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Civil Society Programme, 15-17 May 2009

The Civil Society Programme at the Annual Meeting 2009 took place from Friday 15 to Sunday morning 17 May. This year around 40 representatives of civil society organisations from 19 countries took part in the Civil Society Programme.

Consultation meetings were designed to provide civil society stakeholders with the opportunity to interact with EBRD staff, senior management and Board Directors, and discuss issues of interest and concern regarding the Bank's policies and major investment projects. Civil society organisations also had an opportunity to discuss their major issues with President Mirow on Sunday 17 May.

Read more about Civil Society Programme

Sustainable Energy Initiative consultation workshop, 27 March, Kiev, Ukraine

A half-day multi-stakeholder consultation workshop on the Sustainable Energy Initiative (SEI) Phase 2 took place on 27 March in Kiev. Nearly 40 representatives of Ukrainian NGOs, think-tanks, academia, private sector and relevant ministries took part in the meeting. Josue Tanaka, Corporate Director of Strategic and Corporate Planning and Sergiy Maslichenko, Business Development Manager at the Kiev RO, shared the results from the SEI Phase 1 with participants and sought their feedback on the Bank's plans for the second phase. The civil society participants familiarised the Bank with the local context – both the potential and constraints – for promoting energy efficiency in Ukrainian cities and the use of biomass. The representatives of private companies presented several practical applications of new technologies to promote sustainable energy.

Read more about EBRD Sustainable Energy Initiative.

Independent Recourse Mechanism review, January 2009

As part of the revision of the current Independent Recourse Mechanism (IRM), the public and civil society stakeholders were provided with an opportunity to express their views in writing on the new draft Rules of Procedure for the proposed Project Complaint Mechanism (PCM). The PCM will replace the IRM. The EBRD also organised a consultation meeting in London HQ on 20 January. As a result of the consultation exercise, the Bank received 20 sets of constructive comments, which will be considered by the EBRD as part of the decision-making process to approve the new Rules of Procedures for the PCM. In accordance with the Public Information Policy, alongside the final PCM adopted by the Board, the EBRD will also publish on line the summary of public comments together and the management responses.

For more information, visit the IRM review web pages.

EBRD workshop: "Gender, civil society and women's entrepreneurship", December 2008

As part of the EBRD's overall commitment to launch a Gender Action Plan (GAP) in 2009, the NGO Relations Unit, in consultation with the Gender Steering Group, organised a half-day workshop on 4 December 2008 with civil society representatives. The workshop was aimed at obtaining civil society organisations' perspectives and practical suggestions on how the Bank could advance gender considerations in the context of its mandate to promote transition to market economy. Gender specialists from Georgia, Serbia, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Germany and the UK attended the workshop. The eclectic mixture of participants produced lively and stimulating debate on how the Bank could improve its draft Gender Action Plan and integrate gender considerations into its operations.

All the relevant comments will be taken into account and incorporated in the GAP. For more information about the content of the discussion, please refer to the workshop report  (0.1Mb).

The EBRD is highly ranked in 2008 Global Accountability Report, December 2008

The EBRD is the highest-ranked international financial institution and takes second place overall among over 30 global organisations from the inter-governmental, corporate and NGO sectors assessed in the 2008 Global Accountability Report (GAR) published on 10 December by the One World Trust think tank.

Read the report