This Systematic Country Diagnostic (SCD)
covers eight small Pacific island countries (PIC8):
Kiribati, Marshall Islands, the Federated States of
Micronesia, Palau, Samoa, Tonga, Tuvalu, and Vanuatu. The
objective of the SCD is to identify the most critical
constraints and opportunities facing the PIC8 to meet the
global goals of ending absolute poverty and boosting shared
prosperity in a sustainable manner. The report is intended

This study was undertaken under the
leadership of the Ministry of Finance and Economic
Development (MOFED) to assess fiduciary risks in using
country financial management (FM) systems in full, or in
part, for implementing Donor and Bank-financed investment
projects in Zimbabwe and to identify risk mitigation
measures required for such use. Fiduciary risk is the risk
that Bank funds (or donor funds) will not be used for their

In this context, this note summarizes
the findings of a recent World Bank, SACU Secretariat
assessment of regional trade facilitation based on the Trade
and Transport Facilitation Assessment (TTFA) methodology.
The assessment looks at regional trade facilitation through
the lens of value chains, with the objective to understand
how the region’s trade and transport environment could be
improved to facilitate more extensive and deeply integrated

Once concentrated among a few large
economies, global flows of goods, services, and capital now
reach an ever-larger number of countries worldwide. Global
trade in goods and in services both increased 10 times
between 1980 and 2011, while foreign direct investment (FDI)
flows increased almost 30-fold. A value chain is global when
some of these stages are carried out in more than one
country, most notably when discrete tasks within a

The countries comprising the Southern
African Customs Union (SACU) are currently not very
integrated into global value chains (GVCs), potentially
missing out on important development opportunities.
Accordingly, we explore high level options for promoting
their integration. Given East Asia’s spectacular success
with integrating into GVCs, we first assess the probability
that SACU can copy their flying geese pattern. That was

In the last years the Brazilian agricultural frontier is expanding towards the cerrado region, more specifically the region called MATOPIBA, comprised of savannah areas of four different states located in the north and northeastern parts of the country. This research paper aims to show a recent pattern of second wave investments in the frontier aimed at inferior quality land.

This handbook is the product of a
workshop held in June 2014 with about 25 environmental
regulators from over 10 FCV-affected countries (Burkina
Faso, Central African Republic, Kenya, Liberia, Madagascar,
Mali, Mozambique, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, South Sudan, and
Sudan) that was financed by the Korean Trust Fund (KTF) and
organized and hosted by the World Bank Group (WBG). Over the
course of one week the participants went through a dense

The purpose of this note is to provide
policy recommendations to improve access to credit of rural
populations and small agricultural producers under
financially sustainable schemes. Although the agricultural
sector remains an important source of employment,
agricultural credit is a small fraction of commercial credit
in Colombia. The share of agricultural credit in Colombia is
below levels observed in other countries in the region.

Twenty million people in Central America
cook with biomass using open fires or rudimentary stoves.
The number of people using biomass for cooking in the region
will remain significant for a long time due to high
incidence of poverty, high Liquid Petroleum Gas (LPG) prices
coupled with unsustainable LPG subsidies, as well as
relatively easy access to fuel wood in the region. Providing
these people with clean and efficient cooking solutions is

Part one of the report provides an
overview of the economy. It has one chapter (chapter one),
which provides an overview of the country’s growth and
macroeconomic performance and challenges and analyzes and
emphasizes the limited dynamism of a rent- and
hydrocarbon-cursed economy. Part II describes cross-cutting
issues that constrain policy implementation, regardless of
the sectors where they occur. In chapter two, the report

This Country Partnership Framework (CPF)
is designed to support the forthcoming Chad Five-Year
Development Plan (2016-2020). It succeeds the Interim
Strategy agreed with the Government of Chad in March 2010.
The Interim Strategy Note (ISN) set out the World Bank
Group’s (WBG’s) support to Chad for the period 2010-2012.
The strategy was composed of three main pillars:
strengthening governance; improving livelihoods and access

Honduras’ recent economic performance
has been positive, especially taking into account the global
economic context. Real Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth
accelerated from 2.8 percent in 2013 to 3.1 percent in 2014
and 3.6 percent in the first half of 2015. Growth has been
supported by improved terms of trade, higher remittance
inflows and export demand driven by the on-going recovery of
the United States (US), and improved investor confidence.