Conflict-Sensitive Business Practice: Towards the Integration of Conflict Assessment and Prevention in Extractive Industry Practice
Publisher: R. Goldwyn and J. Switzer
Date: 2004
Topics: Assessment, Conflict Prevention, Extractive Resources
For oil, gas and mining companies operating in areas of potential or open conflict, there are clear bottom-line and ethical drivers compelling them to manage their operations in such a way to avoid aggravating or triggering violence at the local and national levels. As the easy sources of valuable natural resources are exhausted, international firms are increasingly investing in frontier areas, which demand greater technical and political sophistication in order to succeed.This paper has four main objectives: to provide an overview of current impact assessment practice; to provide an overview of conflict impact assessment approaches in the development and humanitarian sectors; to identify gaps in current environmental and social impact assessment from a conflict sensitive perspective; and to trace the outlines of a toolkit for the extractive sector, whose purpose is to fill in the gaps in private sector practice.