Information Disclosure & Grievance Mechanisms of the New Development Bank

The New Development Bank (NDB) has funded 9 projects in South Africa and Lesotho totaling USD 3.2 billion. While the NDB has an Environmental and Social Framework (ESF) and an Information Disclosure Policy (IDP), the document highlights a lack of transparency, noting that project applications, risk assessments, management plans, and Country Partnership Plans are not publicly available. The NDB delegates the responsibility for environmental and social assessments and grievance mechanisms to its clients, creating uncertainty regarding how the bank monitors the effectiveness and fairness of these processes.

• The New Development Bank (NDB) has approved 9 projects for South Africa, including 8 within South Africa and 1 in Lesotho, with an estimated total value of USD 3.2 billion since the launch of the NDB Africa Regional Center in August 2017.
• The NDB utilizes a risk-based framework for project screening, but critical details regarding the process are not public. This includes the detailed risk assessment process, deliberations on screening, the final classification decision, and the reasons behind that decision.
• Under the NDB's Environmental and Social Framework (ESF), the client is responsible for implementing assessments, consultations, plans, grievance redressal, dispute resolution, disclosure, and monitoring. The NDB's role is to support clients during processing, monitoring, and supervision, though it is unclear how the NDB monitors the fairness of the client's grievance mechanisms.
• Significant project documentation is not publicly available from the NDB, including project applications, management plans for environmental and social impacts (such as resettlement action plans), records of decision making, due diligence outcomes, Financial and Economic Analysis of Projects (FEA), and the Country Partnership Plan (CPP).

APA

Centre for Environmental Rights (2021). Information Disclosure & Grievance Mechanisms of the New Development Bank. https://cer.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/oxfam-ndb-exec-summary-web.pdf?x21779

Chicago

Centre for Environmental Rights. Information Disclosure & Grievance Mechanisms of the New Development Bank. 2021. https://cer.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/oxfam-ndb-exec-summary-web.pdf?x21779.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |author=Centre for Environmental Rights |title=Information Disclosure & Grievance Mechanisms of the New Development Bank |date=March 2021 |url=https://cer.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/oxfam-ndb-exec-summary-web.pdf?x21779 |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{centreforenvironmentalrights2021information, author = {{Centre for Environmental Rights}}, title = {{Information Disclosure \& Grievance Mechanisms of the New Development Bank}}, institution = {Centre for Environmental Rights}, year = {2021}, month = mar, url = {https://cer.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/oxfam-ndb-exec-summary-web.pdf?x21779}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }