A Soros-run nonprofit’s plan to pump hundreds of millions of dollars into third-world climate programs reeks of “green colonialism,” experts told the Daily Caller News Foundation.
The Open Society Foundations (OSF) will commit $400 million over eight years to support green industrial policies for a group of developing nations dubbed the “global south,” according to a July 16 press release. The new funding is the latest in a long line of initiatives from left-wing billionaire George Soros that pressure developing countries into aligning with the organization’s green agenda, which ultimately harms locals in pursuit of its climate goals, experts told the DCNF.
“It’s a horribly misguided idea, but it’s the namesake and guiding ideology of the Open Society Foundations,” Capital Research Center investigative researcher Parker Thayer told the DCNF. “OSF’s latest push to try and remake the ‘global south’ through top-down government industrial policy is going to be a disaster for developing nations whose problems would best be solved by the free market. It’s nothing more than a misguided experiment in green colonialism.”
One way OSF inserts itself into the affairs of developing nations is by pouring resources into conservation efforts, such as for the Amazon rainforest, where its Latin American program works to preserve the ecosystem, according to a 2021 press release. Farmers and agriculture workers clear the Amazon to keep up with beef and soybean demand as they continue to develop and industrialize the available land, using the freshly cut space for agriculture and cattle grazing, according to the Council on Foreign Relations.
“We have seen ‘so-called’ experts in climate change, forcing communities to protect their surroundings by a scheme of forest conservation,” Miriam Lang, professor of environment and sustainability at Universidad Andina Simón Bolívar in Ecuador, told Leadership News. “But now, these experts want them to stay out of the forests because the carbon in them has to remain untouched, supposedly. This is a modern form of colonial appropriation, which is also very absurd.”
The OSF manages over $4 billion in net assets, according to 2022 IRS filings. The foundation is a regular donor to other climate-related organizations in addition to their own spending, donating over $2.5 million in 2022.
“They’re tied in heavily with the World Economic Forum and the internationalist agenda,” David Blackmon, who had a 40-year career in the oil and gas business before writing and consulting on the energy sector, told the DCNF. “It’s a huge wealth transfer, disadvantaging the use of oil, gas, and coal, which have been the cheap and reliable forms of energy, and replacing them with weather-dependent sources like wind and solar energy.”
The initiative lists Brazil, Mexico, South Africa, Senegal, Malaysia and Indonesia among the nations that grants will be distributed to, according to the press release.
“It is routine for think tanks and economic policy experts to produce policy recommendations for their governments on all aspects of industrial and economic policy,” Laura Carvalho, OSF director of economic and climate prosperity, told the DCNF. “Top-down prescriptive recommendations have not worked, especially as there is no one-size-fits-all solution. We want to invest in ideas that are homegrown and owned. That is why we will be supporting work on generating knowledge, policy options, civil society engagement and capacity development in our target countries and beyond.”
To develop green industrial policies that contribute to economic growth in the Global South and address the climate emergency, we’re committing $400 million over eight years, a significant increase in our support for economic development. https://t.co/7P3tK3w6yQ pic.twitter.com/GiRBAiWQIJ
— Open Society Foundations (@OpenSociety) July 16, 2024
OSF claims the initiative will help create “jobs and reduce inequalities in developing countries,” according to the press release. However, Steve Milloy, a senior legal fellow for the Energy and Environment Legal Institute, told the DCNF that these green jobs deserve skepticism.
“So all this talk about green jobs is just ridiculous. These are not good jobs. These are not long-lasting jobs, not the kind of jobs you have economic growth with,” Milloy told the DCNF. “And so, you know, at face value, this sort of debunks the green jobs bit, and it’s just virtue signaling for Soros. I suspect it’s really a cover for something else. You know, the money is going into poor countries for political agitation.”
In the U.S., where there has already been a significant push for green energy, a large portion of the jobs that have been created in the industry have been in construction rather than operating the plants, making them temporary upon completion of the project as opposed to the fossil fuel sector, which requires a greater permanent workforce, according to Forbes. Additionally, less than 1% of workers who left the fossil fuel industry in the past have gone on to work in green energy jobs.
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