Minutes of the Meeting of the Board of Directors, May 9, 2006
9 February 2007
Bank Information Center
Minutes of the Meeting of the Board of Directors
May 9, 2006
Present:
Robin Broad
Jonathan Fox (chair)
Marianne Ginsburg
David Hunter
Smitu Kothari
Atila Roque
Frances Seymour
Manish Bapna (ex-officio)
Bruce Jenkins (reporting)
1. Call to order: Jonathan Fox convened the meeting at 11:05 am. The Board warmly welcomed its newest member, Smitu Kothari.
2. Approval of Minutes: The minutes of the January 17, 2006 Board meeting were amended to include summary information on the 2006 budget and were approved. The minutes will be posted on BIC’s website.
3. 2006 Finance Update: Manish presented an update on the organization’s finances. Expenses for the first quarter (approximately $290,000) were on track and in line with available income. Regarding projected 2007 revenue, Manish estimated that approximately $1.4 million could be viewed as relatively secure and that the 2007 budget could reach an estimated $1.6 million pending new grant income. BIC’s finance manager, Alvin Carlos, proposed the creation of a cash reserve policy to ensure secure cash flow should the need arise. The Directors welcomed the idea and requested staff to develop a proposal for such a reserve fund together with a strategy for its financing.
4. Program Workplan discussions: Each of BIC’s programs presented its 2006 priorities and workplans to the Directors. Short synopses of the presentations follow:
A. Africa Program: Priority areas include working with communities in the Democratic Republic of Congo (forestry, mining, governance issues); Ghana (mining); Chad-Cameroon pipeline (governance, use of revenues, support for local groups); implementation of World Bank Extractive Industries Review recommendations; and development of popular education tools. It was noted that while the program was focused largely on assisting communities regarding the impacts of IFI-financed projects, there remained a need to better leverage lessons from these engagements for policy advocacy.
B. Asia Program: Creation of regional BIC offices to strengthen networking and to provide more contextualized training and support services has been a top priority for the Asia Program. The South Asia office has been established in Delhi and a Mekong region office will most likely be established in Bangkok after careful scoping has been completed. The Asia Program is also focused on the upcoming ADB safeguard policy revision in which it, together with the Policy Program, will provide informational, analytical and advocacy support services to a broad network. The Asia Program also developed and organized media workshops in preparation for the ADB annual meeting in Hyderabad. Key challenges ahead include providing a balanced degree of services to groups throughout the South Asia region (not just in India) and in preserving autonomy when multiple groups would be seeking closer alliances on a range of issues.
C. Eastern Europe and Central Asia: The predominant focus of the ECA Program is on the extractive industries sector. Priority areas include promoting greater transparency of revenue flows and contracts for extractive projects throughout the region. Georgia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, and increasingly Russia are priority countries for the program. The ECA program has the most active fellowship program of all BIC programs and is both benefiting from and assisting with the training of fellows from the region through resident stays in Washington.
D. Info Services: Priority areas have included preparation of redesigned website; preparation of new BIC toolkit on the World Bank; producing regular e-newsletter; systematizing contact and mailing lists; and providing broad information services for the annual and spring meetings of the World Bank. Information Services is working on a communications strategy for the organization.
E. Latin America: Central focus of the LAC program is BICECA, the initiative and web-portal to promote informed civil society engagement with governments and the IFIs on a range of regional infrastructure plans and projects. The LAC program has been central in building a network of civil society groups to monitor the regional infrastructure initiative—IIRSA. The LAC program is undertaking a series of infrastructure case studies to derive lessons and insights. While IIRSA has given impetus for engagement with other regional financial institutions, such as the CAF, the program maintains a focus on the IDB to promote strong social and environmental standards.
F. Policy: The Policy Program highlighted two initiatives. First, the program has been coordinating an effort to focus more NGO energy and attention to leveraging international rights and standards (social, economic, political, and environmental) in efforts to pressure IFIs to respect the rights of individuals and communities in their operations. Second, BIC plays a pivotal role in the Global Transparency Initiative—a network of civil society organizations promoting openness in the IFIs. The GTI, which forms a bridge between national freedom of information organizations and IFI-focused groups, has drafted a charter of transparency principles for IFIs and provides a broader advocacy platform.
5. BIC Strategic Directions: Manish engaged the Directors in a discussion on devising a set of strategic questions that would inform choices of key organizational objectives and trade-offs. The discussion highlighted a number of issues: BIC staff should continually assess structural shifts in the priorities and operations of the IFIs and seek to align BIC programs accordingly; BIC cannot apply blanket strategies for its work across multiple regions, institutions, and civil society partnerships but must contextualize its objectives and services to address specific needs; striking the right balance between service, research and advocacy objectives is important but it must be recognized that the needs of partners require engagement across all three dimensions; BIC continually faces competing needs and demands of partners and should weigh costs and benefits in choosing how best to deploy limited resources; BIC should also address ramifications of its decision to invest greater resources in regional expansion than in efforts focused on institutions and partners based in Washington, DC; BIC staff should also consider the proper balance between ambitious work programs and the ability to respond to burgeoning opportunities and crises (particularly for the policy program). The Directors suggested that Manish reexamine a set of questions that consider the points raised in the discussion and that are as concrete as possible. The Directors welcomed further discussion of such strategic questions and priorities.
6. Organizational Issues: Manish presented a set of organizational issues and developments. BIC staff members are generating proposals for the establishment of a personnel/operations committee as well as a grievance committee to address gaps in organizational procedures. Manish has begun developing a more explicit workplan for the Executive Director that will provide greater clarity on his responsibilities. Manish informed the Director’s that he was seeking to boost the organization’s “center” capacity as most of the recent organizational expansion has occurred in the regional programs; he felt that that both the policy program as well as central management functions were understaffed. The Directors encouraged Manish to further engage staff in identifying solutions for addressing gaps in organizational structure and capacity.
7. BIC Board Development: The Directors discussed efforts to recruit additional members of the Board. The Directors also noted the need to develop a terms of reference for membership on BIC’s Board of Directors. Jonathan and David agreed to circulate a draft terms of reference, and David agreed to review the organization’s By-Laws to ensure that they are up to date.
8. Executive Session: The Directors met in executive session.
9. Adjournment: The meeting was adjourned at 5pm.
Drafted by Bruce Jenkins
Assistant Secretary