Call for Partnership with the Early Warning System — South Caucasus and Central Asia
Development of any kind should start from a community’s priorities, and respect their environmental and human rights. Communities should play a leadership role in determining their own development.
Today’s development is currently designed, funded and implemented in a way that is often neither inclusive, sustainable nor beneficial to those most affected. Governments and companies design the majority of development projects which in turn are funded by development banks and international financial institutions. Civil society and communities rarely lead this process and are rarely meaningfully consulted about their ideas, priorities and visions, despite being the intended beneficiaries of these projects with crucial firsthand knowledge and expertise. Key information is often inaccessible, including the sectors and locations of major projects, as well as assessments of potential project impacts on the environment and human rights.
Worldwide, collective experiences have proven that when development projects do not address local priorities or are designed without meaningful community participation, they are likely to cause harm to people’s homes, lands and human rights.
Partner with the Early Warning System!
The Early Warning System is a global initiative that ensures civil society and communities have verified information about projects proposed by development banks to prevent human and environmental rights abuses, and provides clear strategies for advocacy before project financing is approved. The Early Warning System operates by exchanging advice, tools and resources with communities and the local organizations and groups supporting them, and operates by connecting civil society, providing access to information and supporting community-led responses for community-led development.
The Early Warning System is looking for partners in the South Caucasus, Afghanistan, Turkey and Central Asia!
The Early Warning System aims to establish a collective of organizations covering all countries in the region, in order to ensure access to information on proposed development finance, support civil society engagement and community-led responses to development, and strengthen community-led advocacy for local development priorities.
We are ideally looking for partners who are interested in supporting community-led development, or have experience in conducting advocacy and community outreach, or have expertise in one (or more) of the following areas:
○ Agriculture and land development
○ Business
○ Climate and environment
○ Forestry
○ Energy
○ Water resources and sanitation
○ Mining, oil and gas
○ Education
○ Media
○ Health and humanitarian
○ Human rights, labor rights, women’s rights, legal aid
○ Ethnic minorities, internally displaced peoples
○ Infrastructure or transport development and construction
○ Government transparency and accountability
○ Community-led development
Partners can be involved in the following activities with the Early Warning System:
▪ Receive periodic updates and information about development projects proposed for their country by development banks;
▪ Share information about proposed projects and analyze their human and environmental rights impacts with communities and groups that may be affected;
▪ Use the data in the Early Warning System to conduct research, investigations and trends analyses about transparency, corruption and development finance in their country and region;
▪ Participate and conduct trainings on community-led research with communities to collect their experiences and expertise in project design and potential risks;
▪ Support communities in developing their responses to proposed development projects;
▪ Advocate with national, regional and international actors (i.e. development banks, private companies etc.) to ensure community priorities are included and shape development projects;
▪ Write and publish case studies, articles, blogs and analyses on the Early Warning System and IAP website.
Benefits of partnering with the Early Warning System:
❏ Early access to information on proposed projects financed by development banks and data on development finance trends in region;
❏ Participation and exchange of experience and information with an international network of NGOs and activists fighting for community-led development to share best practices, peer learning;
❏ Access to trainings and resources on development finance, community organizing, community-led research; and
❏ Support in organizing community-led responses, workshops and campaigns targeting development banks, local and national authorities, private actors.
Join Us!
If you are interested in participating and partnering with the Early Warning System, please submit this Google Form. If you would like to request the form in Word format, please write to eurasia@accountabilityproject.org.
You can find more information about the Early Warning System in the South Caucasus and Central Asia here.
