Russia's exports became further
dominated by petroleum and natural gas over the last decade.
The sector experienced double-digit annual export growth in
the last decade and represented almost 65 percent of
Russia's exports value in 2009 a product of higher
commodity prices and higher export volumes. Export growth
rates of the non-oil and gas sector were also notable. Such
industries as machinery, electronics, transportation

Ningbo serves as the Chinese pilot city
for the World Bank Climate Resilient Cities (CRC) Program.
The CRC program aims to, prepare local governments in the
East Asia region to better understand the concepts and
consequences of climate change; how climate change
consequences contribute to urban vulnerabilities; and what
is being done by city governments in East Asia and around
the world to actively engage in learning capacity building,

This 2010 report, Valuation of
Environmental Services in Sri Lanka : A Case Study of Soil
and Watershed Benefits in the Southern Province, uses
valuation tools to evaluate environmental services to allow
policymakers to efficiently address sustainable economic
development and environment protection within the country s
economic policy. The Government of Sri Lanka has committed
to a 10-year development framework of increased growth and

This report shows that trends in farm
mechanization are attributable to differing approaches to
reform and differing agricultural resource endowments. The
level of reform determines the pattern and extent to which
labor and capital change, with land reform and commodity
market liberalization as the underlying forces for change.
These reforms substantially raise the incentives to invest
as a means to increase productivity and incomes. In

This paper discusses the progress made
by Cambodia from the early 90s to 2007, in reduction of
poverty incidence. Reduced poverty occurred in both urban
and rural areas, and was experienced by rich and poor, and
by men and women. Households, including those in the poorest
groups, have improved their housing quality, increased
ownership of motorbikes, televisions, and mobile phones, and
are better able to access and afford schools and healthcare.

The agricultural season in Bosnia and
Herzegovina (BH) begins earlier than in most European
countries, shipping costs are relatively low, and land and
labor prices are more favorable than in other southern
European countries. As a result, the country's
agriculture sector should be well positioned to compete on
the export markets. With 20.6 percent of all employed in BH,
agriculture remains an important sector for employment,

In this report, in addition to aggregate
results, six brief case studies are used to highlight the
impact of Bank supported mining sector reform on various
indicators at different links of the value chain. These
include: the impacts on investment; production and
employment in Argentina; institutional capacity building in
Papua New Guinea; production and fiscal revenues in
Tanzania; community and regional development in Madagascar;

The World Bank Group has a unique
opportunity to match the increases in financing for
agriculture with a sharper focus on improving agricultural
growth and productivity in agriculture-based economies,
notably in Sub-Saharan Africa. Greater effort will be needed
to connect sectoral interventions and achieve synergies from
public and private sector interventions; to build capacity
and knowledge exchange; to take stock of experience in

World development indicators 2011, the
15th edition in its current format, aims to provide
relevant, high-quality, internationally comparable
statistics about development and the quality of
people's lives around the globe. Fifteen years ago,
World development indicators was overhauled and redesigned,
organizing the data to present an integrated view of
development, with the goal of putting these data in the

The five countries of Central Asia
expanded their trade significantly since beginning their
transition with exports quadrupling to almost USD70 billion
between 2003 and 2008 but without substantial
diversification. These countries achieved this by promoting
private investment, property rights, trade liberalization,
and transport infrastructure in varying degrees. This study
focuses on three countries of Central Asia-Kazakhstan, the

Services are failing poor urban and
rural people in the developing world, and poverty remains
concentrated in rural areas and urban slums. This state of
affairs prevails despite prolonged efforts by many
governments to improve rural and urban services and
development programs. This book focuses on how communities
and local governments can be empowered to contribute to
their own development and, in the process, improve

This case study is one of six
evaluations of the implementation of the World Bank's
1991 Forest Strategy. This and the other cases (Cameroon,
China, Costa Rica, India, and Indonesia) complement a review
of the entire set of lending and nonlending activities of
the World Bank Group and the Global Environment Facility.
The World Bank has clearly diminished its lending presence
in the Amazon in the past decade. It has moved from the