MIDDLE EAST AND NORTH AFRICA
BLUE SKIES, BLUE SEAS Air Pollution, Marine Plastics, and Coastal Erosion in the Middle East and North Africa By Martin Philipp Heger, Lukas Vashold, Anabella Palacios, Mala Alahmadi, Marjory-Anne Bromhead, and Marcelo Acerbi
This book shows how virtually all forms of natural capital, but particularly “blue” natural capital—skies and seas—has been degrading in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region over the past three decades, and focuses on the three challenges of air pollution, marine plastics, and coastal erosion. MENA's cities are on average more than five times as air-polluted as recommended by the WHO guidelines, and not a single MENA city, which reported data, meets them. This natural capital degradation has effects on people and the economy, which are assessed in this book. In terms of health impacts, ambient air pollution causes about 270,000 premature mortalities each year and is responsible for about 60 days of disease over the lifetime of the average MENA resident. The economic damages from the three priority areas—air pollution, marine plastics, and coastal erosion—are estimated to amount to about 3 percent of regional GDP every year. MENA DEVELOPMENT REPORT February 2022. 290 pages. Stock no. C211812 (ISBN: 978-1-4648-1812-7). US$53.95
Policy recommendations for getting to clean blue skies and blue seas elaborate on (1) how monitoring the degradation and providing information about its sources can be improved, (2) how market-based incentives for more sustainable blue resource use can be designed, (3) the kinds of regulatory reforms needed to strengthen institutions, and (4) the types of investments needed to move towards blue skies and blue seas.
DISTRIBUTIONAL IMPACTS OF COVID-19 IN THE MIDDLE EAST AND NORTH AFRICA REGION Edited by Johannes G. Hoogeveen and Gladys Lopez-Acevedo
COVID-19 is one of multiple crises to have hit the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region in the decade following the Arab Spring. War, oil price declines, economic slowdowns, and now a pandemic are tearing at the social fabric of a region characterized by high rates of unemployment, high levels of informality, and low annual economic growth. Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, MENA was the only region in the world experiencing increases in poverty and declines in life satisfaction. Distributional Impacts of COVID-19 in the Middle East and North Africa Region investigates how COVID-19 changed the welfare of individuals and households in the region. This report's results show that, in the short run, poverty rates in MENA will increase significantly and inequality will widen. A group of “new poor” is likely to emerge that may have difficulty recovering from the economic consequences of COVID-19.
MENA DEVELOPMENT REPORT December 2021. 278 pages. Stock no. C211776 (ISBN: 978-1-4648-1776-2). US$49.5
24
The report adds value by analyzing newly gathered primary data, along with projections based on newly modeled micro- and macrosimulations, and by identifying key issues that policy makers should focus on to enable a quick, inclusive, and sustained economic recovery.
www.worldbank.org/publications • books@worldbank.org
WORLD BANK PUBLICATIONS AND ePRODUCTS
