Social & Environmental Commitments

Asia Energy is committed to developing and operating the Phulbari Coal Project, and rehabilitating all Project affected sites, in an economically, socially and environmentally responsible and sustainable manner. This will be done adhering to the highest national and international norms, standards and requirements, including the Equator Principles adopted by major international financial institutions. In particular we are following the guidelines of World Bank, IFC and Asian Development Bank (ADB).

Environmental and Social Impact Assessments

The Environmental and Social Impact Assessments set out in detail how the various social and environmental impacts of the proposed open pit mine will be carefully managed and minimised. The multi-volume EIA and ESIA are the product of more than two years' intensive field work by 300 Bangladeshi and international experts. They represent some of the most extensive research carried out on any project in Bangladesh. A separate ESIA for Coal Transportation was also completed in June 2006.

The EIA of June 2005 was formally approved by the Government of Bangladesh's Department of Environment (DoE) on 11 September 2005 and at the same time the DoE gave the Project Environmental Clearance.

Social Commitment

The EIA and the ESIA detail the open pit mining process and demonstrate how approximately 40,000 people will be progressively re-settled and compensated over the 30-plus-year life of the mine, how livelihoods will be maintained through training and new job opportunities, living standards improved and houses and infrastructure re-located and re-built. They detail how plentiful water supplies will be maintained for both housing and farming, bio-diversity protected, and how the mined land will be progressively rehabilitated. The reports also explain that Asia Energy will establish a Development Fund to promote jobs and assistance programmes and implement an Environmental Management Plan for the life of the mine.

Asia Energy has an ongoing programme of consultation with all the communities in the Project area and with all the Project's stakeholders.

A Resettlement Plan and an Indigenous People's Development Plan, incorporating the findings and recommendations of the EIA and ESIA, were prepared in April 2006 in accordance with international best practice, including the Equator Principles and World Bank and Asian Development Bank (ADB) guidelines.

Highlights of the EIA and ESIA

• Implementing a detailed social and environment management plan to address all potential impacts
• Implementing a resettlement plan which involves an extension of the part of Phulbari Township west of the Little Jamuna River and establishment of a number of new settlement village sites with special care for the around 2,500 indigenous people who will have to be resettled.
• Full and fair compensation to replacement value for all loss of homes, land, business and other assets
• Assistance to re-establish and enhance livelihoods
• Establishment of a Community Development Fund
• Reinjection of water into the ground surrounding the mine and establishment of a reticulated water distribution system to homes and farms in the Project area
• Environmental protection measures including noise bunds and buffer areas
• Conservation of bio-diversity, and creation of new forests to increase tree coverage in the area.
• Progressive rehabilitation of the mined area back to its natural state
• Adopting measures to minimise loss of agricultural production and enhance production on rehabilitated land and elsewhere in the Project area