Between 2000 and 2003, an American-led consortium invested $3.7 billion into the project, approximately $2 billion of which was invested in Chad. Since 2003 the economy of Chad is currently dependent on oil. Pipeline project was officially suspended in September 2008. It is a 1,100km-pipeline - with 890km of it passing through Cameroon - to the Atlantic. It was hoped that this project would serve as a catalyst for the entire economy by helping to reduce energy costs and attracting additional trade and investment in other sectors. This pipeline is a perfect example of the Bank’s disregard for environmental concerns. The oil development project passes through or close to important ecological areas that are home for many endangered species.
The Bank has been also engaged in the Community Based Ecosystems Management Project in Chad since June 2005. The main aim was to restore some of the most fragile ecosystems, by enabling local communities to better fight desertification and protect biodiversity. Thanks to this project 35,500 children secured for full school years, 257,000 people have access to clean water and 65,000 people have access to basic health care.
The Bank has been engaged in an urban development project in Chad since 2007, aiming to increase sustainable access to municipal services for residents in targeted project cities, including N’Djamena, Moundou, Sarh, Abeche and Doba.
In July 2010 the World Bank’s Executive Board discussed a new Interim Strategy Note covering Bank engagement in Chad over the June 2010 to June 2012 period. The main objectives are re-establishment a productive dialogue and working relationship with state and non- state actors.
"Even before recent developments, the people of Chad were among the poorest of Africa, with the bleakest prospects. Our aim has always been to help the Government improve the basic services Chad’s people desperately require, from HIV/AIDS projects to schools and roads. Suspending aid was a difficult decision but one the Bank had to take given developments that undermined the original agreement to ensure that resources went to benefit the poor people of Chad," said World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz.
IFC, the private sector arm of the World Bank Group, believes that the livelihoods of people affected by the operations need to be restored by finding alternative land and developing feasible opportunities for employment other than farming. The strategy was to use the World Bank’s money and credibility to persuade Chad to dedicate its earnings from oil to attacking its poverty by building schools, roads and hospitals. In May 2005 the board, in a damning investigation, found that much of the money was being wasted on abuses like shoddy school desks made of buckled wood, computers and printers purchased at inflated prices, and wells, schools and hospitals that were paid for but not completed.
Life has gone from bad to worse for most people. According to UNICEF, child mortality rose from 1990 to 2006. Only one adult in four is literate, and 37 percent of children are underweight.
Ian Gary, an Oxfam America specialist in managing mineral resources said:
“The World Bank made a gamble,” “It knew the situation in Chad going in, but it argued it could build the capacity of the Chadian government and the governance situation would improve alongside the oil boom. But what we have seen in Chad and in so many other places, it is that boom and that flow of revenue that undermines governance rather than improving it.”
Moreover, the World Bank and the Chad authorities agreed to strengthen the Collège de Controle et Surveillance des Revenues Pétrolières – an independent body with oversight of the use of oil revenues for poverty reduction – by ensuring it has the resources to more effectively perform its duties.
Without the World Bank this projects would never have happened.
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CIA World Factbook
Ian Gary and Nikki Reisch, Chad's Oil: Miracle or Mirage