PESHAWAR, Nov 6: The Sungi Development Foundation did not attend the Asian Development Bank review mission’s meeting with NGOs regarding the extension of the Forestry Sector Project (FSP) held here on Tuesday.

According to a press release, in a letter addressed to the Manila-based ADB official, Sungi urged the ADB to delay the process of consultations for the extension of the FSP until the new government is in place, and conduct an independent evaluation of the reasons for FSP’s failure.

The bank officials, through the letter, were apprised that the failure of the FSP in ensuring a consensual policy, legal and institutional reforms, the achievement of physical target under the project is not more than seven per cent.

Without conducting an independent and unbiased review, an extension to the FSP will prove to be yet another failure.

The letter stated that the Bank’s negotiations for the extension of the FSP with the present set-up was not appropriate when the new NWFP assembly was likely to be in place within a few days.

“We consider the current efforts of the international financial institutions (IFIs) to negotiate and make important agreements prior to the formation of the new government inappropriate and against the standard democratic norms and practices,” the letter stated.

Giving the examples of the IFIs’ haste in making important agreements with the military government, the letter stated that the forthcoming visit of the IMF’s mission, aiming to start negotiations on Poverty Reduction and Growth Facility Agreement is scheduled to meet only a couple of days before the induction of the new government.

“The same was done in the case of Chashma Right Bank Irrigation Project when the ADB review mission convened the meeting on the resettlement and land compensation issues,” it further noted.

Secondly, Sungi observed that most of the policy, legal and institutional reforms under the FSP were undertaken by an un-elected regime. As a result, all important issues, including the new forest ordinances, selection of roundtables and establishment of forestry commission, have become controversial and thus rejected by the majority of forest peoples in the Hazara and Malakand division.

The FSP, starting from 1996, was aimed at bringing about policy, legal and institutional changes in the forestry sector, and improving the productivity of the private, communal and government lands suitable for forestry development.

The ADB had given $26.95 million for the project.