The CSO Aid Observatorio includes a total of 34 ADB-funded development projects, of which most (26 projects) are funded by ADB alone. Touting themselves as the “climate bank” of the Asia Pacific, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) is an international financial institution that provides grants, loans, technical assistance, and equity investments to developing member countries with the goal of achieving a “prosperous, inclusive, resilient, and sustainable Asia and the Pacific.” It is one of the major channels of development finance in the region.

ADB is channeling majority of its financing towards infrastructure projects in the sub-regions of Central Asia (15 projects), South Asia (12), Southeast Asia (6), and Northeast Asia (1). According to data submitted to the Aid Observatorio, there is an evident concentration of ADB-funded projects in the Central Asian countries of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan. These countries continue to face threats of authoritarian policies that hinder civil society movements from monitoring development projects and safeguarding people’s rights in their own countries.

If movements clamoring for people’s rights are silenced and targeted, affected people in these project sites will continue to experience adverse impacts on human rights, peace and security, democracy, and the environment, such as forced displacement, militarization, corruption, a lack of accountability and transparency, pollution, deforestation, hazardous waste or oil spills, loss of biodiversity, and landslide risks.

See trends, analysis, and visualization of ADB-funded development projects below.