NGO Forum on ADB and its allies has called on the Asian Development Bank (ADB) to steer away from risky energy development pathways that will deepen debt, fossil fuel dependence, nuclear risks and extractive harm, warning that the Bank’s credibility will depend on whether it can be cascading crises without shifting more burdens onto vulnerable communities and whether it embeds robust safeguards and enforceable accountability mechanisms across all its operations.
While recognizing the importance of dialogue and engagement, the Forum remains deeply critical of the Bank’s development model and the continuing impacts of harmful projects on communities, livelihoods, human rights, and the environment
During the 59th Annual Meeting of the ADB in Samarkand, Forum urged the Bank to ensure that its financing decisions reduce inequality and protect communities rather than intensify existing vulnerabilities. The call comes as developing countries face worsening economic uncertainty driven by geopolitical instability, rising energy prices, inflation, shrinking fiscal space, and mounting debt pressures linked to ongoing conflict in the Middle East. Civil society groups also stressed the need for clear and transparent safeguard compliance, as well as accessible grievance and redress mechanisms for affected communities.
Evidence from multilateral institutions underscores the scale of risk. According to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), a 10% rise in oil prices could increase global inflation by 0.4 percent and reduce output by 0.1-0.2%, further tightening fiscal space in developing countries. The ADB similarly warns that prolonged conflict could slow developing country growth to 4.7%. The United Nations Trade and Development data shows that rising interest payments have constrained fiscal capacity in 99 developing countries between 2018 and 2024.
“ADB cannot claim to be a partner in Asia’s resilience while financing pathways that deepen the very crises people are already enduring. In a region facing debt distress, energy insecurity, climate shocks, and shrinking public budgets, every ADB dollar must reduce dependency, protect communities, and strengthen public accountability — not lock countries into fossil fuels, risky technologies, extractive sacrifice zones, and future liabilities,” said Rayyan Hassan, executive director of NGO Forum.
“The Bank’s test today is not how much money it can move, but whether its financing choices stop transferring crisis costs onto the poor, the displaced, Indigenous Peoples, workers, women, and affected communities across Asia,” he added.
Central to the group’s concerns are ADB’s policy shift that failed to close existing loopholes around fossil fuel financing, allowing financing to nuclear power development, and the growing interest in critical minerals, both introduced under amendments to the ADB’s Energy Policy approved in November 2025.
Forum network stated that the new policy still allows indirect coal financing, fails to establish a sunset provision for fossil gas classified as a “transition fuel,” and expands support for methane leakage reduction in existing upstream oil and gas projects without corresponding improvements in safeguard systems, independent monitoring, and public disclosure requirements.
“From the beginning, we’ve called out ADB to reverse all the support for fossil fuels and raised critical concerns over new areas of engagement, such as the critical minerals and nuclear energy. Yet the Bank failed miserably to uphold its climate commitments, acting on the whims of its rich shareholders rather than the genuine needs of people and the planet. Communities carry the brunt of the environmental crisis and worsening climate impacts driven by excessive extraction of and fossil fuel dependency. Without a clear and decisive shift from the ADB, as one of the biggest development financiers in the region, the Bank is perpetuating the very same inequalities it claims to combat,” according to Nazareth Del Pilar, Forum’s Just Transitions Advocacy Officer.
The group also warned that nuclear energy cannot be treated as a routine technology option in a region where safeguards implementation, public accountability, and institutional oversight remain uneven. They stressed that nuclear power carries long-term risks, including radioactive waste, safety and security threats, high water and resource use, emergency preparedness requirements, exclusion zones, public debt burdens, corporate capture, governance failures, and intergenerational liabilities that will fall heavily on workers, local communities, Indigenous Peoples, and public institutions in borrowing countries underscoring the urgent need for stringent, independently verifiable safeguards, liability frameworks, and long-term accountability mechanisms before any such investments proceed.
Yuki Tanabe, Program Director of the Japan Center for a Sustainable Environment and Society (JACSES), explained, “Fifteen years have passed since the Fukushima nuclear accident, yet 300 square kilometers remain an evacuation zone, and more than 20,000 people are still unable to return to their hometowns. Normally, nuclear power plants are decommissioned 50 years after shutdown, but in the case of the Fukushima plants, because the nuclear fuel melted down, decommissioning work lasting several centuries will be needed. Considering the scale of the disaster, there are serious doubts about whether realistic evacuation plans can be established in many Asian countries and whether meaningful consultations can be held with such a large number of affected people.”
Forum also warned ADB that minerals extraction cannot be presented as part of a “just transition” if it is built on weakened oversight, territorial sacrifice, and exemptions from safeguards obligations, and called for binding due diligence standards, community consent processes, and enforceable accountability for corporate and state actors involved. It underscored the risks of repeating the consequences of weak mining governance, citing the Marcopper tragedy in Marinduque as a stark reminder of the long-lasting environmental and social damages when accountability fails, and affected communities are left to absorb the costs.
“The bank should ensure that its loans and investments are not imposing more suffering for affected communities and creating additional sacrifice zones to ensure access to raw materials including transition and critical minerals. The path to an energy transition must be inclusive and just and the Bank’s commitment to a robust implementation of genuine ESG safeguards and meaningful community participation must be ensured,” said Jaybee Garganera of Alyansa Tigil Mina.
Beyond energy and finance decisions, the Forum stressed that accountability ultimately hinges on whether the Bank’s system can deliver a real remedy. They said that the ongoing review of the ADB’s Accountability Mechanism Policy is a critical test for the institution, and urged that it not be reduced to a procedural exercise, but instead result in reforms that make the mechanism genuinely accessible and responsive for project-affected people, with guaranteed independence, timeliness, protection from retaliation, and binding corrective actions when harm is identified.
Radhika Goyal, Policy Associate at Accountability Counsel, said, “The new Environmental and Social Framework introduced ambitious commitments that help ADB maintain its standing as a responsible investor. Yet without an effective Accountability Mechanism to provide independent oversight of these commitments, ADB and its shareholders cannot know whether the framework is being implemented in practice. The ongoing review of the Accountability Mechanism Policy, taking place after 12 years, is a crucial opportunity for the ADB Board to ensure that the mechanism remains independent from management, accessible to communities living in and around project sites, and capable of delivering meaningful redress.”
Across these policy directions and financing choices, communities across the region are already experiencing the impacts. ADB-funded projects have been linked to land loss, displacement, environmental damage, and weakened livelihoods, while risks associated with fossil fuel dependence, extractive expansion, and high-risk technologies continue to grow amid uneven safeguards and weak oversight. Civil society groups warned that these patterns reflect deeper systemic gaps in accountability and enforcement that urgently need to be addressed.
Titi Soentoro of Aksi! for Gender, Social, and Ecological Justice said that while ADB presents itself as committed to a “prosperous, inclusive, resilient, and sustainable” Asia-Pacific region, its current practices often continue to favor corporate interests through top-down development models, environmentally harmful projects, and privatization policies that deepen inequality.
“The ADB should address its current flaws by better protecting women and vulnerable groups from harmful project impacts, ensuring women’s participation in meaningful consultations, and establishing grievance and redress systems that effectively address gender issues,” Soentoro said. “The Bank also needs to take responsibility and provide remedies for the indirect, long-term, and cumulative harm caused by its project financing.”
NGO Forum on ADB and its allies said the Bank’s leadership will not be judged by the size of its investments, but by whether it protects people, upholds rights, prevents harm, and delivers justice to affected communities. The groups stressed that development cannot continue to come at the expense of displaced families, damaged ecosystems, and violated rights, warning that communities across the region will continue to resist projects and policies that prioritize profit, extraction, and corporate interests over people’s welfare, climate justice, and genuine accountability.
