With 2015 marking the transition from
the Millennium to the Sustainable Development Goals, the
international community can celebrate many development
successes since 2000. Three key challenges stand out: the
depth of remaining poverty, the unevenness in shared
prosperity, and the persistent disparities in non-income
dimensions of development. First, the policy discourse needs
to focus more directly on the poorest among the poor. While

Iraq appears to have firmly entered the
ranks of upper middle-income countries in 2012, having
experienced strong economic growth following the
establishment of a civilian elected government in 2005-06.
In 2012 the years of growth culminated in a per capita GDP
of 2472 constant 2005 US$. This three-volume poverty and
inclusion assessment provides the first in-depth analysis of
Iraq's economic and social development during the

El Salvador is the smallest country in
Central America, and one of the most densely populated in
the world. El Salvador is among the countries most affected
by weather-related events and other hazards, incurring
annual losses of around 2.5 percent of GDP. Worldwide, it
ranks second highest for risk exposure to two or more
hazards and highest for the total population at a relatively
high risk of mortality. Furthermore, climate change is

Myanmar is a country in transition with
great regional diversity. It is still a relatively young
country with the highest share of its population at active
working age. Myanmar’s more pressing needs are the
following: a) reducing the incidence of poverty and
improving human development outcomes, with a particular
emphasis on reaching the poor and vulnerable. Children from
poor families fare worse when it comes to nutrition, and

In the past decade, Latin America and
the Caribbean has achieved impressive social and economic
successes. For the first time in history, more people are in
the middle class than in poverty. Inequality, although still
high, declined markedly. Growth, jobs and effective social
programs have transformed the lives of millions. In a
striking departure from the crisis-prone Latin America of
the past, the region has shown it is better prepared to

This paper analyzes environmental
reliance, poverty, and climate vulnerability among more than
7,300 households in forest adjacent communities in 24
developing countries. The data are from the detailed,
quarterly income recording done by the Poverty Environment
Network project. Observed income is combined with predicted
income (based on households’ assets and other
characteristics) to create four categories of households:

The purpose of this note is to provide the monetary cost of various social safety net
targeting schemes that can be deployed to reduce vulnerability and increase resilience. It is
believed that gradually switching to the provision of social safety nets can reduce the chronic
dependency on humanitarian (mainly food) aid. At the same time, it could help to alleviate reliance
on patronage networks and switch a portion of the public spending from unproductive uses (e.g.,

Africa has great potential for
agriculture. Although international commodity prices have
been buoyant, Africa’s supply response seems to be weak. A
variety of constraints may exist. Using the case of
Tanzania, the paper examines the impact of market
connectivity, domestic and international, on farmers’ crop
choices. It is shown that the international market
connectivity, measured by transport costs to the maritime

This paper identifies the low-elevation
coastal zone populations and developing regions most
vulnerable to sea-level rise and other coastal hazards, such
as storm surges, coastal erosion, and salt-water intrusion.
The focus is on the rural poor in the low-elevation coastal
zone, as their economic livelihoods are especially
endangered directly by coastal hazards and indirectly
through the impacts of climate change on key coastal and

The recent decline in India’s rural
female labor force participation is generally attributed to
higher rural incomes in a patriarchal society. Together with
the growing share of the urban population, where female
participation rates are lower, this alleged income effect
does not bode well for the empowerment of women as India
develops. This paper argues that a traditional supply-side
interpretation is insufficient to account for the decline in

This paper discusses how catastrophe
crop risk models can be used to assess food security needs
at the sovereign level for the purpose of risk transfer. The
rationale for a system to evaluate food security needs at
the national level is discussed. The role of technology and
remote sensing data availability as an enabler of
catastrophe crop risk models is discussed followed by a
description of the framework of catastrophe crop models for

Sustainable development goals (SDGs)
placed access to basic services at the center of
international development in 2016-2030. Out of 17 goals,
five address the access of poor people to basic services: to
health in SDG3, to education in SDG4, and SDG5, to water and
sanitation in SDG6, to energy in SDG7, and to urban services
in SDG11. The mutually reinforcing relationship between
electricity access, economic development, and poverty