The states in the Brazilian Amazon have
made progress in reducing poverty and improving social
indicators in the last decade. Despite this progress, the
poverty rate in the Amazon is among the highest in Brazil.
As of 2000, rural poverty is the greatest challenge. In
Par?, not only is the headcount poverty rate of 58.4 percent
in rural areas more than 55 percent higher than headcount
poverty in urban areas, but also poverty is much deeper in

The rapid urbanization in many
developing countries over the past half century seems to
have been accompanied by excessively high levels of
concentration of the urban population in very large cities.
Some degree of urban concentration may be desirable
initially to reduce inter- and intraregional infrastructure
expenditures. But in a mature system of cities, economic
activity is more spread out. Standardized manufacturing

In conformity with its objective of
functioning as a local Government, Kathmandu Metropolitan
City (KMC) sought the assistance of the World Bank for the
preparation of a City Development Strategy (CDS). The
various sectoral as well as integrated strategies presented
in this document seem to be an overwhelming demand on KMC
with its limited manpower and money. A CDS is essential if
KMC is to focus its development potential. The optimism lies

Fueled by fast-expanding demand, the production of meat and milk in the developing world has doubled in recent decades, and this trend is expected to continue. This expanding sector can provide income, employment, and high quality nutrition for vulnerable groups, and in many areas of the world, essential soil fertility inputs.

Slum upgrading programs are being used by national and city governments in many countries to improve the welfare of households living in slum and squatter settlements. These programs typically include a combination of improvements in neighborhood infrastructure, land tenure, and building quality. In this paper, the authors develop a dynamic general equilibrium model to compare the effectiveness of alternative slum upgrading instruments in a second-best setting with distortions in the land and credit markets.

Strategies to help the one billion people worldwide who live in informal settlements have mainly focused on slum upgrading, sites and services programs, and tenure security. In contrast, there has been less attention on what enables slum dwellers to transition into the formal housing sector, which has the dual benefits of improving service access and escaping social stigma. In this paper the authors investigate residential mobility among slum dwellers in Bhopal, India.

Urban growth is, in all parts of the
world, inevitable and welcomed. Despite concerns that local
governments will not be able to address those issues
associated with increased urban population, the number of
people living in urban centers will sur-pass those of the
rural population by 2030. Since productivity levels are
consistently higher in urban areas than in rural settings,
this would seem a reason to rejoice since it suggests more

This review of the active portfolio of
World Bank projects aimed at improving urban environmental
quality was carried out during 2002-03 in order to assess
the level of commitment of the institution to urban
sustainability. The review focuses on the contributions of
key sectors to urban environmental improvements, in
particular on those belonging to the Infrastructure
Vice-Presidency, and on how projects are contributing to

This study reviews Malawi's
policies in the biomass, rural electrification, and
non-biomass renewable energy sub-sectors to identify
problems and constraints to progress and to propose
policies, initiatives, and institutional structures to
overcome those problems and constraints. The main
recommendations of this report to the Government of Malawi
are as follows: 1) reform the present legislative and

The 2006 edition of the little green
data book coincides with a wave of renewed attention to the
energy sector coming out of the group of eight summit at
Gleneagles, Scotland. While energy demand is rising along
with gross domestic product (GDP) in the developing world,
many poor countries still lack the basic infrastructure that
sustains everyday needs. Electric power consumption per
capita is 25 times lower in low-income countries than in

The 2007 edition of the little green
data book includes a new focus section, four introductory
pages that focus on a specific issue related to development
and the environment in this edition, carbon dioxide
emissions. The reports deem human causation of climate
change to be very likely. Late 2006 saw the publication of
the Stern review on the economics of climate change, which
emphasizes the major economic costs of climate change under

This report sets out a new poverty line methodology for Turkey, as the basic measure of poverty in the country. However, several poverty lines are calculated for the purpose of international comparability, and comparability to the Bank's poverty measures, using the 1987 and 1994 data. The basic data used in Volume One are from the official 2002 Household Budget Survey (HBS). The analysis refers generally to the new poverty line methodology that results in 27 percent poor. This line is called "complete" poverty line, and is referred to as "Total poverty" in statistical tables.