The fieldwork for this report consisted
of a household energy survey of households living in 180
villages in six states (Andhra Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh,
Maharashtra, Punjab, Rajasthan and West Bengal). The report
was initiated in response to concerns that energy strategies
for rural India were not progressing toward modern energy
use.It examines energy use, including renewable energy, to
determine if households in rural areas have access to modern

This study reviews the available
quantitative and qualitative information on urban poverty
issues and trends in the East Asia and Pacific (EAP) Region,
with particular focus on Indonesia, the Philippines, and
Vietnam. The review is a desk study-which is limited to
material accessible to the Bank in Washington and draws
mainly on existing field work and other published and
unpublished papers. The empirical analysis focuses on the

To find out why African countries' experience with urbanization and sustained growth appeared to differ from that of other countries, the authors investigated the determinants of urbanization across countries over 40 years. Rather than studying individuals' decisions to migrate, they relied on macroeconomic data and cross-country comparisons. A central hypothesis of their study: that individuals move (with varying degrees of ease) in response to economic incentives and opportunities. If location incentives are distorted, so is growth.

This book synthesizes, and elaborates on
the results of a series of country studies, completed under
the Poverty Dynamics in Africa Initiative, organized by the
Africa Region of the Bank. These studies made use of vastly
improved household survey data, which have enhanced
understanding of African poverty dynamics during the past
decade. The book examines the main factors behind observed
poverty changes in eight countries - Ethiopia, Ghana,

The authors use China's national
household surveys for rural and urban areas to measure and
explain the welfare impacts of the changes in goods and
factor prices attributed to WTO accession. Price changes are
estimated separately using a general equilibrium model to
capture both direct and indirect effects of the initial
tariff changes. The welfare impacts are first-order
approximations based on a household model incorporating

The acute water shortage, and pollution
problems in North China have been exacerbated by the
continued population growth, and the accelerated industrial
expansion over the past half-century, conducive to
increasingly severe freshwater shortages, and catastrophic
consequences for the future. Significant commitments need to
be made to rapidly implement strategies to bring water
resource utilization back into a sustainable balance. The

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) for
Kathmandu. 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. However, a CDS is essential if KMC is to focus its

Environmental degradation can inflict
serious damage on poor people because their livelihoods
often depend on natural resource use and their living
conditions may offer little protection from air, water, and
soil pollution. At the same time, poverty-constrained
options may induce the poor to deplete resources and degrade
the environment at rates that are incompatible with
long-term sustainability. In such cases, degraded resources

This paper provides evidence consistent with elite capture of Social Fund investment projects in Ecuador. Exploiting a unique combination of data-sets on village-level income distributions, Social Fund project administration, and province level electoral results, the authors test a simple model of project choice when local political power is unequally distributed. In accordance with the predictions of the model, poorer villages are more likely to receive projects that provide excludable (private) goods to the poor, such as latrines.

The study outlines the socioeconomic
development strategy for Vietnam, during the first decade of
the twenty first century, envisaging sustainable economic
development, to rapidly adjust to social stability, while
maintaining cultural, and traditional ties. The aim is to
become a socialist market economy, fully integrated into the
global economy, internationally competitive, with
characteristics of an industrialized, and knowledge-based

China has very serious water problems
despite substantial economic development achievements,
strong technical expertise, and political stability. But in
terms of its potential and the critical pressing needs for
water resources management, China could do much better in
managing its water resources. The World Bank's
assistance to China in water resources development and
management in the past has tended to be reactive and

The case in Mexico City offered an
opportunity to observe the advantages, and disadvantages of
gradualist reform. Unfortunately, the authors find that the
long-term nature of an incremental approach does not match
well with the generally shorter-term horizons of elected
politicians. Difficult decisions in implementation are left
to later years, which pushes potentially unpopular actions
onto the shoulders of future administrations, while allowing