Forests Sourcebook - HCV Resource Network

CHAPTER 9
Applying Forests Policy OP 4.36
Operational Policy (OP) 4.36 applies to all World
Bank investment operations that potentially have
an impact on forests, regardless of whether they
are specific forest sector investments. It also encourages the
incorporation of forest issues in Country Assistance Strategies
(CASs), and addresses cross-sectoral impacts on forests.
The policy provides for conservation of critical natural
habitats and prohibits World Bank financing of any commercial
harvesting or plantation development in critical
natural habitats. It also allows for proactive investment support
to improve forest management outside critical forest
areas, with explicit safeguards to ensure that such World
Bank–financed operations comply with independent certification
standards acceptable to the World Bank, or operations
with an agreed upon, time-bound action plan to
establish compliance with these standards.
OBJECTIVE OF THE FORESTS POLICY
The objective of OP 4.36 is to assist clients to harness the
potential of forests to reduce poverty in a sustainable manner,
to effectively integrate forests into sustainable economic
development, and to protect the vital local and global environmental
services and values of forests. Where forest
restoration and plantation development are necessary to
meet these objectives, the World Bank assists clients with
forest restoration activities that maintain or enhance biodiversity
and ecosystem functionality. The World Bank assists
clients with the establishment of environmentally appropriate,
socially beneficial, and economically viable forest plantations
to help meet growing demands for forest goods and
services.
Specifically
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The World Bank uses environmental assessments,
poverty assessments, social analyses, public expenditure
reviews, and other economic and sector work to identify
the economic, environmental, and social significance of
forests in borrowing countries.
The World Bank integrates strategies into its CASs to
address any potential significant impacts of the CAS on
forests.
The World Bank does not finance projects that would
involve significant conversion or degradation of critical
forest areas or other natural habitats.
The World Bank does not finance projects that contravene
applicable international environmental laws.
The World Bank does not finance plantations that involve
any conversion or degradation of critical natural habitats,
including adjacent or downstream critical natural habitats.
The World Bank only finances commercial harvesting
operations or the purchase of logging equipment in areas
that it has determined are not critical forests or related
critical natural habitats.
The World Bank only finances industrial-scale commercial
harvesting operations in areas outside critical forest
areas, where such operations are either certified as meeting
standards of responsible forest management under
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