Illustrates the key development challenges facing our world. Using easy-to read, colorful world maps, tables, graphs, text and photographs, this book presents the social, economic, and environmental issues that are facing the planet.
"The Little Data Book on Financial Inclusion 2015 is a pocket edition of the Global Financial Inclusion (Global Findex) database published in 2015. This data set represents a second round of data collection, following the initial round three years earlier. The database provides nationally representative, demand-side data on access to and use of accounts, credit, payments and savings by adults age 15 and above in 143 economies. In addition, new indicators measure people's ability to manage risk. This book presents data for selected indicators by country, region, and income group. For some indicators the data are disaggregated by age, gender, income level, and rural residence."
This report presents the five roots of spatial inequity in institutional inefficiencies across MENA--urban regulatory frictions, credentialist education systems, centralized control over local public services, barriers to the spatial mobility of goods and people, and barriers to market entry and lop-sided business environments.
With more than 70 percent of its population living in cities, Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) is among the most urbanized regions in the world. Yet, although its cities are, on average, more productive than those elsewhere in the world, their productivity lags that of North American and Western European cities. Closing this gap provides LAC with the opportunity to raise living standards and join the ranks of the world's richest countries.Raising the Bar: Cities and Productivity in Latin America and the Caribbean is about the productivity of cities in LAC and the factors that help to explain its determination. Based on original empirical research, the report documents the high levels of population density and other features of LAC cities that mark them out from those in the rest of the world.The report also studies the role of three key factors - urban form, skills, and access to markets - in determining the productivity of LAC cities. It shows that while excessive congestion forces and inadequate metropolitan coordination seem to be stifling the benefits of agglomeration, LAC cities benefit from strong human capital externalities. It also finds that, within individual LAC countries, cities are poorly integrated with one another, which contributes to large differences in performance across cities and undermines their aggregate contribution to productivity at the national level.
With growing water scarcity in many parts of the world and projections that indicate the need to increase agricultural production and, concurrently, agricultural water use, it is increasingly advocated to focus efforts on improving agricultural water productivity and efficiency--and thus achieve more crop per drop. Many international organizations concerned with water management are also promoting these efforts, and significant public and private investments are being made in both developed and developing countries. Yet some serious problems are associated with this approach. They include conceptual issues, the methods used for measuring agricultural water productivity and efficiency, and the application of these concepts and methods in different contexts--all of which influence the choice of interventions and the evaluation of their implementation. The report aims to shed further light on these issues: first, by clarifying some of the underlying concepts in the discussion of agricultural water productivity and efficiency; second, by reviewing and analyzing the available methods for assessing water productivity and efficiency, including single-factor productivity measures, total factor productivity indices, frontier methods, and deductive methods; and, third, by discussing their application and relevance in different contexts. As a background for this analysis, the report highlights the central role of water use in irrigated agriculture and its link with increasing water scarcity. An underlying framework of the analysis is the view of the water economy transitioning from an expansionary to a mature phase. The report further develops this framework to reflect water management issues in irrigated agriculture. The framework is then applied to make the case that, with increasing water scarcity, the ongoing efforts for improving agricultural water productivity and efficiency need to move beyond crop per drop approaches, because they are in many circumstances an insufficient and sometimes counterproductive attempt to adapt agricultural water management to a maturing water economy
By comparing countries like Venezuela and Chile, China and India, Dominican Republic and Haiti, and others, the book tries to answer the questions of which institutions and policies are crucial for stable long term economic growth.
The rapid increases in world food prices since 2005 have raised widespread concerns about their possible impact on poverty, hunger, and general progress toward the Millennium Development Goals. This year's report summarizes the short- and long-term impact of food prices on several MDGs, explores future trends, and review policy responses, from domestic policies such as social safety nets, nutritional programs and agricultural policies, to regional trade policies to support by the international community. This year's theme is used as a filter to examine progress toward the MDGs--especially for women, children, and countries in fragile situations. The Global Monitoring Report is prepared jointly by the World Bank and International Monetary Fund.
This report conveys the Bank's global priorities and programs to help countries progress toward the international education goals and improve the quality of teaching and learning.
In November 1997 the World Bank and Singapore's Institute of Policy Studies sponsored a conference, 'Financing Health Care and Old Age Security, ' to assess and identify potential solutions to these concerns. It addressed a topic of concern to nearly every country, developing and industrial, that is, how to deal with the implications of financing medical care and income security for rapidly aging populations. The issues identified and the solutions proposed can provide insight and guidance for policymakers, researchers, and others interested in addressing these challenges now. Of special interest are the contributors' analyses of Singapore's unique, integrated approach to managing social risk, which is based on mandatory individual savings accounts