In preparation for its 2019-2022 Country Partnership Framework with South Africa, the World Bank Group has drafted a Systematic Country Diagnostic (SCD) which forms the basis of this book. Its aim is to strengthen understanding of the constraints in achieving two goals in South Africa: to eliminate poverty by 2030, and to boost shared prosperity. These goals are enshrined in South Africa’s Vision 2030 in the National Development Plan.

This book is the result of consultations and conversations with key government departments, the National Planning Commission, the private sector, academics and trade unions. It identifies five broad policy priorities: to build South Africa’s skills base; to reduce the highly skewed distribution of land and productive assets; to increase competitiveness and the country’s participation in global and regional value chains; to overcome apartheid spatial patterns; and to increase the country’s strategic adaptation to climate change. The key obstacle to growth that has been identified is ‘the legacy of exclusion’.

Undoing this is a long-term process, but renewed commitment by the political leadership to strengthen institutions and rebuild the social contract present an enormous opportunity in achieving progress towards South Africa’s Vision 2030.

Regenerating Urban Land draws on the experience of eight different case studies from around the world. The case studies outline various policy and financial instruments to attract private sector investment in urban regeneration of underutilized/unutilized areas and the requisite infrastructure improvements.

Just like nearly every aspect of human experience, crime, civil conflict, and violence have become increasingly global. Around the world, civil wars, of which there are more today than at any time since the end of World War II, displace greater numbers of people ever further from their countries of origin. Transnational terrorism has reached a 50-year high, in terms of both its incidence and the number of reported fatalities. Cross-border criminal markets—illicit drugs, human trafficking, wildlife trade, and so forth—take a heavy toll on the many societies they affect. This Policy Research Report, The Internationalisation of Crime, Conflict, and Violence, offers a unified framework to take stock of the theoretical and empirical literature on crime, conflict, and violence and to discuss how the international community organizes itself to address security as a regional and global public good. The increasingly global effects of crime and conflict require an equally global response to violence

Doing Business 2018 is the 15th publication in a series of annual reports comparing business regulation in 190 economies. It ranks economies on their ease of doing business and analyzes reforms to business regulation. This year's report expands the paying taxes indicator and includes a new annex which measures public procurement regulations.

The Little Data Book on Private Sector Development 2016 provides country tables on aspects of private sector development, accompanied by summary pages by region and by income group aggregates.

Remittances remain a key source of funds for developing countries, far exceeding official development assistance and even foreign direct investment. Remittances have proved to be more stable than private debt and portfolio equity flows, and less volatile than official aid flows, and their annual flow can match or surpass foreign exchange reserves in many small countries. Even in large emerging markets, such as India, remittances are equivalent to at least a quarter of total foreign exchange reserves. India, China, Philippines and Mexico are the top recipients of migrant remittances.The Migration and Remittances Factbook 2016 attempts to present numbers and facts behind the stories of international migration and remittances, drawing on authoritative, publicly available data. It provides a snapshot of statistics on immigration, emigration, skilled emigration, and remittance flows for 210 countries and 15 regional and income groups. The Migration and Remittances Factbook 2016 updates the 2011 edition of the Factbook with additional data on bilateral migration and remittances and second generation diasporas, collected from various sources, including national censuses, labor force surveys, populationregisters, and other national sources.

The World Bank Group was a principal founding partner of the Global Environment Facility (GEF) in its pilot phase in 1991, and of the restructured GEF in 1994. The Bank plays three different roles in the GEF: (a) as trustee of the GEF and related trust funds, (b) as implementing agency, including the implementation of private-sector GEF projects by the International Finance Corporation (IFC), and (c) as the host organization of the functionally independent GEF secretariat. Focusing primarily on the role of the Bank as an implementing agency, this review documents how the partnership that the GEF and the World Bank Group established in the early 1990s has evolved over time, offers explanations for observed changes, and draws a number of lessons. The review addresses the following issues: The mutual relevance of the World Bank Group and the GEF Inter-organizational coordination along the World Bank Group-GEF project cycle The introduction of the GEF s resource allocation systems in 2006 and 2010 The evolution and effectiveness of the Bank Group s GEF portfolio Catalytic approaches in the Bank Group-GEF partnership: co-financing, blending, and mainstreaming The World Bank s corporate activities as a GEF implementing agency. The principal purposes of this review are (a) to help improve the relevance and effectiveness of the Bank Group s partnership with the GEF, and (b) to draw lessons for the Bank Group s partnership with the GEF and other large global partnership programs."

The underlying goal of this book is to facilitate and stimulate sharing of information on these phenomena, and to provide an interdisciplinary framework for bringing about improved environmental conditions in Sindh. It includes a methodology that enables the identification of environmental and climate change priority problems; the analysis of interventions to address such problems; the establishment of a social learning mechanism to continuously improve Sindh's responses and build resilience in the face of climate variability and change; and opportunities for the potential involvement of different stakeholder groups to decisively tackle climate change and deteriorating environmental conditions.

The unanticipated spike in international food prices in 2007-08 hit many developing countries hard. International prices for food and other agricultural products increased by more than 100 percent between early 2007 and mid-2008. Prices for food cereals more than doubled; and those for rice doubled in the space of just a few months. The food price increases were particularly hard on the poor and near-poor in developing countries, many of whom spend a large share of their income on food and have limited means to cope with price shocks. An estimated 1.29 billion people in 2008 lived on less than $1.25 a day, equivalent to 22.4 percent of the developing world population. In addition, the Food and Agriculture Organization estimated that 923 million people were undernourished in 2007. Simulation models suggested that poverty rose by 100-200 million people and the undernourished increased by 63 million in 2008. The World Bank organized rapidly for short-term support in the crisis, launching a fast-track program of loans and grants, the Global Food Crisis Response Program (GFRP). The GFRP mainly targeted low-income countries, and provided detailed policy advice to governments and its own staff on how to respond to the crisis. The Bank also scaled up lending for agriculture and social protection to support the building of medium-term resilience to future food price shocks. The International Finance Corporation responded by sharply increasing access to liquidity for agribusinesses and agricultural traders in the short and medium term, as well as new programs to improve incentives for agricultural market participants. This evaluation assesses the effectiveness of the World Bank Group response in addressing the short-term impacts of the food price crisis and in enhancing the resilience of countries to future shocks.

Global growth again disappointed in 2014 but a lackluster recovery is underway, with increasingly divergent prospects in major economies. Looking ahead, growth is expected to rise slowly, supported by continued recovery in high-income countries and receding domestic headwinds in developing economies. Weak global trade growth and lower commodity prices are projected to persist while financial conditions will likely tighten gradually. Risks to the outlook are still tilted to the downside. The stability of remittances may help some of the lowest-income countries weather shocks. In some developing economies, monetary policy challenges may be attenuated if falling commodity prices reduce inflationary pressures. Fiscal stimulus could effectively support growth if there is sufficient fiscal space. Some developing countries, however, have to rebuild fiscal space to preserve their ability to implement countercyclical fiscal policy, which has served them well over the decade. Both high-income and developing countries need to undertake structural reforms that promote growth and job creation and help achieve poverty reduction goals. The Global Economic Prospects is a World Bank Group Flagship Report. On a twice yearly basis (January and June), it examines global economic developments and prospects, with a special focus on developing countries. The report includes analysis of topical policy challenges faced by developing countries through extensive research in the January edition and shorter pieces in the June edition.

This book is based on the findings of analysis that measured the expansion and population change in urban agglomerations across East Asia between 2000 and 2010. Key findings show an overall rapid pace of urban growth, both in terms of land and population, dominated mostly by China. In the coming decades, urban areas will be the place where millions of East Asians will have the chance to leave extreme poverty behind and to prosper. But getting the urban form, density, and administrative coordination right will be essential to increase the odds of that happening. There is much policy makers can do to influence urban growth in a coordinated way both at a national level through a system of cities and at the level of individual agglomerations to make urban growth more economically efficient, more socially inclusive, and more environmentally sustainable.

Violence against Women and Girls: Lessons from South Asia examines the prevalence and factors associated with various types of violence against women and girls in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka. It analyses the nature of violence throughout the life cycle and highlights gaps where intensive research or interventions might be undertaken. Analyses of the most recent data reveal that South Asia has the world's highest levels of excess female child mortality and child marriage. The prevalence of intimate partner violence also remains unacceptably high, particularly for married adolescents. Reliable data are limited for other forms of violence. The number and intensity of efforts to address violence in the region are truly impressive and yield promising practices for future action. Important challenges remain, however-particularly the need for more rigorous evaluation and the urgency for actors to engage across forms of violence and to more systematically involve men and boys in addressing this violence. Different stakeholders have distinct roles to play if the region is to make progress in violence prevention and response, including increased funding of programs and evaluations. On the whole, strengthening the effectiveness, reach, and sustainability of interventions will involve multifaceted coordination across all actors on the ground. This book offers evidence-based recommendations for these actors and for coordination among them.

As part of its strategy to support global trade, the World Bank Group seeks to enhance trade finance in emerging markets. In 2005 the International Finance Corporation (IFC), part of the Bank Group, introduced the Global Trade Finance Program (GTFP) to support the extension of trade finance to underserved clients globally. This IEG evaluation found that overall, the GTFP was a relevant response to the demand to reduce risk in trade finance in emerging markets. The programme significantly improved IFC's engagement in trade finance by introducing an open network of banks and a quick, flexible response platform to support the supply of trade finance. IEG's evaluation covers the programme's operations from its inception in 2005 through FY2012. The programme grew from a $500 million annual commitment to $5 billion in FY12. It accounted for 39 percent of total IFC commitments and has low costs-it accounted for 2.4 percent of IFC's capital use and 1.2 percent of its staff costs and has had no claims to date. It is profitable as well, although not to the extent originally expected, accounting for 0.6 percent of IFC's net profit. IEG found that the GTFP has particular additionality among higher-risk countries. In its early years, it was concentrated in these countries, particularly in Africa. During the global crisis, the programme risk-mitigation instrument became relevant in much broader markets. Client feedback on the programme has been positive. In its evaluation IEG does offer several recommendations to enhance its effectiveness, including on issues of transparency and reporting methods, as well as expanding the share of the programme in needier markets. For development professionals, the lessons in this evaluation can be applied to private sector development situations, particularly mitigation of financing risks in emerging markets.

The World Bank Group has made important contributions to poverty reduction in developing countries. But to stay relevant under the uncertain conditions that characterise today's global development context, the Bank Group needs to enhance its capacity to help clients cope with weak economic growth, address persistent disparities in development progress, and manage the increasingly global and cross-cutting nature of development solutions. The messages in this report from the Independent Evaluation Group (IEG) seek to help the Bank Group improve its programs and development outcomes. Thus the primary audience is Bank Group management. Additional audiences include other development organisations, nongovernmental organisations, and civil society organisations that are involved in development issues, as they also seek better development outcomes. This report addresses IEG's work over the last year, summarising findings from its evaluations and discussing the trends that are revealed. In particular, as a consequence of the Bank Group's rapid, large-scale response to the 2008-09 crisis, the Bank's remaining capital headroom precludes a comparable expansion should another crisis occur. In addition, the extent to which country programmes meet their objectives has yet to reach the performance target set in the Bank's Corporate Scorecard. Development outcome ratings of Bank-funded investment projects, as well as the outcome ratings for International Finance Corporation (IFC) investments, have recently declined. IEG's findings suggest that enhancing the quality of projects at their outset as well as their supervision would help reverse the decline in Bank project ratings; along the same line, improving IFC's work quality would strengthen the results of its investments. Evaluation evidence also underscores the importance of sustained dialogue with stakeholders and of high-quality analytical work to sharpen the understanding of client circumstances, which is essential for successful outcomes. Effective development solutions require intensified efforts by the Bank Group to work across conventional boundaries.

Global Development Finance 2012: External Debt of Developing Countries is a continuation of the World Bank s publications Global Development Finance, Volume II (1997 through 2009) and the earlier World Debt Tables (1973 through 1996). As in previous years, GDF 2012 provides statistical tables showing the external debt of 129 developing countries that report public and publicly guaranteed external debt to the World Bank s Debtor Reporting System (DRS). It also includes tables of key debt ratios for individual reporting countries and the composition of external debt stocks and flows for individual reporting countries and regional and income groups along with some graphical presentations. GDF 2012 draws on a database maintained by the World Bank External Debt (WBXD) system. Longer time series and more detailed data are available from the Global Development Finance 2012 on CD-ROM and the World Bank open databases, which contain more than 200 time series indicators, covering the years 1970 to 2010 for most reporting countries, and pipeline data for scheduled debt service payments on existing commitments to 2018. The database covers external debt stocks and flows, major economic aggregates, and key debt ratios, as well as average terms of new commitments, currency composition of longterm debt, and debt restructurings in greater detail than can be included in the GDF book. The CD-ROM also contains the full contents of the print version of GDF 2012. Text providing country notes, definitions, and source information is linked to each table. World Bank open databases are available through the World Bank s website, http: // www.worldbank.org. The Little Data Book on External Debt 2012 provides a quick reference to the data from GDF 2012. For more information on the GDF database, CD-ROM, and print publications go to http: //publications. worldbank.org/ecommerce/. Global Development Finance 2012: External Debt of Developing Countries is unique in its coverage of the important trends and issues fundamental to the financing of the developing world. This report is an indispensible resource for governments, economists, investors, financial consultants, academics, bankers, and the entire development community. Further details about the GDF 2012 can be found at http: //data.worldbank.org/."

The book details the steps taken by 11 countries across Eastern Europe and Central Asia to strengthen their HIV programs based on the findings, and highlights critical issues for the road ahead.

Policy makers in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) often complain that poor fiscal performance in their countries is a result of a high degree of spending rigidity. Despite being a common complaint, the issue has remained largely ignored by the literature because of the lack of adequate measures of rigidity that allow cross-country and time series comparability. This report helps close this gap by introducing a new measure of spending rigidities that can be easily applied to multiple countries. It focuses on the categories of spending that are naturally inflexible--wages, pensions, transfers to subnational governments, and debt service--and separates them into two components: structural and nonstructural. The structural component is determined by economic, demographic, and institutional fundamentals. The nonstructural component is determined by short-run transitory factors associated with business and political cycles. The degree of rigidity of spending is then proxied by the ratio of structural spending to total spending, with a higher value indicating that spending is driven mostly by factors out of the policy makers' control. This concept of rigidity was applied to 120 countries for the years 2000+"17 and produced several interesting results: - Advanced economies and developing countries in other regions have higher levels of rigidity than countries in LAC. - The sources of rigidity vary by country. - Higher rigidity is associated with higher spending levels, higher tax rates, higher public debt, and lower efficiency of public spending. - Rigidity has pervasive effects on fiscal sustainability, increasing the country's financing needs and reducing the probability of the country starting a fiscal adjustment. Given these pervasive effects of spending rigidity, the report concludes by discussing several policies to contain the sources of rigidity in the long term, ranging from the importance of deepening the pension reform process to the need of establishing strong fiscal institutions promoting medium-term fiscal planning.

This book begins with an extensive descriptive account of villagers' dealings in the markets for labor, tenancies, credit, and crops, drawing on interviews and household surveys from the early 1980s. The book subsequently analyzes various alternative contractual arrangements and villagers' choices among them.

Learning outcomes in Lebanon have been lower than the international average and with a declining trend since 2007. This volume uses a political economy approach and a system-level analysis to uncover why the education system in Lebanon is not reaching its full potential.

The International Comparison Program (ICP) is a worldwide statistical initiative led by the World Bank under the auspices of the United Nations Statistical Commission. It produces comparable price and volume measures of gross domestic product (GDP) and its expenditure aggregates across economies. Through a partnership with international, regional, sub-regional and national agencies, the ICP collects price data and GDP expenditures to estimate purchasing power parities (PPPs) for the world's economies. The report provides ICP results for the benchmark year 2017 and revised results for earlier years. ICP data are used for socio-economic analyses by researchers, academics, policy makers at the national and international levels, and by organizations such as the European Union, the International Monetary Fund, the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, the United Nations, and the World Bank. Notably, PPPs and ICP data are used in indicators monitoring progress towards eight goals of the United Nations' 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, the World Bank's international poverty lines, and the construction of the Human Development Index by the United Nations, among others. The use of PPPs continues to grow and the ICP website (icp.worldbank.org) lists many applications of the data by the development community, academia, media and others.

The fourth edition of IFC's Food Safety Handbook is a step-by-step guide to help food sector businesses large or small establish or improve food safety systems. Written in easy-to-follow English and supplemented with useful tools for food safety management system implementation.

This publication provides a comprehensive overview of topics focusing on assessment, analysis, and management of financial risks in banking. It emphasizes risk management principles and stresses that key players in the corporate governance process are accountable for managing the different dimensions of financial and other risks. This fourth edition remains faithful to the objectives of the original publication. The new business aspects affecting banking risks, such as mobile banking, and regulatory changes over the past decade-specifically those related to Basel III capital adequacy concepts-have been included, as have new operational risk management topics, such as cybercrime, money laundering, and outsourcing. This publication will be of interest to a wide body of users of bank financial data. The target audience includes the persons responsible for the analysis of banks and for the senior management or organizations directing their efforts. Because the publication provides an overview of the spectrum of corporate governance and risk management, it is not aimed at technical specialists of any particular risk management area.

This guide aims to convey country experiences and good international practices as a basis for decisions on how to address country-specific public investment management reform agendas.

How can countries make sustainable gains in student learning at scale? This is a pressing question for Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) – and the developing world more broadly – as countries seek to build human capital to drive sustainable growth. Significant progress in access has expanded coverage such that nearly all children in the region attend primary school, but many do not gain basic skills and drop out before completing secondary school, in part due to low-quality service delivery. The preponderance of evidence shows that it is learning – and not schooling in and of itself – that contributes to individual earnings, economic growth, and reduced inequality. For LAC in particular, low levels of human capital are a critical factor in explaining the region's relatively weak growth performance over the last half century. The easily measurable inputs are well-known, and the end goal is relatively clear, but raising student achievement at scale remains a challenge. Why? We propose that part of the answer lies in management – the processes and practices that guide how inputs into the education system are translated into outputs, and ultimately outcomes. While management (and related concepts, such as institutions, governance, or leadership) is often mentioned as an important factor in education policy discussions, relatively little quantitative research has been done to define and measure it. And even less has been done to unpack how and how much management matters for education quality. In this study, we begin filling these gaps, with new conceptual and empirical contributions that can be synthesized in four key messages: (1) Student learning is unlikely to improve at scale without better management. (2) Management affects how well every level of an education system functions, from individual schools to central technical units, and how well they work together. (3) Management quality can be measured and should be measured as a catalyst for improvement. (4) Several pathways to strengthening management are open to LAC countries now, with the potential for significant results. The study elaborates on each of these messages, synthesizing recent data and research and presenting the results of six new papers written to inform this report. The target audience for the Executive Summary is policymakers across LAC (and beyond) who are seeking approaches to strengthening their systems at scale. The target audience for the study overall includes the researchers and technical advisors who work on topics related to education management in development organizations, governments, think tanks, and other institutions across LAC