The Government of Lao PDR (GoL)
announced that its 7th national socio-economic development
plan, covering 2010 through 2015, will focus on achieving
the Millennium Development Goals by 2015 and exiting least
developed country status by 2020. To achieve these goals,
one of the priority areas in the 7th National Socio-Economic
Development Plan (NSEDP) is to reduce vulnerability to
shocks by providing and improving social safety nets (SSN).

Reducing poverty continues to be one of
the main priorities of the Government of Albania. Currently,
Albania has an ample platform to provide social protection
to its citizens through social insurance, social assistance
and employment programs. However, these programs are not
efficiently linked to each other, which can lead to unclear
and occasionally overlapping roles among the programs. Among
these social protection programs, Ndihma Ekonomike (NE) is

The World Bank has provided technical
assistance (TA) support to the Government of Samoa to help
identify measures to strengthen agriculture sector
institutions, to improve the performance of selected
commodities - including livestock, fruits and vegetables and
organic products - and to identify strategic agriculture
infrastructure investments. This report provides information
and analysis on opportunities for further development of

Bangladesh is one of the most vulnerable
countries in the world to climate risks. Two-thirds of the
nation is less than 5 meters above sea level and is
susceptible to river and rainwater flooding, particularly
during the monsoon. The Bangladesh Climate Change Strategy
and Action Plan (BCCSAP), adopted by the government of
Bangladesh in 2009, seek to guide activities and programs
related to climate change in Bangladesh. Until the past few

Lao PDR has experienced high levels of
economic growth in recent years and the incidence of poverty
has fallen dramatically since the 1990s. Yet, this report
shows that Lao households continue to be highly vulnerable
to regular seasonal fluctuations, as well as agricultural
shocks and natural disasters. The report also highlights the
importance of health shocks, injury and death for household
welfare. Households adopt a variety of strategies to cope

Over the last two decades Samoa has
suffered major damage from two cyclones in 1990-91, minor
damage from a third cyclone in 2004, and an earthquake
tsunami in 2009. Changes in the scale and impact of these
types of natural disasters are likely to be important
consequences of climate change for the country because the
increases in sea level and in average sea surface
temperatures will increase theintensity and damage

Policymakers in developing countries are
increasingly recognizing the necessity of developing
strategies and identifying specific investment programs to
reduce spatial differences in living standards within their
national territories. Choosing among alternate policy
instruments to support spatial convergence is not
straightforward. Should the focus be social policies that
support human development in lagging regions and promote

The report is structured as follows.
Section one examines the contribution of the rural economy
to the national economy, the structure of the farm and
non-farm sectors and their relative importance. Section two
describes policies and constraints affecting the wider rural
economy including, reforms in macro-economic management,
recent external influences and financial services before
discussing those which relate specifically to agriculture

Due to climate change and increasing
food prices, emphasis needs to be placed on addressing water
management as a key determinant for agricultural production
and productivity. However, governments and donors have
tended to pay relatively little attention to this area, and
investments remain low. This report, which is based on
economic and sector work carried out in the Water Anchor of
the World Bank, highlights the importance of improving water

The agriculture sector has been and will
continue to be important for poverty alleviation efforts in
Indonesia. Indonesia was very successful in increasing
agriculture productivity during the 1970s and up to the
early 1990s, but productivity stagnated during most of the
1990s, partly as a result of declining public investments.
Public spending on agriculture has increased significantly
in the last decade, but a large share of that spending has

This report attempts to diagnose
existing constraints and prospects for growth in
people's incomes in South Kordofan. Given the breadth
and depth of difficulties facing the state, the focus is on
identifying the key areas of reform, or binding constraints,
to growth. There is a combination of extremely low social
returns, the prevalence of government and market failures,
the weak investment climate and the limited access to

The high levels of public debt and
persistent fiscal deficits limit Organization of Eastern
Caribbean States (OECS) governments' ability to pursue
counter-cyclical fiscal policies during future economic
downturns, leaving private investment as the key driver of
future growth. This study on private sector financing in the
OECS analyzes the issue of access to finance from three
different angles: the demand side; the supply side; and the