Newsletter - World Bank in India : March 2022

World Bank in India Vol 24 / No. 4

Development Dialogue

March 2022

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Regional Dialogue

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Publications

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hirty-five year old Ram Kishore Yadav walked into the forest bordering his village Kupwa in Betul district of the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh. The early morning sun filtered through the canopy of trees, lighting up the lemon-yellow mahua flowers that lay strewn like stars on the nets around. He would return at noon to gather the nectar-laden flowers from nets around the eight trees that his family tended and sell them to liquor manufacturing companies to use in a popular brew.

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“Every year, in March and April, the mahua flowers would fall to the forest floor,” Yadav recalls. “So, we would light small fires under the trees to clear a patch of ground to collect them easily.”

Unfortunately, this practice not only destroyed the natural vegetation of the forest but, since this was the dry season, these fires would frequently spread, destroying the trees and the wildlife around.

In 2020, to contain the fires and encourage the villagers to protect the forest’s biodiversity, the Madhya Pradesh Forest Department started providing villagers with free nets under the World Bank’s Ecosystem Services Improvement Project. The idea to use these nets came from the community itself.

“Ever since the forest department provided us with the nets to collect the mahua flowers, the delicate blooms remain unsullied by the leaves and dust of the forest

floor, bringing us a better income,” Yadav declares proudly.

The deciduous forests of central India, and the wildlife they harbor, have also benefitted significantly. As Puneet Goel, the district forest officer of North Betul in Madhya Pradesh explains, “Incidents of forest fires have reduced by almost 95 percent over the last few years.

Even if there is a small accidental fire in the forest now, the villagers report it quickly and the fires gets put out immediately.” Over the last two years it is estimated that the nets have helped reduce the incidence of forest fires over some 18,000 hectares.

Increase in income Before the nets were introduced, the soiled flowers sold for just Rs 15-20 per kilogram. And villagers often made distress sales to meet their urgent economic needs.

Every year, in March and April, the mahua flowers would fall to the forest floor. So, we would light small fires under the trees to clear a patch of ground to collect them easily.

Ram Kishor Yadav, Mahua farmer

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Incidents of forest fires have reduced by almost 95 percent with the use of nets for collecting the Mahua flowers and creating awareness about protecting the forests and its biodiversity.

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And since each tree yields close to 100 kg of flowers over a season, local families, who own between five to six trees per family on average, gain significantly.

Free to earn, study or work at home

What’s more, since 2018, the production of mahua flowers has doubled in the eight Madhya Pradesh villages where nets have so far been introduced. Seeing these results, the district forest officer, Ashok Kumar Solanki, claims that many nearby villages that are not part of the World Bank project, have also started requesting for nets.

Besides the higher income, the nets have made the lives of local communities easier. Nizakat Khan, a local healer from nearby Khatpura village, remembers his whole family venturing out before dawn and spending all day collecting the flowers from the ground, often missing meals. “By then the flowers would be trampled upon and muddy, and there were snakes, scorpions and bees to contend with as well.”

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After the forest department helped the villagers to work together as a collective and demand a higher price, the flowers sell for close to Rs 55-60 per kg, significantly above the minimum support price of Rs 35 a kg fixed by the state.

Ram Kishore Yadav, who is also the head of the Van Suraksha Samiti (Forest Protection Committee), agrees.

He says that since the nets have made it possible to collect the flowers at the end of the day, the men can work in other small jobs such as construction labor, children can go to school and the women can focus on their work at home.

forests, and its flowers have high nutritional value, they are now being put to a number of other uses.

For generations, local communities have been mixing them with millets to make food products like laddoos and puris.

Now, the villagers are being trained to bake the flowers into higher value goods like biscuits and cookies.

For Asha, who suffers from sciatica in her back and legs, life is also much easier now. A former sarpanch or village head from Budhni, District Sehore, she says she no longer needs to spend all afternoon bending down to pick up the flowers. Instead, she can now come to the forest late in the afternoon and collect the flowers from the nets in an easy and painless manner.

Says Puneet Goel, the district forest officer, “The forest department is setting up a processing unit to make this enterprise more professional and sustainable. We also plan to train villagers to supply mahua biscuits and cookies to hotels and resorts nearby.”

Alternative Uses

In 2020, under the World Bank project, trial samples of food grade mahua flowers were sent to the United Kingdom for marketing and processing. The following year, an export order of 100 quintals (10,000 kg) of flowers was received.

Since the mahua tree is prevalent in central India and other parts of the country with deciduous

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simple investment such as the nets has not only helped in increasing household incomes and making mahua harvesting truly sustainable but has also protected the forests of central India from devastating fires that, in turn, add to carbon emissions.

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Development Dialogue Infrastructure investments as growth multipliers Junaid Kamal Ahmad

Can infrastructure investments provide a strong stimulus for the Indian economy? The answer is a resounding but conditional yes: conditional on how the investments will be financed and spent.

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Size versus Leverage The policy discussions on how to finance infrastructure inevitably focus on the size of a potential fiscal stimulus. This is surely an important aspect of financing infrastructure and is well reflected in the Government of India’s (GOI’s) fiscal allocations through various centrally sponsored schemes, different funds like the Consolidated Roads Infrastructure Fund (CRIF), the allocations of the Finance Commissions, and directly and indirectly through the multiple Development Finance Institutions (DFI). Increasing fiscal allocations through these channels is always possible and is being actively pursued.

But, the amount of resources needed to finance the infrastructure deficit – at least 7-8% of GDP per annum – would be a challenge to fund directly from the annual fiscal allocation of government. Rather, the need of the hour is to pivot from a focus on the size of a fiscal stimulus to an emphasis on leverage – how much can public resources crowd-in the financial markets. The latter allows for a more efficient and equitable way of financing infrastructure. First, by smoothening the cost of financing the investments over time and second, by sharing the cost with future beneficiaries of investments made today.

But leveraging should not be about piggy backing on the public banking system. Public banks in India are in the middle of an evolving reform process that needs

to continue. And the maturity of their money does not match the need for long term infrastructure finance.

The alternative of strengthening public DFIFs to tap into financial markets and ensure on-lending for investment purposes is already part of GOI’s arsenal. DFIs can be further leveraged but their track record is mixed and like the public banks, their roles would benefit from a rethink in terms of purpose and operational framework.

Instead, the power of the fiscus is perhaps best used to offer different mechanisms to access capital markets and institutional investors – pension funds and life insurance agencies – to finance infrastructure.

A second generation of DFIs which offer credit enhancement and bond insurance is the need of the day. These institutions would offer credit enhancement, first loss, and partial guarantees to enable infrastructure providers to access long term finance from international and local markets.

Such an approach would receive additional fillip if the regulatory framework also enabled domestic institutional investors to increase their funding for infrastructure. DFIs with credit enhancement approach

The need of the hour is to pivot from a focus on the size of a government fiscal stimulus to an emphasis on leverage – how much can public resources crowd-in the financial markets.

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has three distinct advantages over traditional DFIs. Government can share more of the risks of the investments with markets while relying on market assessments of the creditworthiness of the projects.

Second, infrastructure providers will seek to establish greater creditworthiness of their investments as the incentive is to rely primarily on market finance with government enhancements offering only additional support. Third, while political interference in credit decision is difficult to eliminate completely, it is less in a credit enhancement system which has a clearer separation between public and private actors.

By themselves, more water pipes may not lead to regular water supply. More buses will not automatically give rise to an efficient urban transport system and more airplanes will not necessarily translate into better airline services.

From hardware to services: bankable infrastructure companies Leveraging finance is, however, only one part of the equation. The other part is on the expenditure side – focusing on how the finance is spent. Traditionally, the emphasis has been on the hardware such as expanding the road network; investing in pipes and wires for water and electricity; building the ports and the airports; and expanding public housing. As these examples suggest,

Ensuring adequate capital expenditure for the hardware has traditionally been the focus of infrastructure programs.

Even more important, however, is to ensure that infrastructure expenditures are successfully converted into infrastructure services.

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India needs accountable and effective utilities, companies, and corporatized agencies that can translate infrastructure spending into, for example, continuous not intermittent water supply, reliable electricity supply, efficient transport services, effective solid waste collection and disposal, and efficient port services.

An infrastructure stimulus program must therefore include a concerted and long overdue push to convert existing public sector departments and agencies into efficient and accountable public sector companies.

Australia which lost its place as a top industrialized country in the late nineties, reformed its infrastructure sector along these lines to give its economy a boost.

England has long reformed its infrastructure agencies linked to financial markets. The examples of PowerGrid, EESL, ConCorp, Delhi electricity companies, Shimla and Belgaum-Hubli-Dharwad water companies, and corporatized airports, however, suggest that India does not need to go beyond its borders to find the innovations in infrastructure service delivery. Rather, India needs to pivot from a focus on bankable projects (more hardware) to supporting bankable institutions

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(scaling up infrastructure services). Such a shift has greater multiplier effect on economic growth and is a pre-requisite for delivering on the PM’s challenge on ease of living.

Bankable institutions are directly linked to the strategy of leveraging financial markets. These institutions can float bonds to tap into long term finance from the markets and take advantage of any credit enhancement programs of GoI. In turn they strengthen the bond market and deepen the financial markets. The demand for financing operations and maintenance by bankable companies also allows the banking sector to participate more efficiently in infrastructure financing. In addition, it would enable the NIIF with its deep pockets to scale up its equity investments.

Importantly, bankable institutions open the door for creating more inclusive institutions. Appropriately structured, an infrastructure company can distribute shares to its workers or, even more ambitiously, government can buy a percentage of the shares and distribute it to households below a certain income threshold. India’s impressive IT platforms and growing experience with DBTs suggest this approach is amply feasible. Even India’s federal structure would stand to benefit as all tiers of government can co-own shares in an infrastructure company. Take, for example, the possibility

of creating a global class commuter railway company in Mumbai. The city of Mumbai, the State of Maharashtra, and Indian Railways, as representative of the center, could co-invest and co-own shares in such a company very much in the spirit of cooperative federalism. Such an approach would also enable a State to devolve certain service delivery systems – water is an excellent example – to city governments in exchange for a commitment to create a water company with joint shareholding between the State and the local tier. A different approach to evolving India’s city governments.

The debate about Public-Private Partnership is also related to the discussion about creating bankable infrastructure companies. A public sector company can contract in a private operator. This is, however, not necessary. The Sao Paulo Water Company is the world’s largest water utility.

It is a public sector company that raises resources from the capital markets and over time has leveraged private capacity in managing some parts of its operation. DFCL in India is a public sector company that is expected to run the freight corridors as open networks offering access to private and public freight operators. These examples suggest that PPP is an approach or instrument that can be leveraged by a creditworthy infrastructure company. The goal should be to create bankable institutions and PPP is an instrument that the former can leverage. The latter need not be an objective by itself.

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Infrastructure and social protection - an important link A possible concern about creating infrastructure companies capable of tapping into financial markets is the issue of user charges. A bankable discom, for example, would need some level of user charges as a revenue source. The possibility of free electricity would then be difficult to deliver if attracting finance from the markets based on bankability was the objective. It is far easier – politically – to rely on a public sector banking system, blanket government underwriting, or direct fiscal transfers, all to sustain free electricity. Herein lies a possible gordian knot to resolve.

The cost of the ‘free electricity’ is well known: an inefficient discom system; erosion of India’s natural resource base especially ground water; the burden on the financial sector and its consequences for economic

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growth; and the inequity of the system which subsidizes the better off. The solutions are also known. At their core is the need to partially delink the focus on redistribution (eg. free water or electricity) from incentivizing efficient and bankable infrastructure companies. India’s evolving social protection architecture with its pivot towards cash transfers – e.g. JAM, cash transfers for farmers – for targeted groups allows governments to credibly and directly support the income of women headed households, farmers, and the poor. Combining this approach with some user charge subsidy – but now more targeted because of a parallel social protection architecture – and linking it to service delivery reform helps resolve the gordian knot.

A social protection architecture is thus an important part of infrastructure strategy.

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Infrastructure and Climate Change The linkage between climate change and infrastructure finance requires a separate discussion and analysis.

For this note, however, it is important to flag that in today’s context of climate change, the standards, technology, and regulation around infrastructure are rapidly changing and financing will respond accordingly. Capital markets will favour investments in resilient infrastructure. Governments are taxing climate inefficient infrastructure, making it harder for old style infrastructure to maintain sufficient margins to access capital markets. In effect, investments in infrastructure that are not climate friendly will be costlier to finance.

In this context, it is essential to allow public sector infrastructure agencies the bandwidth and flexibility to adapt and change and reap the benefit of the various mechanisms that are emerging in the context of “green financing.” Bankable infrastructure companies as defined in this note are therefore even more important in today’s setting of climate change. In India, efficient and viable discoms, for example, are essential to ensure that GoI’s goal of 450 GW of renewable energy is achieved.

Effective and credit worthy infrastructure institutions are therefore a prerequisite for a world where green infrastructure is now critical for sustainable, economic growth.

In conclusion So yes, infrastructure spending will have growth multipliers. It will depend on whether these investments are financed by leveraging financial markets and undertaken by creditworthy infrastructure companies. While technocratically possible, the implementation of this approach will require active political shepherding. Prices will have to be restructured; roles and responsibilities between tiers of governments reimagined; and public policies shaped to leverage markets.

The availability of a new social protection architecture, a global class IT system, and India’s past and on-going experience in infrastructure management offers the capacity for India to unleash a rethinking of how infrastructure can be delivered at scale. Climate considerations further add to this imperative.

Ultimately, India needs a new class of infrastructure companies modelled as modern utilities under company law capable of accessing financial markets to accompany any infrastructure stimulus from GoI. In this context, the next generation of DFIs can play a critical role.

This Opinion piece was first published on NDTV online on February 5, 2022

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Regional Dialogue #OneSouthAsia Conversations

Regional Energy Trade: Toward a Clean, Green and Energy-Secure South Asia

said Kul Man Ghising, managing director of Nepal Electricity Authority. Ghising was speaking at the 9th #OneSouthAsia Conversation on Regional Energy Trade: Toward a Clean, Green, and Energy Secure South Asia held in January 2022.

In April 2021, Nepal became the first country to purchase energy from the day-ahead market (DAM) at the India Energy Exchange (IEX)—a leading electronic power trading platform. The DAM allows purchase and sale of energy at prices that are locked a day before trading, avoiding price volatility. Till date, the energy trade between India and Nepal had only been through medium-and long-term bilateral agreements.

World Bank’s Vice President for South Asia, Hartwig Schafer referred to Nepal’s capital city Kathmandu, where daily power cuts averaged between 16-18 hours until 2015. This changed dramatically after Nepal started importing power from India via the 1,000 MW crossborder transmission line, and now can even export surplus power during non-peak hours.

A few months later, in November 2021, the Indian power ministry granted permission to Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA) to sell surplus power at the Exchange. A new beginning for cross border electricity trading was set into motion.

“The first bilateral energy trade between India and Nepal dates way back to 1971, with an initial exchange of five megawatts. Over the years, the exchange has slowly grown, with Nepal establishing its first crossborder transmission line with India, which has a capacity to exchange 1,000 megawatts (MW) of power,”

Regional power exchanges ensure energy reliability and support clean energy transition. Schafer said the Green Grids Initiative-One Sun One World One Grid, announced by India and the United Kingdom at the COP26, is a timely platform for South Asian countries to benefit from greater regional cooperation and trade. The initiative aims to connect energy grids across borders and facilitate a faster transition to renewable energy use. In its first phase, it will connect the Indian grid with Middle East, South Asian and South-East Asian grids, enabling sharing of solar and other renewable energy resources.

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South Asia has made good progress on energy cooperation. Since 2015, with the World Bank’s support, the cross-border power transmission capacity has increased threefold — from 2.1 giga watts to 6.4 gigawatts — mainly driven by projects connecting India, Nepal, Bhutan, and Bangladesh. With an increase in the transmission capacity, the energy trade has doubled.

The WB is also supporting sustainable electricity trade and transmission between Central Asian countries of Tajikistan and Kyrgyz Republic and the South Asian countries of Pakistan and Afghanistan, to better utilize the hydro and thermal generation resources.

Engagement Program in South Asia, said the countries need commercial rules to govern the energy market as well as technical rules to enable reliable operations and cross-border investments. “There has never been a better time to act than now, " she added.

In Bhutan, where hydropower exports contribute to 3050 percent of the country’s foreign exchange earnings, the time is right to expand, diversify, and even innovate.

Bhutan currently sells 70 percent of its generated hydropower to India via bilateral agreements. This contributes significantly to Bhutan’s economy, and to India’s energy reliability.

Despite signs of progress, the regional energy trade still remains low, and there is greater potential to be tapped.

Better infrastructure, common understanding, and a strong political will can help optimize it. Cecile Fruman, the director of World Bank’s Regional Integration and

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Hartwig Schafer Vice President, South Asia Region, World Bank “Since 2015, with the World Bank support, the cross-border power transmission capacity increased threefold — from 2.1 gigawatts to 6.4 gigawatts — mainly driven by projects connecting India, Nepal, Bhutan, and Bangladesh. The World Bank is also supporting infrastructure for electricity transmission and trade between Central Asia-South Asia, to better utilize hydro and thermal generation resources."

Cecile Fruman Director, Regional Integration and Engagement, South Asia, World Bank "There is a need for a common understanding and political will among South Asian countries of regional energy trade. We also need commercial rules to govern this market as well as technical rules to enable reliable operations and crossborder investments. There has never been a better time to act than now."

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Chhewang Rinzin, who is the managing director of Bhutan’s Druk Green Power Corporation Limited, said they are looking to expand exports to other regional markets including Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. Rinzin added that Bhutan has immense potential for clean hydropower generation, but it requires huge financial and social investments. “Long-term commitments and planning are a necessity,” he said.

While the governments define the contours of longterm planning, the private sector has a role to play too.

Nicholas Padgalskas, the chief financial officer of Summit Power International in Bangladesh, said the private sector can demonstrate the technical and financial feasibility of cross-border projects and create a push factor for the markets in a constructive way. This will help the public sector make decisions and be confident in moving forward, he said.

Private companies like Summit are increasingly looking into renewable energy markets. “Bangladesh has a goal of reducing emissions between 7 to 15 percent and adding 1 to 4 gigawatts of renewable power by 2030.

Cross-border trade will be instrumental in achieving those goals,” said Padgalskas.

Mahua Acharya, the chief executive officer of Convergence Energy Services Ltd —a company that focuses on clean energy solutions—emphasized that energy transition is no longer a single-country approach.

“We need common needs understanding, common memorandums and regional energy pool pilots, with market instruments to drive this trade,” she added.

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Some recent Blogs E-commerce is creating growth opportunities for small businesses in South Asia Post COVID several small firms have adopted e-commerce services to sell their products. At the same time, there is a concern about those whose livelihood is threatened by competition from e-commerce.

Providing access to digital infrastructure and training and extending social protection to the informal sector can help them face more risks and, ultimately, be more growth oriented.

Read more : https://blogs.worldbank.org/endpovertyinsouthasia/e-commerce-creating-growth-opportunities-small-businesses-south-asia

Vaccinating 2 billion and beyond in India A year after its launch, India had administered 1.5 bn doses of a COVID-19 vaccine by January 2022. Vaccine hesitancy in India appears to be a smaller problem than elsewhere in the world. But vaccinating the next billion will require reaching a poorer segment of the population, for whom the main barriers to vaccine access may include knowledge, awareness, proximity and convenience. A greater focus on these aspects of last-mile service delivery may offer the key to bringing the pandemic one step closer to its conclusion.

Read more : https://blogs.worldbank.org/endpovertyinsouthasia/vaccinating-2-billion-and-beyond-india

The hidden $1 trillion: Halting waste in public procurement Governments today spend an estimated $13 trillion each year on public contracts for goods, services and public works . As much as a quarter of that is wasted in inefficient or shortsighted procurement practices. Halting the waste could free up at least $1 trillion a year to put economies on a path toward green, resilient, and inclusive development.

Read more : https://blogs.worldbank.org/voices/hidden-1-trillion-halting-waste-public-procurement

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What will it take to connect the Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal (BBIN) sub-region?

Long delays at the borders contribute to the high costs of trade between the countries of the BBIN sub-region - Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, and Nepal. These are largely due to the inadequate infrastructure at border crossings, a plethora of paper-based procedures, restrictive policies and regulations, and inefficient logistics for cargo handling.

Read more : https://blogs.worldbank.org/endpovertyinsouthasia/what-will-it-take-connect-bangladesh-bhutan-india-nepal-bbin-sub-region

The perils of prawn-catching for women in Sundarbans In the Sunderbans, almost 100,00 poor women in the Sunderbans are employed collecting wild Tiger prawn seedlings (or prawn postlarvae) from rivers and creeks is an important occupation for poor women in the Sundarbans. The blog draws attention to their lives and the risks they face when they collect prawn PL

Read more : https://blogs.worldbank.org/developmenttalk/perils-prawn-catching-women-sundarbans

Empowering women: Send social assistance payments directly to her The COVID-19 crisis disproportionately affected women who are facing higher job losses, shrinking work hours and greater responsibilities for care. Directing social assistance payments to women – prioritizing them as the recipients – can offer them safer access to and increased control over funds and empowering them as well.

Read more :https://blogs.worldbank.org/voices/empowering-women-send-social-assistance-payments-directly-her?CID=SAR_tt_India_ EN_EXT_2022HumWomaniya

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From the Archives

1970s

The World Bank had the unique privilege of taking India’s Amul model of milk cooperatives from Anand in Gujarat to the rest of the country. This remarkable movement – known as Operation Flood or the White Revolution - transformed the chronically milk-deficient country into one of the largest producers of milk and milk products in the world.

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lion l i m 4 .

6 5 $1 7 9 1 h s ya Prade h d a M lion l i ct m e j o 0 r 7 P . t $27 5 elopmen 7 v 9 e 1 D y r i Da asthan j a R t c illion m Proje t 0 n e 3 $ m p velo 1974 Dairy De arnataka K t c illion e j o m r P 0 t 5 n e 1 $ velopm 1978 Dairy De ional t a N t ion l c l i e j o m r P 0 t 6 n 8 $3 8 velopme 9 1 t Dairy De c nt Proje e m p o l e illion Dev m y r i 2 a 5 D 3 l $ a Nation 2012 Second l

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New Project West Bengal Gets $125 Million to Help Citizens Access Social Protection Services The Government of India, the Government of West Bengal, and the World Bank have signed a $125 million loan to support efforts to help poor and vulnerable groups access social protection services in the state of West Bengal.

India’s eastern state of West Bengal runs more than 400 programs that provide social assistance, care services, and jobs. Most of these services are offered through an umbrella platform called Jai Bangla. The West Bengal Building State Capability for Inclusive Social Protection Operation will support these interventions at the state level, with particular focus on vulnerable groups such as women, tribal and scheduled caste households, and the elderly, as well as households in the state’s disaster-prone coastal regions.

Over the next four years, the operation will: •

•

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• “With its fast-growing urban population and pockets of the urban poor, West Bengal has recognized the need to move from a fragmented, scheme -based social protection system to providing an integrated basket of social protection benefits and services to its most vulnerable citizens. The project will support and strengthen the state’s capability in this area to ensure that it can deliver social protection services — both cash and in-kind — to all its vulnerable citizens.”

- Junaid Ahmad, Country Director, World Bank

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Help strengthen the state’s capability to expand coverage and access to social assistance and to deliver cash transfers for the poor and vulnerable through a consolidated social registry Help digitize the state’s unified delivery system, the Jai Bangla platform, to help consolidate disparate social assistance programs and speed the delivery of social pensions to vulnerable and poor households.

Support the creation of a teleconsultation network for social care services, complemented by a cadre of case management workers who can help households with advice on eldercare and links to health services and facilities.

Create an institutional platform to improve coordination and effectiveness of government interventions to address the state’s low participation of women in the labor force.

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Publications India Publications

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his report presents the results of an impact evaluation of the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY) rural roads program in India. The program targeted the provision of all-weather roads to about 178,000 habitations across India.

The impact evaluation uses a difference-indifference approach and panel data from the states of Himachal Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, and Rajasthan collected in 2009 and 2017 The evaluation finds that PMGSY improved accessibility, particularly in hilly areas, increased access to economic opportunities, triggering a change in the structure of employment in rural India, and had a positive impact on human capital formation in rural India, with boys and girls benefiting equally.

Policy Research Working Papers (India) WPS9931

What Do We Know about Poverty in India in 2017/18 This paper describes several methods to estimate poverty in India in 2017. India is likely the country with the largest number of people living below the international poverty line of $1.90 and its latest publicly available household survey dates to 2011/12, giving rise to considerable uncertainty over the recent trend in global poverty. The authors use a range of methods to derive a poverty estimate for India in 2017 which can be incorporated in the global poverty counts.

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Other Publications Women, Business and the Law 2022 March 2022 This is the eighth in a series of annual reports measuring the laws and regulations that affect women’s economic opportunity in 190 economies. The Report makes the case for reform toward gender equality and highlights the way toward a more equitable and prosperous world. This year, the report also includes important pilot research on the legal frameworks surrounding the availability, affordability, and quality of childcare, and preliminary results of pilot efforts to examine the implementation of the laws measured by the Women, Business and the Law indicators.

Reshaping Global Value Chains in Light of COVID-19: Implications for Trade and Poverty Reduction in Developing Countries March 2022 The Report examines the economic impact of the COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic on GVCs and explores whether they can continue to be a driver of trade and development.

World Development Report – Financing for an Equitable Recovery February 2022

The Impact of COVID-19 on the Welfare of Households with Children : An Overview Based on High Frequency Phone Surveys March 2022 The Report – a joint World Bank and UNICEF publication – presents findings from data from high-frequency phone surveys collected in 35 countries. The analysis identifies the impact of the crisis on households without and with (few or many) children, both focusing on the initial impact in 2020 and the subsequent evolution of this impact.

Steering Tertiary Education: Toward Resilient Systems that Deliver for All March 2022 This paper describes the approach of the World Bank to support the development of effective, equitable, efficient, and resilient tertiary education systems and institutions.

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The COVID 19 pandemic triggered the largest global economic crisis in more than a century. The report examines the central role of finance in the economic recovery from the pandemic. It examines the consequences of the crisis most likely to affect emerging economies and advocates a set of policies to mitigate the interconnected financial risks stemming from the pandemic and steer economies toward a sustainable and equitable recovery.

Innovations in Tax Compliance: Building Trust, Navigating Politics, and Tailoring Reform February 2022 The Report takes a fresh look at tax reform. Building on the achievements of recent decades, the authors of the Report argue for a greater emphasis on the overlapping goals of building trust, navigating political resistance, and tailoring reform to unique local contexts—an emphasis achieved by identifying the most binding constraints on reform.

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Disaster Resilient and Responsive Public Financial Management: An Assessment Tool

From Jobs to Careers: Apparel Exports and Career Paths for Women in Developing Countries

February 2022

January 2022

The Disaster Resilient and Responsive Public Financial Management (DRRPFM) Assessment is designed to help countries strengthen the capability of their Public Financial Management (PFM) systems to prepare for, respond to, and recover from disasters.

Analyzing Banking Risk: A Framework for Assessing Corporate Governance and Risk Management - Fourth Edition

In recent decades, the apparel industry has shifted its production to lowwage developing countries, increasing the demand for women, closing male-female wage gaps, and bringing women into the formal labor force. Indeed, the benefits of apparel exports have reached the female population, but is an apparel-led export strategy sufficient to induce the transition from jobs to careers?

A Global Procurement Partnership for Sustainable Development : An International Stocktaking of Developments in Public Procurement : Synthesis Report

February 2022 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.

Global Economic Prospects, January 2022 January 2022 Global Economic Prospects (GEP) is a World Bank Group flagship report published in January and June, examines global economic developments and prospects, with a special focus on emerging market and developing economies. According to the January 2022 edition of GEP, following a strong rebound in 2021, the global economy is entering a pronounced slowdown that could endanger the recovery in emerging and developing economies.

January 2022 This report outlines the key challenges and opportunities in moving toward modern procurement systems around the world and makes the case for a global procurement partnership to strengthen development effectiveness through better understanding and implementation of procurement reforms.

Positioning Nutrition with Universal Health Coverage: Optimizing Health Financing Levers January 2022 The health system, and most especially primary health care (PHC), is essential for delivering highimpact, cost-effective, nutrition-specific interventions at scale. There are gaps in knowledge on how to deploy resources more effectively to improve the delivery of nutrition services as part of preventive and promotive health care. A shift in focus is needed from the “what” and “why” of scaling-up nutrition to the “how” of improving nutrition services coverage and quality of nutrition services delivered through the health system, and especially PHC.

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The Global Health Cost of PM2.5 Air Pollution: A Case for Action Beyond 2021

World Bank Group Macroeconomic Models for Climate Policy Analysis

January 2022

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This publication aims to support policy makers and decision-makers in client countries in prioritizing air pollution amid competing development challenges. Its findings build a robust economic case to invest scarce budgetary resources in the design and implementation of policies and interventions for improving air quality.

Getting Down to Earth : Are Satellites Reliable for Measuring Air Pollutants That Cause Mortality in Low, and Middle-Income Countries January 2022 This report shows that satellites are unreliable for estimating ambient concentrations of PM2.5 in LMICs. Furthermore, satellite-derived measurements cannot replace properly operated and maintained ground-level monitoring networks for measuring the concentrations of PM2.5 that human beings are typically exposed to daily.

Impactful Women: Examining Opportunities and Constraints for Women in Mining Organizations Worldwide January 2022 In every mining region across the globe, there are a multitude of entities primarily focused on progressing the interests of women in mining. At the national level, the most notable interest group is that of Women in Mining (WIM) organizations. WIM organizations generally evolve organically and are structured, managed, and financed in accordance with their membership composition, location, context, and purpose. Our research findings show, regardless of the form, the number of WIM organizations has been steadily increasing over the last decade.

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January 2022 Policymakers in developing countries face multiple challenges related to climate change. To provide policymakers with reliable recommendations on a variety of climate related policies, this report summarizes the range of climate and development issues addressed by each model in the WBG suite, revealing both strengths and limitations of individual models, as well as the complementarity among models.

Digital Services Tax: Country Practice and Technical Challenges Ana Cebreiro-Gómez, Colin Clavey, Marcello Estevão, and et.al.

January 2022 Digital platforms are transforming social, business, and economic norms, changing the way we interact, consume, and do business. Digital technologies present many opportunities and benefits for society and governments. They also provide new opportunities for tax administrations, such as prospects for better and more efficient tax collection by accessing new data sources and improved international collaboration.

Place, Productivity, and Prosperity : Revisiting Spatially Targeted Policies for Regional Development The latest volume of the World Bank Productivity Project series, Place, Productivity, and Prosperity: Revisiting Spatially Targeted Policies for Regional Development provides new analytical and empirical insights into the drivers of economic geography, how they are playing out differently in developing countries and in advanced economies and it provides a heuristic framework with which to inform policy makers’ assessments of placebased policy proposals, helping them identify the regions where policy is likely to have an impact and those that would remain nonviable.

World Bank in India

Repurposing Agricultural Policies and Support: Options to Transform Agriculture and Food Systems to Better Serve the Health of People, Economies, and the Planet January 2022 The report finds that repurposing a portion of government spending on agriculture each year to develop and disseminate more emission-efficient technologies for crops and livestock could reduce overall emissions from agriculture by more than 40 percent. Meanwhile, millions of hectares of land could be restored to natural habitats. Redirecting about $70 billion a year, equivalent to one percent of global agricultural output, would yield a net benefit of over $2 trillion in 20 years.

International Debt Statistics 2022 December 2021 The International Debt Statistics (IDS) 2022 report features external debt statistics and analysis for the 123 low and middle-income countries that report to the World Bank Debtor Reporting System (DRS). It is part of a series that supports the World Bank’s broader agenda on debt transparency.

Policy Research Working Papers WPS9936

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Private Cities: Implications for Urban Policy in Developing Countries

Addressing Gender-Based Segregation through Information: Evidence from a Randomized Experiment in the Republic of Congo

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Relevance of the World Bank Group’s Early Response to COVID-19: A Cross-Country Sector Analysis Dominik Naeher, Raghavan Narayanan and Virginia Ziulu

Marine Gassier, Lea Rouanet and Lacina Traore

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Understanding and Predicting Job Losses due to COVID-19: Empirical Evidence from Middle Income Countries Maho Hatayama, Yiruo Li and Theresa Osborne

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Scars of Pandemics from Lost Schooling and Experience: Aggregate Implications and Gender Differences Through the Lens of COVID-19

When Promising Interventions Fail: Personalized Coaching for Teachers in a Middle-Income Country

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What Do We Know about Poverty in India in 2017/18 Ifeanyi Nzegwu Edochie, Samuel Freije-Rodriguez, Christoph Lakner, Laura Moreno Herrera, David Locke Newhouse, Sutirtha Sinha Roy and Nishant Yonzan.

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International Voids, Capital Markets and Temporary Migration: Evidence from Bangladesh

Hidden Defaults Sebastian Andreas Horn, Carmen M. Reinhart and Christoph Trebesch

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Anatomy of Brazil’s Subjective Well-Being: A Tale of Growing Discontent and Polarization in the 2010s Martijn Burger, Martijn Hendriks and Elena Ianchovichin

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Laurent Bossavie, Joseph-Simon Görlach, Çağlar Özden and He Wang

Resource-Backed Loans in Sub-Saharan Africa

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Debt Vulnerability Analysis: A MultiAngle

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Life out of the Shadows: Impacts of Amnesties in the Lives of Refugees

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The Returns to Innovation in East Asia: The Role of the Business Environment and Firms' Characteristics Francesca De Nicola and Pinyi Chen

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A Dynamic Model of Fiscal Decentralization and Public Debt Accumulation

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Public Debt Reporting in Developing Countries

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World Bank in India

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Women in Paid Employment: A Role for Public Policies and Social Norms in Guatemala

Forced Migration, Social Cohesion and Conflict: The 2015 Refugee Inflow in Germany

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Can Economics Become More Reflexive Exploring the Potential of Mixed-Methods

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Social Cohesion and Refugee-Host Interactions: Evidence from East Africa

The Impacts of Lockdown Policies on International Trade in the Philippines

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Local Peace Agreements and the Return of IDPs with Perceived ISIL Affiliation in Iraq

Exploring the Urban Model: Employment, Housing, and Infrastructure

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How Do Shared Experiences of Economic Shocks Impact Refugees and Host Communities Evidence from Afghan Refugees in Iran Mohammad Hoseini and Mahsa Jahan Dideh

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Labor Market Integration, Local Conditions and Inequalities: Evidence from Refugees in Switzerland Tobias Müller, Pia Pannatier and Martina Giorgia Viarengo

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Heat, Crime, and Punishment Arnold Patrick Behrer and Valentin Bolotnyy

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Nonclassical Measurement Error and Farmers’ Response to Information Reveal Behavioral Anomalies Kibrom A. Abay, Christopher B. Barrett, Talip Kilic and et.al.

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Illicit Schemes: Fossil Fuel Subsidy Reforms and the Role of Tax Evasion and Smuggling Jun Erik Maruyama Rentschler and Nobuhiro Hosoe

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Sovereign Bonds since Waterloo

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Surveying Informal Businesses: Methodology and Applications Gemechu Aga, David Francis, Filip Jolevski, Jorge Rodriguez Meza and Joshua Seth Wimpey

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Infrastructure and Structural Change in the Lake Chad Region Mathilde Sylvie Maria Lebrand

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The Effects of Subsidizing Social Security Contributions: Job creation or Informality Reduction

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Understanding Public Spending Trends for Infrastructure in Developing Countries

More Is Better: Evaluating the Impact of a Variation in Cash Assistance on the Reintegration Outcomes of Returning Afghan Refugees

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COVID-19 and Economic Inequality: Short-Term Impacts with Long-Term Consequences Ambar Narayan, Alexandru Cojocaru, Sarthak Agrawal and et.al.

The Interplay of Regional and Ethnic Inequalities in Malaysian Poverty Dynamics

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What Explains Boys’ Educational Underachievement in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia Mahmoud Abduh Ali Elsayed, Aidan Clerkin, Vasiliki Pitsia and et.al.

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FDI and Trade Outcomes at the Industry Level—A Data-Driven Approach Jean-Christophe Maur, Milan Nedeljkovic and Jan Erik Von Uexkull

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Challenges of Public Credit Guarantee Schemes in Latin America during the Pandemic Heinz P. Rudolph, Federico A Diaz Kalan and Faruk Miguel Liriano

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World Bank in India

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The US-China Trade War and Global Reallocations

How Much Does Physical Infrastructure Contribute to Economic Growth: An Empirical Analysis

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Microdata Collection and Openness in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA): Introducing the MENA Microdata Access Indicator Uche Eseosa Ekhator-Mobayode and Johannes G. Hoogeveen

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The Role of Work-from-Home in the Gender Asymmetries of COVID-19: An Analysis for Latin America Based on High-Frequency Surveys Inés Berniell, Leonardo Carlos Gasparini, Mariana Marchionni and Mariana Viollaz

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Estimating Food Price Inflation from Partial Surveys Bo Pieter Johannes Andree

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Indirect Tax Incidence in Brazil: Assessing the Distributional Effects of Potential Tax Reforms Gabriel Lara Ibarra, Rafael Macedo Rubião and Eduardo Simoes Fleury

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Learning to Learn: Experimentation, Entrepreneurial Capital, and Development

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Transnational Terrorism and the Internet Quy-Toan Do, Nicolas Gomez Parra and Bob Rijkers.

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A Puzzle with Missing Pieces: Explaining the Effectiveness of World Bank Development Projects

William F. Maloney and Andrés Zambrano

Helen Louise Ashton, Jed Friedman, Diana Goldemberg and et.al.

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Exploring the Growth Effects of COVID-19 across Developing Countries

Lost in Interpretation: Why Spouses Disagree on Who Makes Decisions

Cesar Calderon and Megumi Kubota

Sundas Liaqat, Aletheia Amalia Donald, Forest Brach Jarvis and et.al.

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The Global Diffusion of Electric Vehicles: Lessons from the First Decade Shanjun Li, Binglin Wang, Muxi Yang and et.al.

Mobilizing Parents at Home and at School: An Experiment on Primary Education in Angola

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Building State Capacity: What Is the Impact of Development Projects Vincenzo Di Maro, David K. Evans, Stuti Khemani and Thiago De Gouvea Scot de Arruda

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Taxation, Accountability, and Cash Transfers: Breaking the Resource Curse Shantayanan Devarajan and Quy-Toan Do WPS9879

What Explains Wage Differentials for Urban Wage Earners: Returns to Education for Ethiopia’s Urban Wage Employed Shanjukta Nath and Christina Wieser WPS9878

Estimating a Poverty Line for Brazil Based on the 2017-18 Household Budget Survey Gabriel Lara Ibarra, Anna Luisa Paffhausen and Daniel Vasconcellos Archer Duque WPS9877

Short-Term Impacts of Targeted Cash Grants and Business Development Services: Experimental Evidence from Entrepreneurs in Burkina Faso Michael Grimm, Sidiki Soubeiga and Michael Weber

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Can Business Grants Mitigate a Crisis Evidence from Youth Entrepreneurs in Kenya during COVID-19 Yanina Eliana Domenella, Julian C. Safir Jamison, Zia Abla and et.al.

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Occupational Hazards: Why Migrants Faced Greater Economic and Health Risks during the COVID-19 Pandemic Laurent Bossavie, Daniel Garrote Sanchez, Mattia Makovec and Caglar Ozden WPS9872

Political Prioritization of Early Childhood Education during the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Comparative Policy Analysis of Low- and Middle-Income Countries Michelle J. Neuman and Shawn Michael Powers WPS9871

What Has Been the Impact of COVID-19 on Debt Turning a Wave into a Tsunami Ayhan Kose, Peter Stephen Oliver Nagle, Franziska Lieselotte Ohnsorge and Naotaka Sugawara

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World Bank in India

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WPS9865

Infrastructure and Structural Change in the Horn of Africa

Does Race and Gender Inequality Impact Income Growth

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Gustavo Alberto Marrero, Juan Gabriel Rodríguez and Roy Van Der Weide

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Getting Real the Uneven Burden of Inflation across Households in Turkey

Measuring Systemic Banking Resilience: A Simple Reverse Stress Testing Approach

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Erik H.B. Feyen and Davide Salvatore Mare WPS9863

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Does Competition from Informal Firms Impact R&D by Formal SMEs Evidence Using Firm-Level Survey Data

Mangroves as Coastal Protection for Local Economic Activities from Hurricanes in the Caribbean

Mohammad Amin

Juan Jose Miranda, Luigi Butron, Chrissie Pantoja and Rashmin Gunasekera

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Estimating the Impact of Weather on Agriculture

Forced Displacement, Gender, and Livelihoods: Refugees in Ethiopia

Jeffrey David Michler, Anna Leigh Josephson, Talip Kilic and Siobhan Murray

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In Someone Else’s Shoes: Promoting Prosocial Behavior Through Perspective Taking

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