Working on corporate social responsibility issues in Tibet involves all the issues that come into play in China, and then some, says John Ackerly.

Few international companies have been interested in Tibet, mostly because of its remoteness, poor infrastructure and small population.

This is not to mention the bureaucratic and administrative headaches of dealing with China over a sensitive ‘national minority’ region.

That is starting to change, however. China has been pumping money into Tibet and encouraging foreign investment under the People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) high-profile ‘Western development’ strategy.

China is opening up transportation links with the hinterland by building a railroad across some of the most forbidding high-altitude terrain in the world to Lhasa from Golmud in Qinghai.

Projects such as these raise a number of corporate social responsibility issues that are distinct from mainland China.

The largest of these issues involves the ethnic divisions between Tibetans and the Chinese, most of whom are recent arrivals or migrant workers in Tibet.

This situation raises significant consequences in that companies who choose to invest in Tibet are actually supporting Chinese strategic and political aims that are of dubious benefit to the Tibetan people.

Many of these are also known to have had a detrimental impact on Tibetan lifestyles, livelihoods, culture and religion.

The development of the Tibetan economy is inseparable from China’s longer-term strategic plan to assimilate Tibetan areas into ‘the motherland’.

This is resulting in the undermining of Tibet’s unique religion and culture. Official Chinese documentation even admits as much.

The indigenous population is being economically marginalized while Chinese companies and workers are snapping up the contracts and the jobs – often because the Chinese workers are more educated and skilled.

Mure Dickie, the Beijing correspondent for The Financial Times, in a lengthy article on Tibet, said that despite government assurances, not a single Tibetan worker could be found at a major job site near Lhasa. [Financial Times, August 2, 2004]

By far the most high-profile controversy over social responsibility didn't involve a private company, but rather the World Bank, which sought to fund the transfer of mainly Chinese farmers from a desperately poor area into traditionally Tibetan lands.

The main underlying issue here was – who were the main beneficiaries and who stood to lose?

This project would have set the damaging precedent of an international financial institution supporting Chinese demographic and political aims.

Ultimately the World Bank scrapped the project when it realized that the project violated its own policies in order to comply with what the Chinese government wanted.

An independent Bank body found that such a "climate of fear" existed amongst Tibetans that genuine social or environmental surveys could not be carried out.

Instead, Beijing withdrew its request for a loan and began to carry out the project itself, without international funding.

Social responsibility concerns are heightened in Tibet partially because of the international spotlight on Tibet in recent years.

The Dalai Lama has brought considerable prestige to his cause as well as a very pragmatic approach toward development issues in Tibet.

The Dalai Lama and the Tibetan government in exile favour and encourage business and development that benefits the Tibetan people and helps to raise their standard of living.

Dozens of non-governmental organizations engaged in micro-enterprise development, eco-tourism, education and heath projects, environmental protection and arts and crafts development all have the wide support of Tibetans both inside and outside of Tibet.

Many Tibetan and Western non-governmental organizations, tour operators and businesses privately consult with the Dalai Lama and keep his office abreast of their work.

However, projects that encourage the influx of more Chinese settlers, such as the World Bank project, run afoul of development guidelines established by the Dalai Lama's government in exile, and sometimes his government actively opposes such projects.

Other social responsibility considerations can come into play also, on a more cultural level, such as Tibetan sensitivities to eating some kinds of meat.

In an unusual move, the Dalai Lama recently made a statement opposing the possibility of Kentucky Fried Chicken opening a branch in Lhasa.

The Dalai Lama personally opposed such a move because of practices in the commercial chicken industry. (Tibetans, including the Dalai Lama, generally eat beef and lamb but traditionally had taboos against fish and ate little or no chicken.)

While the KFC incident made news, it is far from representative of the typical social responsibility issues in Tibet.

These much more to do with the impact on Tibetans of large-scale, state-funded infrastructure projects such as the Qinghai-Tibet Autonomous Region railway.

The railway poses one of the greatest dilemmas to Tibetans because, while some Tibetans favour it (or rather welcome the prospect of better transport links to different areas), they also realize that it represents a major threat.

Certainly, Tibetans will benefit in a variety of ways, but the main users of the railway will be the Chinese settlers and the military, both of which have always needed more dependable transportation and supply lines to China.

Few doubt that the railway will facilitate a greater influx of Chinese into Tibet, and Beijing has shown no concern for limiting migrants into Tibet as they do for major cities in eastern China.

China is itself underwriting this massive construction project and has not approached the World Bank or the Asian Development Bank. To date there seem to be few contracts on the project that foreign companies can bid on.

Tibetan advocacy groups have called on foreign companies not to participate in this project because its primary users will be the military and Chinese settlers rather than the Tibetans, whose livelihoods, culture and tradition it places at risk.

A broader understanding of the intensity of the conflict in Tibet by senior management would have gone a long way towards heading off the debacle that befell the World Bank. This could easily be replayed by corporate actors in the future if they are not careful.

Those companies likely to risk money in the region in the future – mining, service and construction companies - should be wary of the World Bank’s mistakes, and learn from them.

"Guidelines For International Development Projects And Sustainable Investment In Tibet," is available at: www.tibet.com/aidTibet.html.

John Ackerly is President of the International Campaign for Tibet