This paper explores the challenges and
opportunities that government officials face in designing
coherent 'rules of the game' for achieving urban
sustainability during times of growth. Sustainability is
judged by three criteria. The first involves elements of
day-to-day quality of life, such as having clean air and
water and green space. The provision of these public goods
has direct effects on the urban public's health and

The development community is
increasingly accepting the importance of evidence, feedback,
and learning. Some of which is generated through research,
monitoring, and self-evaluation during policy-making,
program design, and implementation. Others come from
feedback from people directly affected by interventions who
have gained a greater voice, be it through third-party
feedback mechanisms, social media, beneficiary surveys, or

This report describes efforts by the
ClimateWorks Foundation and the World Bank to quantify the
multiple economic, social, and environmental benefits
associated with policies and projects to reduce emissions in
select sectors and regions. The report has three objectives:
1) to develop a holistic, adaptable framework to capture and
measure the multiple benefits of reducing emissions of
several pollutants; 2) to demonstrate how local and national

The Association of Southeast Asian
Nations (ASEAN) brings together ten countries with over 620
million people and a combined gross domestic product of more
than USD 2.5 trillion. These countries are well integrated
into the global economy and have benefited from this
integration. And, as evidenced by their adoption of the
ambitious goal of forming an ASEAN Economic Community (AEC)
by 2015, they are committed to even deeper regional

The government of Argentina and the
World Bank desire to improve the efficiency and results of
the environmental and social outcomes of jointly financed
development projects. As part of a workshop in November 2010
attended by officials of the Ministry of Economy and Public
Finance of Argentina, World Bank staff, and representatives
of implementing units of projects being co-financed by the
Bank, several issues with regard to the implementation of

The objective of this report is to
examine the linkages between rural economic activity, food
insecurity and poverty in Haiti as a means of determining
the barriers to rural development. The analysis draws on a
newly available set of house-hold level living standards
measurement data collected in 2012 (ECVMAS). About 70.7
percent of all rural households are poor, and education
levels are low with an average of 2.8 years of education for

The development and business communities
involved in the African agriculture and agribusiness sectors
have recently experienced a strong resurgence of interest in
promoting value chains as an approach that can help design
interventions geared to add value, lower transaction costs,
diversify rural economies, and contribute to increasing
rural household incomes in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA)
countries. Enhancing value chain competitiveness is

This paper takes stock of the current
state of banking systems across Sub-Saharan Africa and
discusses recent developments including innovations that
might help Africa leapfrog more traditional banking models.
Using an array of different data, the paper documents that
African banking systems are shallow but stable. African
banks are well capitalized and over-liquid, but lend less to
the private sector than banks in non-African developing

In the past 50 years, Indian agriculture
has undergone a major transformation, from dependence on
food aid to becoming a consistent net food exporter. The
gradual reforms in the agricultural sector (following the
broader macro-reforms of the early 1990s) spurred some
unprecedented innovations and changes in the food sector
driven by private investment. These impressive achievements
must now be viewed in light of the policy and investment

Housing matters to the livability of
cities and to the productivity of their economies. The
failure of cities to accommodate the housing needs of
growing urban populations can be seen in the proliferation
of poorly serviced, high-density informal settlements. Such
settlements are not new in the history of rapidly growing
cities, their persistence results as much from policies as
from economics and demographic transition. Slums have

Climate change presents significant
threats to sustainable poverty reduction in Tajikistan. The
primary impacts on rural livelihoods are expected to stem
from reduced water quantity and quality (affecting
agriculture), and increased frequency and severity of
disasters. Options for farming households to autonomously
adapt (and thereby move from climate vulnerability to
resilience) include adoption of on-farm and off-farm

Over the past century or so, a wide
assortment of pre-harvest agreements, joint ventures, deals,
and pledges that can be termed contract farming have been
brokered between farmers and buyers. During the 1980s and
1990s, contract farming was frequently criticized as a
potentially exploitative arrangement, which favored the more
powerful buyer and left the small-scale farmer and the
environment vulnerable to abuse. More recently, there is