The heavily criticized legal mechanism, known as ISDS, is an important tool for European companies to pressurize developing countries. This year Uganda joins the rank of developing nations asking themselves: “Why have we ever signed this?”
American mining corporation Newmont escaped the domestic processing requirement from Indonesia’s 2009 Mining Law. It achieved this by using a clause in a Dutch investment treaty.
The vast majority of the land deals from the recent wave of agribusiness investments in low and middle-income countries are protected by at least one investment treaty.