clusterhead1.gif (2471 bytes)
Business Partners for Development:
iconnrcpipelinesmall.jpeg (8867 bytes) Natural Resources Cluster
Partners

Quarterly Updates

Focus Projects

Cluster- wide Products

Training Modules

Links and Library

Contact

 

Welcome                                                 

The Natural Resources Cluster seeks to enhance the role of oil, gas and mining corporations in development. Our aim is to produce practical examples, based on 'focus projects' around the world, of how three-way partnerships involving companies, government authorities and civil society organisations can be a more effective means of reducing social risks and promoting community development. Working in different countries and at different stages of project development, the Natural Resources Cluster is systematically testing the performance of tri-sector partnerships in terms of both business benefit and development impact.

Meeting the Challenges

Specifically, we are exploring the role of tri-sector partnerships in providing answers to the unresolved social management and sustainable development challenges confronting non-renewable natural resource (oil, gas and mining) projects. For example, the initiative looks for creative ways in which these partnerships can:

  • promote more equitable and visible economic development in the region of operation;

  • 'pool' resources, skills and experience to increase the quality, reach and sustainability of local public services - health, education, water supply, housing water disposal etc;

  • encourage local business activity and leave an economic legacy independent of the oil, gas or mining business;

  • improve the quality of resettlement and income restoration programmes;

  • deliver effective community development in situations of violent conflict;

  • overcome weak capacities in civil society and local government.                           

"There is a logic, an inevitable logic, in fact a necessity that we should come together, and I don't think that the paradigms of this development have been adequately developed."

James D. Wolfensohn, President, The World Bank Group

Building Practical Examples

The Focus projects offer an opportunity to 'learn-by-doing'. To this end we are currently working with project stakeholders to:

  • identify where tri-sector partnerships might contribute the greatest 'added value' to what the parties can achieve alone
  • facilitate agreement between prospective partners on objectives, roles and responsibilities in areas such as health care, education, employment, business enterprise, training and environmental management;
  • build capacity to enable tri-sector partnerships to be effective and durable; and
  • learn lessons from the impact of the partnerships on social investment and sustainable development.

tablehome2.gif (7378 bytes)

Promoting Good Practice

The Natural Resources Cluster is also a programme designed to study and promote 'good practices' relevant to tri-sector partnerships in the oil, gas and mining sectors. As such we:

  • organise practitioner study visits and theme-based workshops to share knowledge;
    •
  • develop and deliver training modules to help build and maintain effective partnerships;
    •
  • commission research and synthesise existing knowledge on priority issues emerging from the 'focus projects';
    •
  • hold national workshops to promote the 'scaling-up' of good practice; and
    •
  • continuously disseminate our ideas, learning and conclusions to a wide audience.
    •

 

| Home | Partners | Updates | Focus Projects | Products | Training | Links | Contact |  
Business Partners for Development (BPD) Home Page