On the eve of an annual gathering of public development banks in Rome, 280 groups from 70 countries have signed a letter slamming them for bankrolling the expansion of industrial agriculture, environmental destruction and corporate control of the food system. The signatories affirm only fully public and accountable funding mechanisms based on people’s actual needs can achieve real solutions to the global food crisis. Over 450 Public Development Banks (PDBs) from around the world are gathering in Rome from 19 to 20 October 2021 for a second international summit, dubbed Finance in Common. During the first summit in Paris in 2020, over 80 civil-society organizations published a joint statement demanding that the PDBs stop funding agribusiness companies and projects that take land and natural resources away from local communities. This year, however, PDBs have made agriculture and agribusiness the priority of their second summit. This is of serious concern for the undersigned groups as PDBs have a long track-record of making investments in agriculture that benefit private interests and agribusiness corporations at the expense of farmers, herders, fishers, food workers and Indigenous Peoples, undermining their food sovereignty, ecosystems and human rights.Our concerns PDBs are public institutions established by national governments or multilateral agencies to finance government programs and private companies whose activities are said to contribute to the improvement of people's lives in the places where they operate, particularly in the Global South. Many multilateral development banks, a significant sub-group of PDBs, also provide technical and policy advice to governments to change their laws and policies to attract foreign investment. As public institutions, PDBs are bound to respect, protect and fulfil human rights and are supposed to be accountable to the public for their actions. Today, development banks collectively spend over US$2 trillion a year financing public and private companies to build roads, power plants, factory farms, agribusiness plantations and more in the name of "development" – an estimated US$1.4 trillion goes into the sole agriculture and food sector. Their financing of private companies, whether through debt or the purchase of shares, is supposed to be done for a profit, but much of their spending is backed and financed by the public – by people's labor and taxes. The number of PDBs and the funding they receive is growing.The reach of these banks is also growing as they are increasingly channeling public funds through private equity, “green finance” and other financial schemes to deliver the intended solutions instead of more traditional support to government programs or non-profit projects. Money from a development bank provides a sort of guarantee for companies expanding into so-called high-risk countries or industries. These guarantees enable companies to raise more funds from private lenders or other development banks, often at favorable rates. Development banks thus play a critical role in enabling multinational corporations to expand further into markets and territories around the world – from gold mines in Armenia, to controversial hydroelectric dams in Colombia, to disastrous natural gas projects in Mozambique – in ways they could not do otherwise. Additionally, many multilateral development banks work to explicitly shape national level law and policy through their technical advice to governments and ranking systems such as the Enabling the Business of Agriculture of the World Bank. The policies they support in key sectors -- including health, water, education, energy, food security and agriculture -- tend to advance the role of big corporations and elites. And when affected local communities, including Indigenous Peoples and small farmers protest, they are often not heard or face reprisals. For example, in India, the World Bank advised the government to deregulate the agricultural marketing system, and when the government implemented this advice without consulting with farmers and their organisations, it led to massive protests.Public Development Banks claim that they only invest in “sustainable” and “responsible” companies and that their involvement improves corporate behavior. But these banks have a heavy legacy of investing in companies involved in land grabbing, corruption, violence, environmental destruction and other severe human rights violations, from which they have escaped any meaningful accountability. The increasing reliance of development banks on offshore private equity funds and complex investment webs, including so called financial intermediaries, to channel their investments makes accountability even more evasive and enables a small and powerful financial elite to capture the benefits.It is alarming that Public Development Banks are now taking on more of a coordinated and central role when it comes to food and agriculture. They are a part of the global financial architecture that is driving dispossession and ecological destruction, much of which is caused by agribusiness. Over the years, their investment in agriculture has almost exclusively gone to companies engaged in monoculture plantations, contract growing schemes, animal factory farms, sales of hybrid and genetically modified seeds and pesticides, and digital agriculture platforms dominated by Big Tech. They have shown zero interest in or capacity to invest in the farm, fisher and forest communities that currently produce the majority of the world’s food. Instead, they are bankrolling land grabbers and corporate agribusinesses and destroying local food systems. Painful examples Important examples of the pattern we see Public Development Banks engaging in:The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the European Investment Bank have provided generous financing to the agribusiness companies of some of Ukraine's richest oligarchs, who control hundreds of thousands of hectares of land. SOCFIN of Luxembourg and SIAT of Belgium, the two largest oil palm and rubber plantation owners in Africa, have received numerous financial loans from development banks, despite their subsidiaries being mired in land grabbing, corruption scandals and human rights violations.Multiple development banks (including Swedfund, BIO, FMO and the DEG) financed the failed sugarcane plantation of Addax Bioenergy in Sierra Leone that has left a trail of devastation for local communities after the company’s exit.The UK’s CDC Group and other European development banks (including BIO, DEG, FMO and Proparco) poured over $150 million into the now bankrupt Feronia Inc’s oil palm plantations in the DR Congo, despite long-standing conflicts with local communities over land and working conditions, allegations of corruption and serious human rights violations against villagers.The United Nations’ Common Fund for Commodities invested in Agilis Partners, a US-owned company, which is involved in the violent eviction of thousands of villagers in Uganda for a large-scale grain farm.Norfund and Finnfund own Green Resources, a Norwegian forestry company planting pine trees in Uganda on land taken from thousands of local farmers, with devastating effects on their livelihoods. The Japan Bank for International Cooperation and the African Development Bank invested in a railway and port infrastructure project to enable Mitsui of Japan and Vale of Brazil to export coal from their mining operations in northern Mozambique. The project, connected to the controversial ProSavana agribusiness project, has led to land grabbing, forced relocations, fatal accidents and the detention and torture of project opponents.The China Development Bank financed the ecologically and socially disastrous Gibe III dam in Ethiopia. Designed for electricity generation and to irrigate large-scale sugar, cotton and palm oil plantations such as the gargantuan Kuraz Sugar Development Project, it has cut off the river flow that the indigenous people of the Lower Omo Valley relied on for flood retreat agriculture.In Nicaragua, FMO and Finnfund financed MLR Forestal, a company managing cocoa and teak plantations, which is controlled by gold mining interests responsible for displacement of Afro-descendant and Indigenous communities and environmental degradation. The International Finance Corporation and the Inter-American Development Bank Invest have recently approved loans to Pronaca, Ecuador’s 4th largest corporation, to expand intensive pig and poultry production despite opposition from international and Ecuadorian groups, including local indigenous communities whose water and lands have been polluted by the company’s expansive operations.The Inter-American Development Bank Invest is considering a new $43 million loan for Marfrig Global Foods, the world’s 2nd largest beef company, under the guise of promoting “sustainable beef.” Numerous reports have found Marfrig’s supply chain directly linked to illegal deforestation in the Amazon and Cerrado and human rights violations. The company has also faced corruption charges. A global campaign is now calling for PDBs to immediately divest from all industrial livestock operations. We need better mechanisms to build food sovereignty Governments and multilateral agencies are finally beginning to acknowledge that today’s global food system has failed to address hunger and is a key driver of multiple crises, from pandemics to biodiversity collapse to the climate emergency. But they are doing nothing to challenge the corporations who dominate the industrial food system and its model of production, trade and consumption. To the contrary, they are pushing for more corporate investment, more public private partnerships and more handouts to agribusiness. This year’s summit of the development banks was deliberately chosen to follow on the heels of the UN Food Systems Summit. It was advertised as a global forum to find solutions to problems afflicting the global food system but was hijacked by corporate interests and became little more than a space for corporate greenwashing and showcasing industrial agriculture. The event was protested and boycotted by social movements and civil society, including through the Global People´s Summit and the Autonomous People´s response to the UN Food Systems Summit, as well as by academics from across the world.The Finance in Common summit, with its focus on agriculture and agribusiness, will follow the same script. Financiers overseeing our public funds and mandates will gather with elites and corporate representatives to strategize on how to keep the money flowing into a model of food and agriculture that is leading to climate breakdown, increasing poverty and exacerbating all forms of malnutrition. Few if any representatives from the communities affected by the investments of the development banks, people who are on the frontlines trying to produce food for their communities, will be invited in or listened to. PDBs are not interested. They seek to fund agribusinesses, which produce commodities for trade and financial schemes for profits rather than food for nutrition.Last year, a large coalition of civil-society organizations made a huge effort just to get the development banks to agree to commit to a human rights approach and community-led development. The result was only some limited language in the final declaration, which has not been translated into action. We do not want any more of our public money, public mandates and public resources to be wasted on agribusiness companies that take land, natural resources and livelihoods away from local communities. Therefore:We call for an immediate end to the financing of corporate agribusiness operations and speculative investments by public development banks. We call for the creation of fully public and accountable funding mechanisms that support peoples' efforts to build food sovereignty, realize the human right to food, protect and restore ecosystems, and address the climate emergency.We call for the implementation of strong and effective mechanisms that provide communities with access to justice in case of adverse human rights impacts or social and environmental damages caused by PDB investments.Signatories:Fundación Plurales - ArgentinaFundación Ambiente y Recursos Naturales (FARN) - ArgentinaForo Ambiental Santiagueño - Argentina Armenian Women For Health &Healthy Environment NGO /AWHHE/ - ArmeniaAustralian Food Sovereignty Alliance - AustraliaSunGem - AustraliaWelthaus Diözese Graz-Seckau - AustriaTurkmen Initiative for Human Rights - AustriaFIAN Austria - AustriaOil Workers' Rights Protection Organization Public Union - AzerbaijanInitiative for Right View - BangladeshRight to Food South Asia - BangladeshIRV - BangladeshBangladesh Agricultural Farm Labour Federation [BAFLF] - Bangladesh NGO "Ecohome" - BelarusEclosio - BelgiumAEFJN - BelgiumFIAN Belgium - BelgiumEntraide et Fraternité - BelgiumAfrica Europe Faith & Justice Network (AEFJN) - BelgiumCoalition for Fair Fisheries Arrangements - BelgiumEurodad - BelgiumFriends of the Earth Europe - Belgium Alianza Animalista La Paz - BoliviaInstituto de Estudos Socioeconômicos (Inesc) - BrazilCentro Ecologico - BrazilFAOR Fórum da Amazônia Oriental - BrazilArticulação Agro é Fogo - BrazilCampanha Nacional de Combate e Prevenção ao Trabalho Escravo - Comissão Pastoral da Terra/CPT - BrazilClínica de Direitos Humanos da Amazônia -PPGD/UFPA - BrazilUniversidade Federal Fluminense IPsi - BrazilAssociação Brasileira de Reforma Agrária - BrazilRede Jubileu Sul Brasil - BrazilAlternativas para pequena agricultura no Tocantins APATO - BrazilCAPINA Cooperação e Apoio a Projetos de Inspiração Alternativa - BrazilMarcha Mundial por Justiça Climática / Marcha Mundial do Clima - BrazilMNCCD - Movimento Nacional Contra Corrupção e pela Democracia - BrazilMarcha Mundial por Justiça Climática/Marcha Mundial do Clima - BrazilSupport Group for Indigenous Youth - BrazilComissão Pastoral da Terra -CPT - BrazilMovimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra (MST) - Brazil Equitable Cambodia - CambodiaCoalition of Cambodian Farmers Community - CambodiaStruggle to Economize Future Environment (SEFE) - CameroonSynaparcam - CameroonAPDDH -ASSISTANCE - CameroonInter Pares - CanadaVigilance OGM - CanadaNational Farmers Union - CanadaSeedChange - CanadaPlace de la Dignité - CanadaCorporación para la Protección y Desarrollo de Territorios Rurales- PRODETER - ColombiaGrupo Semillas - ColombiaGroupe de Recherche et de Plaidoyer sur les Industries Extractives (GRPIE) - Côte d'IvoireRéseau des Femmes Braves (REFEB) - Côte d'Ivoire CLDA - Côte d’IvoireCounter Balance - Czech RepublicAfrosRD - Dominican RepublicConseil Régional des Organisations Non gouvernementales de Développement - DR CongoConstruisons Ensemble le MONDE - DR CongoSynergie Agir Contre la Faim et le Réchauffement Climatique , SACFRC. - DR CongoCOPACO-PRP - DR CongoAICED - DR CongoRéseaux d'informations et d'appui aux ONG en République Démocratique du Congo ( RIAO - RDC) - DR CongoLatinoamérica Sustentable - EcuadorHousing and Land Rights Network - Habitat International Coalition - EgyptPacific Islands Association of Non-Governmental Organisations (PIANGO) - FijiInternationale Situationniste - FrancePouvoir d’Agir - FranceEurope solidaire sans frontières (ESSF) - FranceAmis de la Terre France - FranceMédias Sociaux pour un Autre Monde - FranceReAct Transnational - FranceCCFD-Terre Solidaire - FranceCADTM France - FranceCoordination SUD - FranceДвижение Зеленных Грузии - GeorgiaNGO "GAMARJOBA" - GeorgiaStrongGogo - GeorgiaFIAN Deutschland - GermanyRettet den Regenwald - GermanyAngela Jost Translations - Germanyurgewald e.V. - GermanyAbibinsroma Foundation - GhanaAlliance for Empowering Rural Communities - GhanaOrganización de Mujeres Tierra Viva - GuatemalaCampaña Guatemala sin hambre - Guatemala PAPDA - HaïtiCentre de Recherche et d'Action pour le Developpement (CRAD) - Haiti Ambiente, Desarrollo y Capacitación (ADC ) - HondurasRashtriya Raithu Seva Samithi - IndiaAll India Union of Forest Working People AIUFWP - IndiaCentre for Financial Accountability - IndiaPeople First - IndiaEnvironics Trust - IndiaToxicsWatch Alliance - IndiaFood Sovereignty Alliance - India Indonesia for Global Justice (IGJ) - Indonesiakruha - IndonesiaWahana Lingkungan Hidup Indonesia (WALHI) - IndonesiaJPIC Kalimantan - Indonesiaتانيا جمعه /منظمه شؤون المراه والطفل - IraqICW-CIF - ItalyPEAH - Policies for Equitable Access to Health - ItalyFocsiv Italian federation christian NGOs - ItalySchola Campesina APS - ItalyCasa Congo- ItalyReCommon - ItalyJapan International Volunteer Center (JVC) - JapanTeam OKADA - Japantaneomamorukai - JapanVoiceForAnimalsJapan - JapanKeisen University - Japan000 PAF NPO - JapanMissionary Society of Saint Columban, Japan - JapanMigrants around 60 - JapanMura-Machi Net (Network between Villages and Towns) - JapanJapan Family Farmers Movement (Nouminren) - JapanPacific Asia Resorce Center(PARC) - JapanA Quater Acre Farm-Jinendo - JapanFriends of the Earth Japan - JapanAlternative People's Linkage in Asia (APLA) - JapanMekong Watch - JapanFamily Farming Platform Japan - JapanAfrica Japan Forum - JapanATTAC Kansai - JapanATTAC Japan - JapanAssociation of Western Japan Agroecology (AWJA) - JapanMennovillage Naganuma - Japan Phenix Center - JordanMazingira Institute - KenyaDan Owala - KenyaJamaa Resource Initiatives - KenyaKenya Debt Abolition Network - KenyaHaki Nawiri Afrika - KenyaEuphrates Institute-Liberia - LiberiaGreen Advocates International (Liberia) - LiberiaSustainable Development Institute (SDI) - LiberiaAlliance for Rural Democracy (ARD) - LiberiaFrères des Hommes - LuxembourgSOS FAIM - LuxembourgCollectif pour la défense des terres malgaches - TANY - MadagascarThird World Network - MalaysiaAppui Solidaire pour le Développement de l'Aide au Développement - Mali Réseau CADTM Afrique - Mali Lalo - MexicoTosepanpajt A.C - MexicoMaya sin Fronteras - MexicoCentro de Educación en Apoyo a la Producción y al Medio Ambiente, A.C. - MexicoMujeres Libres COLEM AC - MéxicoGrupo de Mujeres de San Cristóbal Las Casas AC - MéxicoColectivo Educación para la Paaz y los Derechos Humanos A.C. (CEPAZDH) - MéxicoRed Nacional de Promotoras Rurales - MéxicoDinamismo Juvenil A.C - MéxicoCultura Ambiental en Expansión AC - MéxicoObservatorio Universitario de Seguridad Alimentaria y Nutricional del Estado de Guanajuato - MéxicoCentro Interdisciplinario de Investigación y Desarrollo Alternativo U Yich Lu'um AC - MéxicoThe Hunger Project México - México Americas Program/Americas.Org - México Association Talassemtane pour l'Environnement et Développement (ATED) - Morocco Espace de Solidarité et de Coopération de l'Oriental - Morocco LVC Maroc - Morocco EJNA - Morocco NAFSN - Morocco Fédération nationale du secteur agricole - Morocco Association jeunes pour jeunes - Morocco Plataforma Mocambicana da Mulher e Rapariga Cooperativistas/AMPCM - MOZAMBIQUE - MozambiqueJustica Ambiental - JA! - Mozambique Community Empowerment and Social Justice Network (CEMSOJ) - NepalWILPF NL - NetherlandsMilieudefensie - NetherlandsPlatform Aarde Boer Consument - NetherlandsBoth ENDS - NetherlandsFoundation for the Conservation of the Earth,FOCONE - NigeriaLekeh Development Foundation (LEDEF) - NigeriaNigeria Coal Network - NigeriaSpire - NorwayPakistan Fisherfolk Forum - PakistanGaza Urban Agriculture Platform (GUPAP) - PalestineUnion of Agricultural Work Committees - PalestineDerecho, Ambiente y Recursos Naturales (DAR) - PeruWoman Health Philippines - PhilippinesAgroecology X - PhilippinesSEARICE - PhilippinesAlter Trade Foundation for Food Sovereignty, Inc - PhilippinesAssociation pour la défense des droits à l'eau et à l'assainissement - SénégalBiotech Services Sénégal - SénégalAssociation Sénégalaise des Amis de la Nature - Sénégal Alliance Sénégalaise Contre la Faim et la Malnutrition - Sénégal Association Sénégalaise des Amis de la Nature - Sénégal Alliance Sénégalaise Contre la Faim et la Malnutrition - Sénégal Green Scenery - Sierra LeoneLand for Life - Sierra LeoneJendaGbeni Centre for Social Change Communications - Sierra LeoneSierra Leone Land Alliance - Sierra LeoneAfrican Centre for Biodiversity - South AfricaAfrican Children Empowerment - South AfricaCooperative and Policy Alternative Centre - South AfricaFish Hoek Valley Ratepayers and Residents Association - South AfricaConsciously Organic - South AfricaWana Johnson Learning Centre - South AfricaAha Properties - South AfricaSacred Earth & Storm School - South AfricaEarth Magic - South AfricaOasis - South AfricaEnvirosense - South AfricaGreenstuff - South AfricaWoMin African Alliance - South AfricaSeonae Eco Centre - South AfricaEco Hope - South AfricaKos en Fynbos - South AfricaGhostwriter Grant - South AfricaMariann Coordinating Committee - South AfricaKhanyisa Education and Development Trust - South AfricaLAMOSA - South AfricaFerndale Food Forest and Worm Farm - South AfricaMxumbu Youth Agricultural Coop - South Africa PHA Food & Farming Campaign - South Africa SOLdePAZ.Pachakuti - SpainAmigos de la Tierra - SpainSindicato Andaluz de Trabajadores/AS - SpainEntrepueblos/Entrepobles/Entrepobs/Herriarte - SpainSalva la Selva - SpainLoco Matrifoco - SpainNational Fisheries Solidarity(NAFSO) - Sri LankaMovement for Land and Agricultural Reform (MONLAR) - Sri LankaAgr. Graduates Cooperatives Union - SudanFIAN Sweden - SwedenFIAN Suisse - SwitzerlandBread for all - SwitzerlandFoundation for Environmental Management and Campaign Against Poverty - TanzaniaWorld Animal Protection - ThailandAsia Indigenous Peoples Pact - ThailandPERMATIL - Timor-LesteAfrique Eco 2100 - TogoAJECC - TogoATGF - TunisiaForum Tunisien des Droits Economiques et Sociaux - TunisiaAgora Association - TurkeyUganda Land Rights Defenders - UgandaHopes for youth development Association - UgandaUganda Consortium on Corporate Accountability - UgandaCentre for Citizens Conserving Environment &Management (CECIC) - UgandaBuliisa Initiative for Rural Development Organisation (BIRUDO)) - UgandaTwerwaneho Listeners Club - UgandaAlliance for Food Soverignity in Africa - Uganda Global Justice Now - UKFriends of the Earth International - UKCompassion in World Farming - UKEnvironmental Justice Foundation - UKFresh Eyes - UKWar on Want - UKFriends of the Earth US - USA Growing Culture - USCenter for Political Innovation - USGMO/Toxin Free USA - USFriends of the Earth US - USThousand Currents - USLocal Futures - USNational Family Farm Coalition - USCommunity Alliance for Global Justice/AGRA Watch - USBank Information Center - USSeeding Sovereignty - USYemeni Observatory for Human Rights - YemenZambia Alliance for Agroecology and Biodiversity - ZambiaZambian Governance Foundation for Civil Society - Zambia Urban Farming Zimbabwe - ZimbabweCentre for Alternative Development - ZimbabweFACHIG Trust - ZimbabweRed Latinoamericana por Justicia Económica y Social - Latindadd - América LatinaEuropean Coordination Via Campesina - EuropeArab Watch Coalition - Middle East and North AfricaFIAN International - InternationalInternational Alliance of Inhabitants - InternationalSociety for International Development - InternationalActionAid International - InternationalInternational Accountability Project - InternationalHabitat International Coalition - General Secretariat - InternationalCIDSE - InternationalESCR-Net - InternationalWorld Rainforest Movement - InternationalTransnational Institute - InternationalLa Via Campesina - International Focus on the Global South - International GRAIN - International