The Onchocerciasis Control Program (OCP)
was created in 1974 with two primary objectives. The first
is the elimination of onchocerciasis as a public health
problem and as an obstacle to socioeconomic development
throughout an eleven-country area. The second is to leave
participating countries in a position to maintain this
achievements by enhancing national capacity to maintain
control of the disease. The principal tool has been vector

Major changes are needed if Africans and
their children are to claim the 21st century. With the
rapidly growing population, 5 percent annual growth is
needed simply to keep the number of poor from rising.
Halving severe poverty by 2015 will require annual growth of
more than 7 percent, along with a more equitable
distribution of income. Trends in Africa will need to change
radically for a catch-up process to materialize. This will

The Argentine government is using
output-based contracts with the private sector for
rehabilitation and maintenance of its nonconcessioned road
network. The multiyear lump sum contracts, funded by the
government, specify required road service outputs and use
incentive-based payment schedules to ensure the quality of
the work. After three years of operation the 60 contracts
(averaging US$10 million) in the first phase are working

Inter-household transfers are an
important resource for low-income households, yet have been
almost ignored by donors. Though they are no substitute for
public programs, these private transfers merit more
attention in poverty research, gender analysis, project
design, and development strategies. The note provides
insight on what drives inter-household transfers - of money,
goods, and services - through anthropological, and

The results of this paper challenge the
conventional wisdom in the literature that productivity
plays no role in the economic development of Singapore.
Properly accounting for market power and returns to scale
technology, the estimated average productivity growth is
twice as large as the conventional total factor productivity
(TFP) measures. Using a standard growth accounting
(production function) technique, Young (1992, 1995) found no

The Africa Gas Initiative (AGI) has been
established by the Oil and Gas Division of the World Bank,
to promote the utilization of natural gas in Sub-Saharan
Africa. The study focuses on coastal countries - Angola,
Cameroon, Congo, Cote d'Ivoire, and Gabon - along the
West African coastline, and the Gulf of Guinea, where most
of the region's gas reserves are located, and where
significant proportions of the gas produced, is being wasted

Based on more than 240 real-life
examples in over 60 countries, Developing Value is the first
large-scale study analyzing the business case for
sustainability in emerging markets, the opportunity for
businesses to achieve benefits such as higher sales, reduced
costs and lower risks from better corporate governance,
improved environmental practices, and investments in social
and economic development. It pinpoints the many

Production in 2004 was actually running
higher than consumption prior to 1995 and this has caused the existence of a world surplus of
baled cotton in the form of stocks in warehouse. It is the existence of these “ending stocks” that
has a large effect on the international price of cotton. Consumption began to
outpace production in 2001 to 2003 period and this, mixed with crop disasters in various regions,
caused the international price to rise. The reaction from many countries was to increase

Malaria kills over one million people
and causes 300-500 million episodes of illness each year.
The majority of the 3,000 deaths each day and ten new cases
every second occur in Africa. The disease not only takes a
high human toll; it also impedes development. Malaria has
economic impacts through labor efficiency and land use;
adversely affects school attendance, performance and
cognitive ability; and translates in monetary costs in terms

During the 1990s private sponsors have
participated in projects involving eighty-nine airports in
twenty-three developing countries, with investment totaling
US$5.4 billion. About three-fifths of this investment was
carried out in 1998 alone, and about two-fifths related to
the award of the Argentine airport system that year.
Analysis of the investment patterns shows that Latin America
leads in attracting private investors, operations and

The more risk and responsibility a
government hands over to the private sector in water and
sanitation, the more powerful the incentives for better
performance-but also the more demands on the government in
commitment and preparation. So a government about to enter
into a long partnership for a water concession or
build-operate-transfer arrangement - typically for
twenty-five to thirty years - needs to be sure that it does

This Financial Sector Assessment (FSA)
is a summary of some of the findings of the Financial Sector
Assessment Program (FSAP) report for the Russian Federation,
which was prepared jointly by the International Monetary
Fund (IMF) and the Bank in close cooperation with the
Russian authorities. Given the small size of the financial
sector, the effects of a potential financial sector distress
on the macro-economy would be relatively small. However,