Fridays Academy: Health, Poverty Reduction and Economic Growth (II)

The unacceptably high mortality rates in the least developed countries can be improved by the control of communicable diseases and enhancing maternal and child health. HIV/AIDS, malaria, tuberculosis (TB), childhood infectious diseases, maternal and prenatal conditions, micronutrient deficiencies and tobacco-related illnesses represent the main causes of (avoidable) deaths in low-income countries (CMH, 2001).  Widespread disease [...]

Barack Obama will double US Aid

In a speech to the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, Barack Obama pledged to double US aid by 2012, if elected President.
For the last twenty years, U.S. foreign aid funding has done little more than keep pace with inflation.  Doubling our foreign assistance spending by 2012 will help meet the challenge laid out by Tony [...]

Dani Rodrik’s blog

Dani Rodrik has entered the blogosphere with a promise of unconventional thoughts on economic development and globalization.
That’s great news. Welcome!
(Via Trade Diversion)
Source: World Bank Poverty and Growth Program

Migration and remittances: leaving in order to live

We have blogged about migrant remittances in the past, from an economic point of view.
The New York Times magazine includes this week an excellent article on remittances that looks at the personal stories behind migration and at its costs and benefits. Jason DeParle’s article focuses on the Philippines, a country with 10 percent of its population living [...]

Satellite monitoring to protect forests

By Bilal Hassan
THE Punjab government has decided to launch a green Punjab programme through public-private joint venture to safeguard and promote forestry in the province. It is a welcome move for environmentalists and for sustainability of agriculture. The provincial government intend to plant 20 million trees on 100,000 acres in the coming three years.To [...]

Expanding South-South trade

Expanding South-South trade
By Hussain H. Zaidi
On the basis of the economic grouping of trade partners, global trade can be classified into three categories: among developed countries or north-north trade, between developed countries on one hand and developing countries on the other also called North-South trade, and among developing countries or South-South trade. It is the [...]

Fridays Academy: Health, Poverty Reduction and Economic Growth

Health, Poverty Reduction and Economic Growth
The opportunity to receive basic health care is a critical component of personal development as well as a key factor for economic progress (Sen, 1999) and is a basic human right that is protected by international law.  Yet for millions of the world’s poor this basic right remains out of [...]

Ending Poverty in South Asia: Ideas That Work

The South Asia Region and the Poverty Reduction Group of the World Bank presented today its new publication: Ending Poverty in South Asia: Ideas That Work, edited by Deepa Narayan and Elena Glinskaya.This is a collection of case studies that describe experiences by practitioners in the ground and ideas that have worked reducing poverty [...]

The Ten Commandments of Pro-Poor Growth

According to Mwangi S. Kimenyi in the latest issue of Poverty in Focus, trying to “highlight the importance of thinking about the poor as people rather than mere numbers and getting a better understanding of the economy and the linkages within sectors and regions”.
Pro-poor reform policies should:

Target activities which most poor are involved in, and because markets of [...]

World Development Indicators 2007

World Development Indicators (WDI) 2007 is out.
WDI is the World Bank’s premier annual compilation of data about development. The 2007 WDI includes more than 900 indicators in over 80 tables organized in 6 sections: World View, People, Environment, Economy, States and Markets, and Global Links. 
According to the data, 1 billion people, or 18.4 percent of the [...]