BANKS DODGY DEALS CAMPAIGNS
About BankTrack
Visit us
Organisation
Our team
Our board
Guiding principles
Team up with us
Jobs at BankTrack
Our annual reports
Funding and finances
History
BankTrack in the media
Our privacy policy
International Bank Campaigners Gathering
Donate
2023-05-25 00:00:00
Philippines communities are fighting back against gas & LNG build-out in the Verde Island Passage
2023-03-17 00:00:00
Briefing: The role of financial institutions in decarbonising the steel sector
2023-03-09 00:00:00
Dutch bank ING supports controversial pipeline to import gas from authoritarian Azerbaijan
2023-02-23 00:00:00
Financial institutions need to address steelmaking’s coal addiction
2023-05-17 14:30:30
EACOP Financial Advisor SMBC is no longer involved with the project
2023-03-28 13:43:00
French bank Société Générale withdraws from Rio Grande LNG
2023-03-20 08:50:41
Who dares to finance Eni and Exxon’s dangerous Rovuma gas plans in Mozambique?
2023-03-14 14:59:00
New ING policy could spark bank shift away from financing oil and gas infrastructure
Connect
2023-06-01 00:00:00
BankTrack's submission to the public consultation on TNFD V0.4
2023-05-03 00:00:00
A Rotten Business: How Barclays became the go-to bank for JBS, one of the world's most destructive meat corporations
2023-04-13 00:00:00
Banking on Climate Chaos 2023
2023-04-12 00:00:00
The East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP): Finance Risk Update No. 4
See all publications
Sections
Banks Dodgy Deals Campaigns
Our campaigns
Banks and Climate
Banks and Human Rights
Banks and Nature
Banks and Pandemics
Our projects
Tracking the NZBA
Banks and Putin's war in Ukraine
Tracking the Equator Principles
Tracking the PRBs
Banks and steel
End Coal Finance
Find a Better Bank
Banks and the OECD Guidelines
Media
News Publications
Fossil Banks No Thanks StopEACOP Forests & Finance Banks & Biodiversity Drop JBS Bank of Coal Don't Buy into Occupation
BankTrack
About BankTrack Visit us Organisation Our team Our board Guiding principles Team up with us Jobs at BankTrack Our annual reports Funding and finances History BankTrack in the media Our privacy policy International Bank Campaigners Gathering Donate
Successes Contact BankTrack
Donate Mailing list Facebook Twitter Login
Home › Partner news ›
Partner News

Deutsche Bank must end its sustainability farce in Central Africa

2021-04-15 | Hamburg
By: Greenpeace
Contact:

Christoph Thies, Greenpeace Germany forests and climate campaigner, +49-0171-883 1107

Tal Harris, Greenpeace Africa International Communications Coordinator, +221-774643195

IIndigenous Baka People from Cameroon were displaced by the rubber plantation Sudcam, which trashed a 10,000 hectares of rainforest . Photo: Greenpeace / Kate Davison
2021-04-15 | Hamburg
By: Greenpeace
Contact:

Christoph Thies, Greenpeace Germany forests and climate campaigner, +49-0171-883 1107

Tal Harris, Greenpeace Africa International Communications Coordinator, +221-774643195

For the second time in 12 months, Deutsche Bank is about to violate its own Environmental and Social Policy Framework. By mid-2021, the bank is expected to transfer the second tranche of a USD 25 million loan to Singapore-based rubber giant Halcyon Agri, knowingly overlooking its record of human rights violations, non-transparency, and some of the most devastating deforestation in Africa’s recent history.

In July 2020, Deutsche Bank announced “an innovative new loan” of USD 25m to Halcyon Agri, through its subsidiary Corrie MacColl, to finance investments for its plantations in Cameroon and Malaysia, promising “a new standard for the rubber industry.” The same month, the bank pledged not to “knowingly finance… activities within or in close proximity to a World Heritage Site,” yet satellite imagery shows that between 2011 and 2018 Halcyon’s subsidiary Sud-Cameroun Hévéa (Sudcam) cleared more than 10,000 hectares of rainforest – an area the size of Paris – less than one kilometer from the Dja Faunal Reserve, a UNESCO World Heritage site. The clear-cutting caused the displacement of Baka Indigenous People.

“Deutsche Bank must cancel its toxic loan immediately,” said Christoph Thies, Greenpeace Germany forests and climate campaigner. “If the bank’s ambitious target of spending EUR 200 billion on sustainability by 2025 means sponsoring human rights abuses and forest-trashing, Germany and the EU must respond with tighter regulation,” Thies added.

Last July, Greenpeace Africa called for the loan’s cancellation, based on findings by UNESCO, (1) Rainforest Foundation UK, (2) Earthsight, (3) Norway’s Government Pension Fund Global, (4) the Center for International Forestry Research, (5) and its own fieldwork. (6)

As Greenpeace reported in 2018 and 2019, the Sudcam plantation lies only seven kilometers from the Mvomeka’a mansion, security compound, and airstrip of Cameroonian President Paul Biya, who has held power since 1982. Greenpeace has obtained reliable evidence that Sudcam’s minority shareholder is the President’s son and potential successor, Franck Biya. Halcyon Agri has staunchly refused to name Sudcam’s 20% shareholder.

“Deutsche Bank’s champion company kicked Indigenous Baka People off their ancestral lands, without the slightest attempt at obtaining their free, prior and informed consent. Dressing up its loan as sustainable is a textbook case of greenwashing,” said Ranèce Jovial Ndjeudja, Greenpeace Africa campaign manager in Cameroon. 

Greenpeace Africa and Greenpeace Germany call on Deutsche Bank to immediately terminate its loan to Halcyon Agri.

See the original press release here. 

 

Notes

(1) UNESCO, Rapport de la mission de conseil d’experts indépendants de l’UNESCO à la Réserve de faune du Dja (Cameroun), 18 February – 4 March 2019.

(2) Rainforest Foundation UK (RFUK), Palmed Off: an Investigation into three industrial Palm Oil and Rubber Projects in Cameroon and the Republic of Congo, May 2019.

(3) Earthsight, Cameroon women denounce “destruction” of forests and community by agribusiness giants, April 2020; The Coming Storm: How Secrecy and Collusion in Industrial Agriculture Spell Disaster for the Congo Basin’s Forest, March 2018. 

(4) Norway Government Pension Fund Global (GPFG) Annual Report, February 27, 2019; Rainforest Foundation Norway, Press Release: Norway’s Government Pension Fund acts against deforestation: divests major agricultural companies, February 28, 2019.

(5) Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), Socioecological responsibility and Chinese overseas investments The case of rubber plantation expansion in Cameroon, 2015.

(6) Greenpeace Africa, We were told not to go to our Forest anymore:  Sudcam’s assault on human rights, 2019; Halcyon Agri’s Ruinous Rubber (2018).

Banks

Deutsche Bank

Germany
Active
Sections
Banks Policies Dodgy Deals Campaigns
Our campaigns
Banks and Climate Banks and Human Rights Banks and Nature Banks and Pandemics
Our projects
Tracking the NZBA Banks and Putin's war in Ukraine Tracking the Equator Principles Tracking the PRBs Banks and steel End Coal Finance Find a Better Bank Banks and the OECD Guidelines
Media
News Publications
Fossil Banks No Thanks StopEACOP Forests & Finance Banks & Biodiversity Drop JBS Bank of Coal Don't Buy into Occupation
BankTrack
About BankTrack Visit us Organisation Our team Our board Guiding principles Team up with us Jobs at BankTrack Our annual reports Funding and finances History BankTrack in the media Our privacy policy International Bank Campaigners Gathering Donate
Successes Contact BankTrack
Vismarkt 15
6511 VJ Nijmegen
The Netherlands
Tel: +31 24 324 9220
Contact@banktrack.org
Donate Mailing list Facebook Twitter
©2022 BankTrack
BankTrack is a registered charity in the Netherlands (ANBI) - RSIN 813874658
Find our privacy policy here

Stay up to date

Sign up now for all BankTrack's news


Make a comment

Your comment will be reviewed, before being posted