Did they get the memo? What the current “best laid plans” of multilateral donors tell us about the conservation debate. A case study of the World Bank financed Sustainable Forests and Livelihoods (SUFAL) project in Bangladesh

The outcome of COP 15 is unlikely to end the debate over the potential adverse effects on human beings caused by a dramatic expansion of area-based conservation targets. Despite uncertainties, common features of a design for conservation approaches that are compatible with human rights commitments have emerged from the literature. These include a substantive decentralisation of decision making to communities, and the application of the principles of recognitional, procedural and distributive justice. Simply by analysing existing documentation disclosed by major conservation initiatives, it is possible to assess how effectively current mainstream approaches, defined by those supported by multilateral donors like the World Bank, embed these features at the intervention level. The Sustainable Forests and Livelihoods (SUFAL) project is currently being funded by the World Bank in Bangladesh, and suffers from major shortcomings relating to all of these characteristics. It is likely that the project will have an adverse impact on local communities, including highly marginalised Indigenous peoples, if it has not already done so. To the extent that the approach used by the World Bank in Bangladesh is replicated by other major actors in the conservation space, so too will these negative human impacts be replicated, vindicating critics of the “30 x 30” target.