UFRGSMUN 2012. WB Done
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UFRGSMUN 2012 BOARD OF EXECUTIVE DIRECTORS OF THE WORLD BANK INTRODUCTION Created following the ratification of the Bretton Woods Agreement, at the end of World War II, the World Bank is an association of five development institutions which seek to provide technical and financial assistance to member countries. The two main ones are the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) and the International Development Association (IDA); the others are the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA), and the International Centre for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID). The World Bank is composed of 187 shareholders who take part in two main decision organs: the Board of Governors, which is the ultimate police maker and is composed by all members, and the Board of Executive Directors, which has specific duties delegated by the Board of Governors. As of November 2010, there are 25 representatives on the Board of Executive Directors. Each of the five largest shareholders—France, Germany, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States—, appoints one executive director. The remainder 20 executive directors are elected to represent each a determined group of countries. From post-war reconstruction, which was the objective of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, its focus has evolved into assisting middle-income and creditworthy poorer countries to diminish poverty levels and engage in sustainable development strategies. To that end, the IBRD promotes loans decided upon by the Board of Executive Directors. Beyond that, the Board is responsible for creating the Bank’s general policies, stimulating a positive investment climate, proposing country assistance strategies and financial decisions, as well as providing support during crisis periods. Within the World Bank structure, reconstruction is now seen as just a part of the institution’s framework. Currently, poverty reduction, sustainable growth and development stand out as the main issues being advanced by the Bank. As a consequence, the World Bank has become deeply sensitive to matters related to the aforementioned topics, particularly regarding the achievement of the Millennium Goals. ~ 1 ~ Exploring new possibilities. Treasuring the past. TOPIC: Extractive Industries in Africa Isadora da Silveira Steffens, Alexandre Piffero Spohr, Diogo Ives, and Othon Veloso Schenatto 1. HISTORICAL BACKGROUND 1.1. From Ancient times to the Industrial Revolution Metal exploration in Africa has been developed in accordance with the civilizational process in that continent. It is estimated that the African peoples abandoned the Stone Age and entered the Metal Age between the 5 th century BC, in Western and Northern Africa, and the 7 th century AD, in Sub-Saharan Africa. During Prehistoric, Ancient and Medieval Times, the metal exploration caused—and it was affected by—political, economic, and social changes within African societies. Because of it, productivity gains in agriculture and commercial contacts between different peoples were intensified. Several empires and city- states, as Egypt, Cartago, Axum, Meroe, Ghana, Gao, Sofala, and Mombasa gained power due to their knowledge of metalworking, which provided them with major wealth and military strength (VERCOUTTER, 2010). The African-European and the African-Asian trade have been occurring since Ancient Times. Ghana had already gained its fame as the gold land in distant regions such as Bagdad (WARMINGTON, 2010). During the Middle Ages, the kingdoms of Western and Northern Africa focused in the gold trade with Arab and European peoples, at the same time that the East African coast was being opened to international trade, especially concerning metal sales to India and China (MASAO; MUTOYO, 2010; DEVISSE, 2010). In the 13 th century, the gold coins coinage was spread in the West. However, the amounts of gold that reached Europe were not sufficient to fulfill the demands of a period of economic expansion. This thirst for gold became a powerful factor that led the European nations to explore the world in the 15 th century. When the Portuguese navigators landed on West Africa, they were amazed by the region’s richness and prosperity (DEVISSE, 2010). Portugal’s contact primarily with the Gold Coast and later with East Africa in the 16 th century caused many economic changes in Africa. The initial Portuguese expansion over the West African coast allowed Portugal to control one of the ending points of the Saharan trade routes and deviate part of the gold formerly sent to the Muslim world. However, Portugal’s lack of means made the direct domination of the discovered lands impossible. The Portuguese then inaugurated the trading post system both in the West and East coasts. Such model was soon imitated by the other European powers that fought against Portugal for the control of ~ 2 ~ UFRGSMUN 2012 African cities. The trading post system, until the moment the Spanish discovered mineral mines in America, supplied the world with large amounts of gold and silver (DIAGNE, 2010). Portugal kept the maritime and commercial supremacy in the West African coast, from Arguin to Angola, until the second half of the 16 th century, when it started suffering the competition of its European rivals, namely France, England, and the Netherlands which had better material and financial conditions than Portugal for trading (MALOWIST, 2010) 1. The impacts of European presence in West Africa are broad. From the 15 th century on, economic production, once directed to the trans-Saharan trade and to the Arab Empires, gradually converged to serve European interests. The disarticulation of the old commercial interior routes and their transfer towards the Atlantic increased incessantly. Even more significant in that moment was the growing European disregard for the African metal trade— once metals abounded from America—and their rising interest in the slave traffic which led to a decrease in African gold production (BOAHEN, 2010; CHÉRIF, 2010; INIKORI, 2010). In East Africa, the Portuguese relations with the autochthonous evolved in a different way. Once reaching the Mutapa Empire region—currently the area of Zimbabwe and Mozambique—the Portuguese tried to dominate the territory, so that they could control the intense trade of gold, ivory, and other metals occurring among the interior lands, the East African Coast, and India. To protect itself, the Mutapa Empire forbade its subjects to indicate the location of mines in the region. Throughout the 16 th century, the region started to diminish its mineral production, leading the interest in that region to decrease considerably (BHILA, 2010). 1.2. Industrial Revolution and Neocolonialism In the late 18 th century, the economic and social changes that spread from an industrializing United Kingdom to the rest of Europe changed European interests in the rest of the world and especially in Africa. Indeed, the economic demands arising with the Industrial Revolution were based on the needs for raw material supplies – to enable the usage of multiple technological innovations in production – and new markets (INIKORI, 2002). 2 The introduction of steam engines revolutionized transports and producing patterns. Metals like 1 European-African trade of fire weapons, forbidden by the Portuguese crown to its nationals, granted at first to the French and later to the British and the Dutch great advantages in the trade of gold and ivory. The introduction of fire weapons in Africa is a fact of major importance, for it increased the conflicts between local kings, producing many war prisoners who were later sold through the increasing slave traffic (MALOWIST, 2010; DIFFIE, WINIUS, 1977). 2 In consequence, from the beginning of the 19th century on, the slave traffic started to collapse, greatly as the result of a British campaign against it. The United Kingdom, formerly the greatest beneficiary of the slave trade, started a fierce campaign to demobilize slave trade and even the slave mode of production. Such a move was deemed necessary as to broaden the potential consuming markets made unavailable for slaves. ~ 3 ~ Exploring new possibilities. Treasuring the past. iron, steel and lead became highly demanded, as they were used to build railroads tracks, steam locomotives, steamships and other diverse steam engines (HILLSTROM; HILLSTROM, 2005). Coal was the main source of power to run steam engines, and it became a fundamental raw material for the industrializing nations (KERR, 1977). In agriculture, the use of local organic matter to fertilize the earth was being replaced by phosphorus material mined at distant regions (CORDELL, DRANGERT, WHITE, 2009). Therefore, the control over raw materials producing regions and mineral-rich areas became essential if European countries were to develop their full productive potential and rise economically (MOKYR, 1985). As such, if only the African coast was broadly explored at the end of the 18 th century, by the beginning of the 19 th century this situation would start to change deeply (MALOWIST, 2010; REED, 2001). During the 19 th century, European presence inside Africa increased. Several Christian missions and naturalist trips put the interior lands on the map showing an increased European interest over African territory. The Berlin Conference (1884-1885) institutionalized the African partition among the main European powers, especially between France and England. Only Liberia and Ethiopia remained as free states, as the