The global monitoring report 2008 comes
at an important time. This year marks the halfway point in
the effort to achieve the millennium development goals
(MDGs) by 2015. This is also an important year to work
toward a consensus on how the world is going to respond to
the challenge of climate change, building on the foundation
laid at the conference in Bali in December 2007.
Successfully meeting this challenge will be essential for

This report seeks to identify changes in
human development outcomes in a period of deepening
decentralization and to suggest how the country's
decentralized governance structure will be improved to
increase access to, as well as the quality of, relevant
services. The report states decentralized governance
structure helped facilitate improvements in service delivery
and human development outcomes. The report argues that while

This study's objectives are: (i) to
present the pros and cons of existing and alternative brick
technologies in Bangladesh with specific focus on pollution
and energy efficiency; (ii) to estimate the private and
social benefits of these technologies (iii) to summarize
China's experience in the development of the brick
industry, as the world leader brick producer and (iv) to
provide concrete recommendations for adopting cleaner

An efficient and affordable access to
jobs, education and services is considered a fundamental
element for development. However, the mobility conditions in
the cities have deteriorated because of the increasing
motorization and urbanization. The number of new cars that
enter the cities every year outpaces the construction of new
roads, aggravating the existing congestion issues.
Therefore, the urban models that revolve around highways and

Recurring environmental incidents have
led to increased public awareness of the threats of
environmental pollution to public health and rapid
urbanization is driving up land prices in Chinese cities. As
a result of these developments, industrial plant relocations
are numerous, particularly of heavily polluting industrial
plants, such as pesticide, coke, steel plants, and chemical
industry plants. These relocations are leaving behind many

The purpose of this report is to provide
an overview of the current situation of brownfield
management in China for World Bank staff and relevant
government officials in order to help raise awareness of
land contamination and help develop remediation activities.
After the introductory section, section two explores the
environmental and development pressures of land. Section
three reviews government plans, targets and actions. Section

This study seeks to strengthen the
knowledge base with respect to competitiveness and
profitability of the Ship Breaking and Recycling Industry
(SBRI) and to investigate the feasibility of ship breaking
countries in this region, specifically Bangladesh and
Pakistan, achieving compliance with the Hong Kong Convention
(HKC) without jeopardizing the future of the industry there.
The objective of the study is to inform key stakeholders

This paper proposes an alternative
approach to addressing the complex problems of climate
change caused by greenhouse gas emissions. The author, who
won the 2009 Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences, argues that
single policies adopted only at a global scale are unlikely
to generate sufficient trust among citizens and firms so
that collective action can take place in a comprehensive and
transparent manner that will effectively reduce global

Over the past 10 years the government of
Uganda has endeavored to increase latrine coverage and
promote hygiene with a view to improving health outcomes. In
1997, in the Kampala declaration for sanitation, leaders
from all of Uganda's districts pledged to improve
sanitation. Then in 2001, three ministries, the Ministry of
Water, Lands, and Environment; the Ministry of Education and
Sports; and the Ministry of Health, signed a memorandum of

The Dominican Republic-Central American
Free Trade Agreement with the United States aims to create a
free trade zone for economic development. The Agreement is
expected to intensify commerce and investment among the
participating countries. This paper analyzes the changes in
the production and trading patterns in 2-digit manufacturing
sectors with the goal of understanding the short-term
environmental implications of the Dominican Republic-Central

This year's edition introduces a
new green national accounting aggregate, adjusted Net
National Income (aNNI), into the set of environment and
development indicators. Using the underlying methodology of
the Adjusted Net Saving (ANS) measure, which has been
published since the first edition in 2000, aNNI provides a
broader measure of national income that accounts for the
depletion of natural resources. The standard measure of

Carbon accounting and labeling are new
instruments of supply chain management and, in some cases,
of regulation that may affect trade from developing
counties. These instruments are used to analyze and present
information on greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from supply
chains with the hope that they will help bring about
reductions of GHGs. The designers of these schemes are
caught in a dilemma: on one hand they have to respond to