MDBs invest extensively across Asia to support economic growth and infrastructure development. However, these investments often entail significant social and environmental risks for communities, including displacement, weak stakeholder engagement, and inadequate implementation of environmental and social safeguards. Climate change is a central cross-cutting challenge in the region, given Asia’s role as the world’s largest source of greenhouse gas emissions and its high exposure to climate-related hazards such as floods, heatwaves, typhoons, and sea-level rise.
Our Asia Program partners with civil society organizations (CSOs) across the region to monitor and influence MDBs, with a particular focus on the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank (ADB). We work to amplify the voices of affected communities, hold MDBs accountable, and promote the effective implementation of their environmental and social policies on the ground. A core priority of our work is ensuring that MDB-supported investments contribute to a just energy transition and are aligned with climate mitigation and adaptation goals.
Our program builds the capacity of CSOs and local communities throughout Asia to engage meaningfully with MDBs. We provide information, strategic guidance, and connections to key decision-makers so that communities affected by MDB-financed projects can raise concerns and influence outcomes. Given the scale of climate finance and infrastructure investment in the region, we support CSOs and communities in monitoring climate-related projects, disaster risk management initiatives, and post-disaster reconstruction to ensure they are socially inclusive, environmentally sound, and responsive to local needs.
BIC works closely with regional and national CSO networks and community-based organizations across Asia to strengthen collective advocacy toward MDBs. Through these partnerships, we support efforts to improve transparency, accountability, and civil society engagement in MDB operations, particularly in the context of climate action, energy transition, and large-scale infrastructure investments that have far-reaching impacts on people and ecosystems.
We support our partners in combining research, monitoring, and strategic engagement to track project implementation, amplify community concerns, and push institutions to address gaps and risks.
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