The report also examines how effectively the World Bank Group addressed current and emerging development challenges, as well as evaluates World Bank Group's portfolio, country programs, and system for monitoring the implementation of IEG's recommendations.  This year's RAP focuses on gender integration in World Bank Group operations.

"No country, community, or economy can achieve its potential or meet the challenges of the 21st century without the full and equal participation of women and men, girls and boys." This statement from the World Bank Group website'€™s topic page on gender states the essential importance of gender for development. In line with that view, the World Bank Group made considerable progress in addressing gender issues during the past 15 years. Gender has been a prominent corporate objective since the first World Bank Group strategy, introduced in 2001. This year, a new World Bank Group gender strategy has been launched - the first joint World Bank-International Finance Corporation (IFC) strategy to focus on gender. It is an important step toward sharpening the corporate focus on gender and improving the approach to gender mainstreaming.

This report describes how mechanisms for integrating gender in projects and country strategies are working, and to what extent they provide meaningful information about progress and results on gender. The analysis aims to inform World Bank Group efforts to strengthen the approach to documenting, assessing, and evaluating results as part of the new strategy rollout. 

Summary of Findings:

GENDER INTEGRATION IN WBG OPERATIONS (see Chapter 1)

• Corporate commitments have helped broaden policy and strategy attention to gender, which increased gender uptake. However, the quality of gender integration was uneven. 
• The monitoring and evaluation (M&E) frameworks of operations and country strategies do not adequately measure and report on gender results.
• The new World Bank Group gender strategy offers an opportunity to improve tracking and reporting of gender results.​

For more findings related to Gender Integration in World Bank Group Operations and Country Strategies, see Chapter 1.

WBG OPERATIONS (see Chapter 2)

• The performance of Bank lending, IFC Advisory Services, and Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA) guarantees remains stable, but the performance of IFC investments continues to decline.  
• Mid-course corrections matter more than project size for successful performance in World Bank projects; for IFC projects, size matters for real sector projects, but less than do other risk factors.   
• Outcomes of country programs for International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) and IDA have improved during the past three years and remained stable in Fragile and Conflict States with a higher success rate than for the World Bank Group average.

Explore the Data

	World Bank Lending Operations Over Time By Region By Global Practice		IFC Supported Investment Operations By IDA Status By Region By Industry Group
	IFC Advisory Services Projects By Business Line		MIGA Guarantee Projects By Sector

For more findings related to Recent Results and Performance of World Bank Group Operations, see Chapter 2.

MANAGEMENT ACTION RECORD (MAR) (see Chapter 3)

• The Management Action Record (MAR) process was successful in creating a formal, transparent, and well-understood structure within the organization for reporting about progress made to address recommendations in IEG evaluations, however, M&E recommendations have eluded meaningful response. 
• The MAR is a useful accountability tool, but the process requires further reform to make it an effective tool for learning.

Explore the Data

For more findings related to the Management Action Record, see Chapter 3.

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