PRIZMA

Prizma's Mehrdad Nazari was engaged by White & Case to serve as an Expert Witness for Claimant in the case of Gold Reserve Inc. v. Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela which is before the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID). According to its press release, Gold Reserve claims damages of approximately $2.1 billion arising from violations of provisions of the Canada-Venezuela bilateral investment treaty resulting in the effective expropriation of Gold Reserve's sizable investments in the Brisas gold/copper project and the Choco 5 property. (more...)

OECD Watch reports that UK National Contact Point for OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises re-initiated review of BHP Billiton's bypass case of its MOZAL smelter in Mozambique after IFC Compliance Advisor Ombudsman appears to have failed to facilitate a resolution of this case.  (more...)

Articles: Prizma provided Expert Witness services on ICSID arbitration case, assisted Lundin Mining and Fulbright Academy to generate Sustainability Reports, and co-delivered four GRI-certified training courses. Access newsletter here.

Greystar shareholders kicked out management and board as they did not secure permits and broad community support. Revisions of IFC Performance Standards and Equator Principles has a new case study to wrestle with. (more...)

In its recent CODE Progress Report on IFC Sustainability Framework Review and Update ( December 1, 2010), IFC notes that, with exceptions (such as the Access to Information Policy), majority of proposed changes are clarifications rather than material changes.  (more...)

As discussions about the failed Bill C300 are subsiding, BHP Billiton's sustainability report is being mocked and NGOs lodged complaints about the company’s Mozal aluminum smelter with the JSE SRI Index and IFC’s independent recourse mechanism. (more...)

IFC launched a second round of public consultation to update the IFC Performance Standards (2006), which provide also the basis for the Equator Principles. In mid June 2010, the first meeting was held in Washington DC. It attracted over 5o participants from Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) and industry.What are the emerging themes? (more...)

Unable to attend the GRI conference in Amsterdam, I watched the many taped snippets of the Mining & Metals Sector Supplement session on YouTube. One take away from a presentation by First Peoples Worldwide suggests that GRI reports are important but also that they are not designed with local communities as target audience in mind. (more...)

Inaugural sustainability reports, even if they don’t hit all the right notes, empower internal champions and create opportunities for better stakeholder engagement and transparency, and can help drive  performance improvements. But are you not intrigued to find out what catalyzed and motivated Perenco, an independent oil and gas company operating in places like Gabon, DR Congo, Peru and Guatemala, to create its first CSR report? Is it perhaps related to the recent creation of a $2.8bn reserve-based lending involving Equator Banks, which will also assist with completion of a controversial oil pipeline in Peru’s rainforests? (more...)

In May 2010, the Compliance Advisor/Ombudsman (CAO) office of IFC/MIGA released its Review of IFC’s Policy and Performance Standards on Social and Environmental Sustainability and Policy on Disclosure of Information. This CAO Advisory Note is a contribution to IFC’s ongoing review and update of its Sustainability Framework about which I blogged previously. (more...)