
surrounding the annual meetings of the World Bank and the International
Monetary Fund in Washington, Zuckerman's advocacy group, Gender Action,
staged a series of workshops accusing international financial
institutions of discriminatory lending.

Her thrust: that the World Bank--which makes loans to developing
countries--and the International Monetary Fund--which monitors global
finance and extends credits to stabilize economies--both undermine
women's rights by exacerbating poverty, gender-based violence and the
spread of sexually transmitted diseases including HIV-AIDS.

"Each year, these international financial institutions make tens of
thousands of investments in developing countries that claim to empower
women but in fact often harm them," Zuckerman told an audience at
Georgetown University Law School last month.

In 2003, for example, Tanzania accepted loans from the World Bank and
the IMF that required privatization of parts of its water utility. That
led to irregular service and price increases, making water less
affordable and forcing women and girls--responsible for providing water
for their families--to walk longer distances to gather water or pay
huge markups to water vendors, according to a 2006 report by Gender
Action.

Founded in 1945, the World Bank has grown from a single organization
designed to make reconstruction loans after World War II to a group of
five development banks that make million- and billion-dollar loans
ostensibly aimed at reducing global poverty. The International
Development Association--the World Bank arm that focuses on the world's
poorest countries--offers longer-term and lower-priced loans than can
be found on the free market.

The IMF also came into existence in 1945 and has a macroeconomic
mission: to promote global economic stability to prevent a repeat of
the 1930s-era worldwide depression. The IMF does that mainly with
initiatives to keep national currencies stable and promoting
cross-border trade, but it also makes its own loans to help countries
pay off debt.

World Bank membership is restricted to countries that belong to the IMF.

Countering Claims of Harm

World Bank and IMF officials took strong exception to Zuckerman's claim
that the financial bodies' actions hurt rather then help women and
girls.

Spokesperson Amy Stilwell said the World Bank--now headed by Robert
Zoellick, who in July succeeded Paul Wolfowitz, the former deputy
secretary of defense for the Bush administration that resigned amid a
storm of controversy--is paying more attention to women's issues and
has made great inroads on fronts such as primary education for girls
and maternal and infant health.

In 2006, the World Bank unveiled a four-year, $25 million plan for
gender-specific projects relating to infrastructure, agriculture,
private-sector development and finance. The budget has since increased
to $30 million over four years.

Last month, the World Bank pledged to heighten its focus on the farm
economy in sub-Saharan Africa, which is managed largely by women and
girls. The promise came after an October critique from the bank's
internal assessors, who charged the bank with neglecting sub-Saharan
agriculture.

For its part, the IMF takes gender equality and women's rights issues
into consideration when giving advice to poorer countries on how to
improve their economies, said spokesperson Conny Lotze.

"We look at the potential effects of our advice on poverty, including
whether women and girls may be disproportionately harmed by cuts in
social spending and layoffs in government or public enterprises.
Improving health, education and gender equality plays a central role in
developing a stable economy and achieving sustainable growth."

Putting Women and Girls in Context

But Zuckerman says the institutions fail to fully consider the
implications of their actions on women and girls.

The IMF lacks any specific policy on gender and none of its 2,633
employees are gender experts, according to Gender Action. Of the 15,000
employees at the World Bank only 115 are experts in gender issues, she
says.

Malcolm Ehrenpreis, a World Bank gender expert, said that data give a
distorted view because all paid employees, such as receptionists and
administrative staff, are included. He said the bank is not adding
gender specialists because it is working instead to make women's rights
a mainstream concern.

At the same time, he said, bringing about gender equality is an ongoing
mission, and noted that women trail men in formal labor force
participation, access to credit, entrepreneurship rates, income levels,
and inheritance and ownership rights.

"This is unfair, it hampers poverty reduction and it is bad economics,"
he said.

Zuckerman says the World Bank, the IMF and other international
financial institutions have not rectified systemic problems--such as
policy-based loans--that discriminate against women.

Conditions for Receiving Loans

With a policy-based loan, a development bank negotiator might, for
example, tie strings to a loan offer that require changes in national
policy considered good for the nation's economy's solvency. Such
changes have often included privatizing state-owned businesses, cutting
labor protections and public-sector wages, liberalizing trade laws and
eliminating corporate taxes.

Gender Action Programs Coordinator Suzanna Dennis said such changes
often lead to price increases, public-sector downsizing and social
displacements that hurt women.

Bangladesh, for example, agreed in 2005 to liberalize its trade laws.
The deal exposed the country's garment industry to fiercer competition
with China and India and led to job losses in an industry dominated by
women, according to Gender Action.

Some loan terms have led governments to cut spending on public schools
and hospitals and impose user fees. This can hurt girls
disproportionately because they are more likely to be taken out of
school if it becomes costly. As caregivers, girls and women often leave
school and jobs to provide health care when it becomes too expensive,
Dennis added.

Ehrenpreis, at the World Bank, said the bank supports countries that
seek to abolish fees for primary school or basic health care.

And he said foreign aid has contributed to "steady improvement" for
women and girls, especially in health care and education. The bank is
combating HIV-AIDS with programs designed to strengthen women's rights,
he added.

"It doesn't happen overnight," World Bank AIDS expert Elizabeth Lule
said in a statement about curbing HIV-AIDS. "I think we have laid a
good foundation. But much more needs to be done."

For more information:

"Pipeline Aid Projects Called Harmful to Women": -
http://www.womensenews.org/article.cfm/dyn/aid/3036/

World Bank, Gender and Development: -
http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/TOPICS/EXTGENDER/0,,
menuPK:336874~pagePK:149018~piPK:149093~theSitePK:336868,00.html

International Monetary Fund: - http://www.imf.org/external/