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Review oil spill plans for companies before signing contracts – NRGI cautions Govt.
Before any contract is signed with an oil operator, the government should require that it presents and obtains approval for contingency plans in the case of emergency.
According to the Natural Resource Governance Institute (NRGI), these contingencies should include the availability of equipment and expertise to manage accidents, such as oil spills. The Institute said that this should be accompanied by the means to monitor a project throughout its life cycle to ensure that all parties follow the plan and to identify future, unexpected impacts of the project.
As it is impossible to predict all the potential costs, NRGI said that requiring developers to have systems in place to monitor and manage environmental and social impacts on an ongoing basis is just as important as the assessments conducted in project planning.
The Institute opined that the government is responsible for setting and enforcing environmental standards (preferably in compliance with international standards such as the Equator Principles), while the extractive company is usually in the best position to mitigate environmental damage. The international organization said that companies may have only weak incentives to consider the environmental consequences of operations, unless the government makes it a condition of awarding the concession, with penalties attached. As such, NRGI said that the government should ensure that either it or the company sets aside funds for remediation, as the company may leave or sell to another party when projects become unprofitable, which may be long before the official project period ends. It said, too, that independent contractors, acquired on a competitive basis, can be hired to undertake environmental operations such as reclamation.
Further to this, NRGI said, “The security arrangements around projects can give rise to human rights concerns when private or state security forces use excessive force. Operations should include strong safeguards and legal recourse mechanisms in cases of human rights violations.”
NRGI said, “Finally, the government should separately and explicitly identify and factor into the decision-making process the social impact of extraction on vulnerable or marginalized groups of resource extraction since these groups are often omitted from broader community impact consideration.”
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