Stop Water Privatisation! Alternatives to the PPIAF

The Public Private Infrastructure Advisory Facility (PPIAF) is a little known World Bank agency that funds consultants to advise impoverished country governments on how to privatise key sectors such as water, energy and telecommunications.
On the agenda of the annual meeting of PPIAF is a proposal to extend its remit and entrench its position in World Bank water policies. Activists are arguing that the money given to the Facility could be much better spent on supporting public-public partnerships.
This civil society position has been backed by the Norwegian government, which announced earlier this year that it would no longer support the Facility as it did not believe it was extending access to water to the most impoverished worldwide.
In advance of the meeting, civil society movements, including TNI, have been mobilising to turn the spotlight on this little known institution, sending an open letter to the donors to PPIAF calling on them to end their suppport for the Facility. Civil society movements are also organising a conference and mobilisations to combine with the opening of the annual meeting in Hague on 23-24 May 2007.

Events and Actions

> International Civil Society Forum: “Stop water privatization - Alternatives to the PPIAF,” 22-23 May

> Programme (PDF)

To register for the forum, contact: Abel Esteban, e-mail: abel[at]corporateeurope.org; Tel.: 0031 206127023.

> See the video of the action at the PPIAF meeting on May 23rd, by Friends of the Earth International

> Open Civil Society Letter to Donors of PPIAF (pdf)

> Open brief aan de donoren van de Public-Private Infrastructure Advisory Facility (Dutch, pdf)

> Italy withdraws its support to PPIAF on the eve of PPIAF's annual meeting of donors in The Hague

Background Information
> Public Private Infrastructure Advisory Facility - The Facts
> World Development Movement: reports and news on PPIAF
> Corporate Europe Observatory