|
| |
| | Africa Action Position Paper: Hazardous to Health |
 | | The World Bank and IMF have promoted "user fees" as a means of generating revenue for the health sector. | | | In 2001, approximately 27% of World Bank lending to African countries was for "adjustment." In the World Bank's total loan portfolio, adjustment lending generally accounts for between one-third and one-half (7). | | | The policies mandated by the World Bank and IMF have forced African governments to orient their economies towards greater integration in international markets at the expense of social services and long-term development priorities. |
|
http://www.africaaction.org/action/sap0204.htm
|
|
| |
| | NodeWorks - Encyclopedia: World Bank |
| | Though repeatedly relied upon by impoverished governments around the world as a contributor of development finance, the World Bank is often and primarily criticised by opponents of corporate "neo-colonial" globalization. | | | The World Bank (and its sister organization, the International Monetary Fund) is a closed system; that is, the decision-making processes are shielded from those who, in fact, fund the projects: primarily the taxpayers in the member nations. | | | As such, World Bank financing is used in many different areas, from reform of health and education sector, to environmental and infrastructure projects, including dams, roads, and national parks. |
|
http://pedia.nodeworks.com/W/WO/WOR/World_Bank
|
|
| |
| | Bank Information Center USA : World Bank |
| | Each member government is a shareholder of the Bank, and the number of shares a country has is based roughly on the size of its economy. | | | Today the World Bank Group is comprised of five separate entities: the original International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD), the International Finance Corporation (IFC, established in 1956), the International Development Association (IDA, 1960), the International Centre for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID, 1966), and the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA, 1988). | | | Executive Directors oversee the day-to-day operations of the World Bank, approving all lending operations, policies and strategies, and institutional budgets and audits. |
|
http://www.bicusa.org/bicusa/issues/world_bank/index.php
|
|
| |
| | CorpWatch : World Bank Fact Sheet |
| | Furthermore, the Bank's staff is currently dominated by economists who have spent their careers defending the validity of neoclassical economics, the foundation of the World Bank model of development. | | | Decisions at the World Bank and IMF are made by a vote of the Board of Executive Directors, which represents member countries. | | | The wealthy Northern countries which control the World Bank and IMF dictate the agendas of these institutions, and their interests are best served by defending the status quo. |
|
http://www.corpwatch.org/article.php?id=444
|
|
| |
| | Activists View Argentina's World Bank Default as Positive - Global Policy Forum - Social and Economic Policy |
| | But World Bank officials Friday vehemently denied that they would be hurt by the default. | | | Argentina defaulted Thursday on its 805-million-dollar debt to the Bank, paying only a token amount of 79.2 million dollars, prompting questions on the future of the cash-strapped Argentine economy and its relationship with the Bank and the Fund. | | | Argentina's decision to default on its debt to the World Bank could hurt the country's poor but might also prove beneficial in the long run, some analysts here say. |
|
http://www.globalpolicy.org/socecon/bwi-wto/wbank/2002/1115arg.htm
|
|
| |
| | World Bank Boycott Home |
| | Congress has begun to cut funding and add criteria for the World Bank and other multilateral development banks (MDBs) as a Federal deadline of June 30, 2005 for a series of accountability and anti-corruption reforms was not met by any of the MDBs. | | | Those who rely upon the assurances of private banks or project developers who apply the “safeguard policies” of the World Bank or its corporate arm, the International Finance Corporation, need to reconsider the level of protection those policies actually provide. | | | World Bank and Regional Development Banks Fail to Meet U.S. Deadline on Transparency, Accountability, and Halting Corruption -Congress Responds with Budget Cuts, Demands |
|
http://www.worldbankboycott.org
|
|
| |
| | Argentina defaults on loan to World Bank |
| | The World Bank responded with a notice that it would halt any new loans and stop payments on $2 billion in old ones by next month unless Argentina made good on its debt payments. | | | Argentina defaulted Thursday on an $805 million debt to the World Bank. | | | In announcing that Argentina would pay only about $80 million in interest on the debt, Duhalde and his ministers pointedly claimed that the default on the World Bank payment was necessary to comply with conditions recommended by the IMF. |
|
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2002/nov2002/arg-n16.shtml
|
|
| |
| | Eldis - World Bank and IMF issues |
| | The purpose of this paper is to assess the World Bank’s recent relations with civil society organizations (CSOs), and to propose options for promoting more effective civic engagement in Bank-supported.... | | | It assesses the extent to which Bank interventions have contributed to growth and poverty reduction and the.... | | | This evaluation assesses World Bank support for public sector capacity building in Africa over the past 10 years. |
|
http://www.eldis.org/wbimf/index.htm
|
|
| |
| | World Bank on Encyclopedia.com |
| | Haiti: World Bank approves grant to support economic governance reform. | | | World Bank chief Paul Wolfowitz begins African tour, with debt forgiveness high on agenda |
|
http://www.encyclopedia.com/html/X/X-W1orldB1an.asp
|
|
| |
| | Carbon Finance at the World Bank |
| | The World Bank's carbon finance initiatives are part of the larger global effort to combat climate change, and go hand in hand with the Bank's mission to reduce poverty and improve living standards in the developing world. | | | The Bank is therefore making every effort to ensure that developing countries and economies in transition can benefit from international efforts to address climate change, including the emerging carbon market for greenhouse gas emission reductions. | | | The BioCarbon Fund – The World Bank has mobilized a new fund to demonstrate projects that sequester or conserve carbon in forest and agro-ecosystems. |
|
http://carbonfinance.org
|
|
| |
| | B92 >> News |
| | Serbia does not have enough quality accountants and auditors, and training and education for these professions must be of a higher quality, according to the World Bank’s report. | | | The report states that in order for reliability and precision in these financial reports to become a reality, company directors must be responsible for making sure that the reports are correct and that they must rely on the Chamber of Audits to monitor the work of auditors. | | | BELGRADE -- Tuesday – Serbia has yet to reach the required standards in the fields of accounting and auditing, according to the World Bank. |
|
http://www.b92.net/english/news/index.php?nav_id=33069&style=headlines
|
|
| |
| | IMF/World Bank policies pave way for continuing famine in Africa |
| | This is in large part due to previous IMF and World Bank policies that encouraged poor countries to take out loans. | | | IRIN also questions what it calls the “Washington consensus” on market reforms promoted by the IMF and the World Bank, which “frown on government intervention, and look at short-term financial considerations rather than medium-term food security”. | | | The situation is compounded by the huge growth in HIV/AIDS, but also, as the United Nations/Integrated Regional Information Networks (IRIN) reports, it is due to the policies of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank. |
|
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2003/feb2003/fam-f05.shtml
|
|
| |
| | Mongolia |
| | Bank assistance to Mongolia is therefore dominated by loans to the energy and transport sectors. | | | World Bank Provides Loan To Mongolia To Expand Financing For Private Firms, Strengthen Banks (Press Release) | | | How is World Bank assistance helping in Mongolia? |
|
http://www.worldbank.org.mn
|
|
| |
| | Development Committee |
| | The Committee's mandate is to advise the Boards of Governors of the Bank and the Fund on critical development issues and on the financial resources required to promote economic development in developing countries. | | | The Development Committee is a forum of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund that facilitates intergovernmental consensus-building on development issues. | | | Known formally as the Joint Ministerial Committee of the Boards of Governors of the Bank and the Fund on the Transfer of Real Resources to Developing Countries, the Committee was established in 1974. |
|
http://www.devcommittee.org
|
|
| |
| | World Bank Group Climate Change |
| | The Bank is increasingly incorporating these considerations into its development operations, advising clients on options, helping promote sectoral efficiency and clean energy alternatives, and assisting its clients in adapting to foreseeable impacts while seeking globally equitable responses to the challenge. | | | I see the Bank's role in climate change as providing every opportunity to developing countries to benefit from the huge investment OECD must make in reducing climate change" | | | An Adaptation Mosaic: A Sample of the Emerging World Bank Work in Climate Change Adaptation (Part 1), 2004 (1,289KB PDF) |
|
http://lnweb18.worldbank.org/ESSD/envext.nsf/46ByDocName/ClimateChange
|
|
| |
| | The IMF-World Bank "Economic Medicine" |
| | Debtor nations forego economic sovereignty and control over fiscal and monetary policy, the Central Bank and the Ministry of Finance are reorganized (often with the complicity of the local bureaucracies), State institutions are undone and an "economic tutelage" is installed. | | | The restructuring of the World economy under the guidance of the Washington based financial institutions increasingly denies individual developing countries the possibility of building a national economy: the internationalization of macro-economic policy transforms countries into open economic territories and national economies into "reserves" of cheap labor and natural resources. | | | The WTO's mandate consists in regulating World trade to the benefit of the international banks and transnational corporations as well as "supervising" the enforcement of national trade policies. |
|
http://www.tenc.net/articles/chuss/imfworld.htm
|
|
| |
| | ECA Watch: International NGO Campaign on Export Credit Agencies |
| | August 9, 2005 (BBC) — Environmental organisations have warned that major banks may be contravening their environmental and social policies by helping to finance controversial projects indirectly. | | | Export credit agencies, or ECAs, have as big, if not bigger, impacts on the growth of irresponsible corporate globalization and national debt in the global south as better-known institutions like the World Bank and WTO. | | | Communities worldwide are becoming increasingly alarmed about the negative impacts of global finance institutions (like the WTO and the World Bank) on the environment and human rights. |
|
http://www.eca-watch.org
|
|
| |
| | SEEN |
| | The Bank is attempting, outside the globally negotiated Climate Convention, to dominate policy through a new, independent, investment framework. | | | SEEN research reveals: World Bank fossil fuel projects benefit Northern corporations, with Halliburton leading the pack, not the global South. | | | Explore SEEN's extensive database of multilateral development bank and export credit agency energy projects. |
|
http://www.seen.org
|
|
| |
| | World Bank Group - Data and Statistics |
| | The World Bank offers technical assistance to member countries in need to create an adequate statistical base for the analysis of economic, financial and social developments necessary to guide policy making. | | | Information and selected samples from the GDF publication, the World Bank's comprehensive annual compilation of data on external debt and financial flows. | | | Our time series databases, World Development Indicators and Global Development Finance, are now available online for a subscription fee. |
|
http://www.worldbank.org/data
|
|
| |
| | Halifax Initiative - What's New: |
| | Canada’s leadership role in debt cancellation discussions must also be reflected at the Annual Meetings of the World Bank and the IMF which come just days after the UN summit where the G8 debt proposal will come for approval. | | | Reform of the World Bank and IMF on G 20 Agenda for October | | | To receive debt reduction through the World Bank and IMF, low-income countries must prepare of a Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper(PRSP). |
|
http://www.halifaxinitiative.org
|
|
| |
| | World Tables - Dataset Description Guide |
| | The World Tables disseminates, with little delay, country estimates used by the Bank in analysis of economic and social trends in developing countries, which emphasizes Bank borrowers. | | | Data for high-income OECD economies are based on reports of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). | | | To make the volume a more useful resource, other economies are covered to the extent that they provide internationally comparable measures in readily usable form; these are not subject to detailed scrutiny by Bank staff. |
|
http://www.ciesin.org/IC/wbank/wtables.html
|
|
| |
| | IMF/ World Bank Struggles |
| | The World Bank and IMF have been promoting their new "poverty reduction" strategy, through which "nationally-owned participatory poverty reduction strategies should provide the basis of all their concessional lending and for debt relief." | | | IMF and World Bank still demand budget cuts, firing of civil servants? | | | Increase in IMF and World Bank control of Third World economies on behalf of corporations? |
|
http://www.nadir.org/nadir/initiativ/agp/free/imf/index.htm
|
|
| |
| | World Bank Publications |
| | The third in a series of annual reports investigating regulations that ease doing business and those that constrain it, this edition provides analysis on those regulations that help create jobs and those that deter it. | | | At $90 billion globally, remittances represent the largest financial flow to developing countries after Foreign Direct Investment (FDI); what can be done to maximize their development impact and alleviate poverty? | | | This year’s Report looks at the role of equity in the development process. |
|
http://publications.worldbank.org
|
|
| |
| | The Whirled Bank Group |
| | World Bank Bonds Boycott, Jubilee+ Debt Relief, Jubilee USA | | | Free Online Banking for developing countries and multinational corporations | | | A rebuttal to the widely-distributed misinformation circulated by the World Bank. |
|
http://www.whirledbank.org
|
|
| |
| | PANNA: World Bank monitoring (campaign) |
| | Our larger goals are to empower rural communities to challenge and change the conditions of “agricultural development” imposed upon them by external institutions and to promote safe and ecologically sound alternatives, greater participation by civil society and increased accountability and transparency in MDB projects. | | | Furthermore, local community groups which are best situated to monitor and report on the impacts of MDB projects are typically denied critical information about their rights, the terms and conditions of these projects and the actual content of the banks’ mandatory policies. | | | We are seeking help in translating our citizens’ guide to monitoring the World Bank’s pest management policy into Spanish, Portuguese, various Asian and other languages. |
|
http://www.panna.org/campaigns/worldBank.html
|
|
| |
| | World Bank Speak Out |
| | April 13, 2004 Daniel Kaufmann, World Bank Institute Governance director | | | December 1, 2003 Debrework Zewdie, the Director of the World Bank’s Global HIV/AIDS program | | | February 2, 2004 David Dollar, the World Bank's Director of Development Policy |
|
http://discuss.worldbank.org
|
|
| |
| | Breaking The Bank |
| | Breaking The Bank is a remarkable independent account of the April 2000 protests against the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank. | | | 50 Years Is Enough: U.S. Network for Global Economic Justice is a coalition of 205 grassroots, faith-based, policy, women's, social- and economic-justice, youth, solidarity, labor, and development organizations dedicated to the profound transformation of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). | | | Breaking The Bank - Part 1 courtesy freespeech TV Breaking The Bank - Part 2 |
|
http://www.whisperedmedia.org/btheb.html
|
|
| |
| | GICT |
| | World Bank issues draft report on Financing ICT Needs in the Developing World: Public and Private Roles | | | Bringing together IFCâs experience in private sector investment transactions and the World Bankâs expertise in policy and regulatory matters, the Global Information and Communication Technologies Department promotes access to information and communication technologies in developing countries. | | | We serve as the World Bank Groupâs core department for investment, policy, and programs related to information and communication technologies.. |
|
http://info.worldbank.org/ict
|
|
| |
| | The Development Group for Alternative Policies |
| | Mexico has paid back its short-term debt to the United States by incurring more debt and squeezing the Mexican economy to the point of repression, said Mexican and U.S. economic analysts today. | | | UPDATE: Joint Facilitation Committee Moving Forward with Agenda to Establish Guidelines for World Bank/ CSO Relations | | | - Commentary: World Bank Uses Political Reform to Promote Its Economic Agenda |
|
http://www.developmentgap.org
|
|
| |
| | MIGA - Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency |
| | WASHINGTON, DC, September 13, 2005â”The Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency, MIGA, a private sector branch of the World Bank Group, today said it issued $1.2 billion in investment guarantees (insurance) for 33 new projects (62 contracts) in developing countries during the fiscal year ending June 30, 2005. | | | The results bring total coverage issued since MIGAâs inception in 1988 to $14.7 billion, including amounts leveraged through its Cooperative Underwriting Program with other insurers. | | | World Bankâs MIGA Hones Focus on Frontier Markets |
|
http://www.miga.org
|
|
| |
| | SOUTH AFRICA: Mbeki's neoliberal blueprint for Africa |
| | What if “promoting reforms” really amounted to the IMF and World Bank imposing their cookie-cutter neo-liberal policies on desperately disempowered African societies, without any reference to democratic processes, resistance or diverse local conditions? | | | [Patrick Bond's new book is Against Global Apartheid: South Africa meets the World Bank, IMF and International Finance, from University of Cape Town Press; ordering information available from <http://pbond@wn.apc.org>.] |
|
http://www.greenleft.org.au/back/2001/472/472p26.htm
|
|
| |
| | 50 Years Is Enough Network |
| | Empty Promises: The IMF, the World Bank, and the Planned Failures of Global Capitalism -- Order Now! | | | More World Bank Loans Don't Equal Less Poverty (IPS) | | | NEW analysis of G8 debt deal and its prospects at IMF/WB meetings Sept. 24-25 |
|
http://www.50years.org
|
|
| |
| | Categorizing NGO |
| | Such NGOs can play a particularly important role as "intermediaries" between CBOs and institutions such as the World Bank or government. | | | Individual operational NGOs vary enormously according to their purpose, philosophy, sectoral expertise and scope of activities. | | | The World Bank defines NGOs as "private organizations that pursue activities to relieve suffering, promote the interests of the poor, protect the environment, provide basic social services, or undertake community development" (Operational Directive 14.70). |
|
http://docs.lib.duke.edu/igo/guides/ngo/define.htm
|
|
| |
| | World Bank - Documents & Reports |
| | Local Book Distributors - Orders can be placed through these companies. | | | Comparing land reform and land markets in Colombia: impacts on equity and efficiency | | | Click here for easy to download copies of World Development Reports and Global Economic Prospects. |
|
http://www-wds.worldbank.org
|
|
| |
| | Research - Document Search |
| | Land security in rural Thailand (Vol 1 of... | | | Do health sector reforms have their intended impacts ? | | | Distortions to world trade: impacts on agricultural markets and f... |
|
http://econ.worldbank.org/resource.php?type=5
|
|
| |
| | Romania |
| | A new World Bank report finds that Romania is among the world's top reformers in terms of improving its business environment. | | | World Bank Annual Report 2005 was released (Country Office Press Release) | | | Sign up for free World Bank e-mail updates on Romania |
|
http://www.worldbank.org.ro
|
|
| |
| | Oxford Journals Social Sciences World Bank Research Observer |
| | The World Bank Research Observer seeks to inform nonspecialist readers about research being undertaken within the Bank and outside the Bank in areas of economics relevant for development policy. | | | Requiring only a minimal background in economic analysis, its surveys and overviews of key issues in development economics research are intended for policymakers, project officers, journalists keeping up to date, and teachers and students of development economics and related disciplines. | | | Papers for the Observer are not sent out to referees, but all articles published are assessed and approved by the Editorial Board, which includes three to four distinguished economists from outside the Bank. |
|
http://wbro.oxfordjournals.org
|
|
| |
| | World Bank President - shining a spotlight on the selection of the tenth president |
| | The piece, by Daphne Eviatar, reminds readers that Wolfowitz "would be in a position to pressure the world's largest public financial institution to help pay for the exploration, drilling and transport of America's most coveted natural resource". | | | Would it have worked for the World Bank process? | | | Mallaby, you'll recall, said the bank's "affinity with the world's most successful society" was a plus and that Paul Wolfowitz's "strength is that he'll make the bank a tool of U.S. policy." more... |
|
http://www.worldbankpresident.org
|
|
| |
| | The Disinvestment Campaign |
| | The strategy of the World Bank Disinvestment Campaign stems from the fact that the World Bank receives 80% of its money by selling bonds on the private capital markets to trade unions, pension funds, universities, life insurance schemes, churches, mutual funds, governments, and civic groups. | | | The International Finance Corporation (IFC), the private-sector arm of | | | Employing the tactics of the anti-apartheid movement, groups organise locally to disinvest from these bonds and effectively shake the foundations of the World Bank. |
|
http://www.wbbeurope.org
|
|
| |
| | Social Indicators of Development |
| | However, users should bear in mind that the concepts, definitions and methodology underlying indicators vary, sometimes significantly, from country to country and over time within countries. | | | Copyright 1995 by the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development/The World Bank | | | The Socio-Economic Data Division of the World Bank's International Economics Department is responsible for archival of the Social Indicators of Development dataset. |
|
http://www.ciesin.org/IC/wbank/sid-home.html
|
|
| |
| | World Bank & IMF Libraries - External Web Site |
| | The World Bank and International Monetary Fund libraries work together to provide information services and resources to World Bank and IMF staff. | | | World Bank Group and IMF staff should follow these remote access instructions to gain access to licensed resources not available to the public. | | | Questions or comments for the World Bank or the IMF? |
|
http://jolis.worldbankimflib.org/external.htm
|
|
| |
| | Data & Research |
| | Inequality of opportunity within and among nations sustains extreme deprivation, wastes human potential and often weakens prospects for growth, concludes World Development Report 2006: Equity and Development,published Sept. 20. | | | The report calls for more equitable access by the poor to public services, jobs, capital, secure land rights; political freedoms and power; justice systems and infrastructure. | | | A panel discussion hosted by the World Bank and National Geographic Society brought the continent’s complex issues into sharp focus. |
|
http://econ.worldbank.org
|
|
|
