GoodElectronics organises two workshops on how to engage with Chinese companies to address the impacts of mining for minerals used in electronics and for the energy transition, with a specific focus on South-East Asia. The workshops will take place online through Zoom on 7 December and 15 December and are organised together with Inkrispena, SRI, and SOMO, and will build on the experiences of the Mind the Gap project.
Background
China has extended its reach since the beginning of the 21st century and has become a major global investor. In South East Asia Chinese expansion is well noticeable. Following from its Belt and Road Initiative, Chinese companies have come to operate projects abroad and Chinese banks, investment funds and insurers make these projects possible by providing loans, foreign currency, insurance and equity investments. Many of these projects relate to the mining of metals and minerals. Although these projects come with benefits, they are also associated with harm to workers, communities and the environment. Civil society advocates seeking justice and accountability for these harms observe that corporations deliberately deploy harmful strategies to avoid responsibility for the effects of their operations on people and the environment.
The Mind the Gap project has identified a framework of five main strategies used by corporations to avoid responsibility for human rights and environmental impacts. In working to overcome these harmful corporate strategies, activists, NGOs, and other civil society actors have learned much about how to counter them – what works and what does not. The Mind the Gap project seeks to bring this combined learning together. In this workshop the information, tools, and resources based on years of experience and hard-won expertise that civil society has achieved around the world will be shared to enable civil society to counter these strategies.
Objectives
Participation in the workshop series is open for all civil society advocates interested in gaining knowledge and resources to engage with Chinese companies. The workshop series will particularly focus on the projects of Chinese mining companies in South East Asia, but is open to civil society advocates from other regions or interested in other sectors as well.
After the workshop series participants will have a better understanding how Chinese investors operate and which corporate accountability standards apply to Chinese overseas operations. Mainly Chinese companies that invest with a joint venture scheme with domestic companies. In the workshop participants will furthermore be trained to recognise strategies implemented by companies to avoid responsibility for their impacts. In the second session participants will gain insights into the strategies for engaging with Chinese companies on observed impacts. Participants will be provided with information, tools, and resources to develop intervention strategies and trajectories towards remedy for victims.
About the organisers
The workshop series is organised by Inkrispena, SRI, SOMO and the GoodElectronics Network. Experts from Friends of Nature and Inclusive Development International (IDI) are invited to share their knowledge with participants.
SOMO, based in Amsterdam, investigates multinationals. Independent, factual, critical and with a clear goal: a fair and sustainable world, in which public interests outweigh corporate interests. We conduct action-oriented research to expose the impact and unprecedented power of multinationals and show the underlying structures that enable them.
INKRISPENA is a knowledge resource center institution dedicated to the development, strengthening, development, political leadership of the working people with the mission of collecting and managing studies, capacity building, and technical assistance assistance on crisis knowledge and alternative development strategies for working people
Social Resources Institute (SRI), founded in April 2008, provide research, evaluation, consulting and sharing services for sustainable development strategies, management, decision support organizations and projects with government, business and nonprofit organizations.
The GoodElectronics network brings together networks, organisations and individuals that are concerned about human rights and sustainability issues in the global electronics supply chain. Members include trade unions, grassroots organisations, campaigning and research organisations, academia and activists. GoodElectronics and its members are not-for-profit only.
