The World Bank’s Early Support to Addressing COVID-19
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The first of two reports focused on the early response to the Coronavirus (COVID-19), this evaluation assesses how well the World Bank responded to the immediate health threat and how well it focused on protecting vulnerable groups against human capital losses, while a parallel IEG evaluation looks at the World Bank Group support to address the economic implications of the pandemic.
The first of two reports focused on the early response to the Coronavirus (COVID-19), this evaluation assesses how well the World Bank responded to the immediate health threat and how well it focused on protecting vulnerable groups against human capital losses, while a parallel IEG evaluation looks at the World Bank Group support to address the economic implications of the pandemic.
Tanzania Country Program Evaluation (Approach Paper)
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The Country Program Evaluation (CPE) for Tanzania assesses the World Bank Group’s effectiveness and relevance in its work to help Tanzania address its key development challenges. The CPE will encompass two Bank Group strategy periods covering fiscal years (FY)12–16 and FY18–22. The evaluation aims to inform the next Bank Group Country Partnership Framework for Tanzania.The Country Program Evaluation (CPE) for Tanzania assesses the World Bank Group’s effectiveness and relevance in its work to help Tanzania address its key development challenges. The CPE will encompass two Bank Group strategy periods covering fiscal years (FY)12–16 and FY18–22. The evaluation aims to inform the next Bank Group Country Partnership Framework for Tanzania.
Ecuador Country Program Evaluation (Approach Paper)
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The Country Program Evaluation (CPE) for Ecuador seeks to assess the performance of the World Bank Group in helping Ecuador address its main development challenges. The objective of this CPE is to assess how the Bank Group supported Ecuador in addressing key challenges that constrained its development and how that support adapted over time to respond to changing circumstances, an evolving Show MoreThe Country Program Evaluation (CPE) for Ecuador seeks to assess the performance of the World Bank Group in helping Ecuador address its main development challenges. The objective of this CPE is to assess how the Bank Group supported Ecuador in addressing key challenges that constrained its development and how that support adapted over time to respond to changing circumstances, an evolving relationship, and lessons from experience. The evaluation will cover the period FY07–22. The time period is selected to include the earliest efforts at normalizing relations after the break in July 2007. Because this was such a pivotal aspect of the World Bank’s support to Ecuador over the past decade, the CPE considers a somewhat expanded time period.
Building the evidence for more effective disaster risk reduction
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After a long hiatus due to the COVID crises, governments will come together in Bali this week to discuss progress on the implementation of the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction. Organized by the UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR) and hosted by the Government of Indonesia, the seventh session of the Global Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction comes at a crucial time: Show MoreAfter a long hiatus due to the COVID crises, governments will come together in Bali this week to discuss progress on the implementation of the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction. Organized by the UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR) and hosted by the Government of Indonesia, the seventh session of the Global Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction comes at a crucial time: while countries struggle to address the compounded threats of food, fuel and financial insecurity in the midst of a pandemic, many must also still contend with the threat of natural hazards and the terrible costs they exact.
Almost 25 million people were internally displaced by natural hazards in 2021. Climate change is exacerbating the risks to lives and livelihoods from more severe droughts, floods, and storms. As with the shocks from the pandemic and the Ukraine crisis, it is poorer countries and their populations that are most vulnerable to the impacts of natural hazards. Building resilience to the risks posed by natural hazards remains vital for protecting people and preserving development gains and creating the conditions for sustainable development. An upcoming evaluation from the Independent Evaluation Group will offer an assessment of how and how well the World Bank has helped countries address risks of disasters caused by natural hazards.
Disaster risk reduction (DRR) is at the core of the World Bank’s approach to support green, resilient, and inclusive development, and in particular to support countries to address climate change through adaptation and resilience. The World Bank has supported hundreds of projects supporting DRR, including through physical investments in risk mitigation and resilient infrastructure, support for policy strategy and institutional reform, disaster preparedness including early warning systems, and disaster risk finance. The evaluation – scheduled to be released in October of this year ahead of the Annual Meetings of the IMF and World Bank Group – seeks to identify the factors that contributed to success and failure, as lessons to build on for more effective support to countries to reduce disaster risk from natural hazards.
Underinvestment in DRR has been a global challenge. Along with a shift in mindset from disaster recovery to risk reduction, DRR requires a complex combination of building institutional capacities, the design of new policies and new investments. The evaluation undertook a series of case studies on engagements where the World Bank sought to use its upstream analytics and technical assistance, its convening power and partnerships with others, and its lending instruments to catalyze action on DRR. The goal was to zero in on the ingredients for especially effective approaches and glean lessons to guide future engagement with countries on DRR.
The evaluation also raises key questions about the extent to which the World Bank has targeted risk reduction support to the most serious hazards in each country, and the way the World Bank has influenced disaster vulnerable countries to undertake disaster risk reduction activities. The assessment also examines the way in which the World Bank’s t approaches have evolved in line with identified good practices, and how effective it has been in reducing disaster risk- including for the groups who are disproportionately vulnerable.
Understanding the effectiveness of the World Bank, or any institution’s contribution to DRR, is no small task. DRR outcomes are inherently difficult to measure because they are a reduction in the negative effects of a probabilistic future shock. Avoided losses cannot be directly measured. Reduced expected mortality and damage are a function of both the probability distribution of natural hazards of varying intensities and the effectiveness of risk reduction activities. Yet the development case for DRR has never been more vital, even as countries face a daunting array of overlapping risks.
While the upcoming evaluation looks deeply at disasters caused by natural hazards and builds the evidence for what works in motivating effective efforts to minimize their potential impacts, its findings should also be relevant for the broader and integrated efforts needed to address multiple and compound disaster risks, and support resilient development.
Pictured above: Indigenous Fijian girl walking on flooded land in Fiji. On Feb 2016 Severe Tropical Cyclone Winston was the strongest tropical cyclone in Fiji Islands in recorded history. Image credit: Shutterstock/ChameleonsEye
World Bank Group Engagement with Morocco 2011–21 (Approach Paper)
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This Country Program Evaluation aims to assess the World Bank Group’s contribution to Morocco’s development trajectory over the past decade (fiscal years 2011–21) and is timed to inform the next Country Partnership Framework and future Bank Group engagements in the country. The Country Program Evaluation will use a range of methods to assess how the Bank Group has supported Morocco’s efforts to Show MoreThis Country Program Evaluation aims to assess the World Bank Group’s contribution to Morocco’s development trajectory over the past decade (fiscal years 2011–21) and is timed to inform the next Country Partnership Framework and future Bank Group engagements in the country. The Country Program Evaluation will use a range of methods to assess how the Bank Group has supported Morocco’s efforts to tackle major constraints to achieving its objective of reaching upper-middle-income-country status. The evaluation will focus on three outcome areas: (i) fostering private sector–led growth that absorbs a growing labor force; (ii) strengthening inclusive human capital formation and addressing the obstacles to women and youth labor force participation; and (iii) reducing climate risks and natural resource depletion and addressing their combined effects on the most vulnerable people, especially in rural areas.
Reducing child undernutrition: lessons from international development
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An online Nutrition for Growth side-eventAn online Nutrition for Growth side-event
Why is urban transportation key in managing urban spatial growth?
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How robust transport infrastructure makes cities more resilient, equitable, and sustainable. How robust transport infrastructure makes cities more resilient, equitable, and sustainable.
World Bank Support to Aging Countries
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This evaluation is the first at the Independent Evaluation Group to assess the World Bank’s contribution to diagnosing client countries’ demographic issues related to population aging.
This evaluation is the first at the Independent Evaluation Group to assess the World Bank’s contribution to diagnosing client countries’ demographic issues related to population aging.
What do cities need to grow equitably, sustainably and build resilience?
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Cities will be home to 2 billion new residents by 2045. Accommodating this growth will require large-scale development of land in and around urban areas. For lower‐income cities, this will be challenging since they tend to grow through slums and other informal settlements. Along with a lack of adequate and equitable access to public services and economic opportunities, slum residents Show MoreCities will be home to 2 billion new residents by 2045. Accommodating this growth will require large-scale development of land in and around urban areas. For lower‐income cities, this will be challenging since they tend to grow through slums and other informal settlements. Along with a lack of adequate and equitable access to public services and economic opportunities, slum residents are more vulnerable to diseases, especially highly communicable ones such as COVID-19, and they are likelier to bear the brunt of natural disasters associated with using land that is environmentally sensitive, unprotected, or more susceptible to disasters. In 2014, an estimated 880 million urban residents lived in slum conditions, compared with 792 million in 2000 (UN 2019). This number is likely to keep growing unless urban spatial expansion is planned and managed well.
IEG recently assessed the World Bank’s support to client countries on managing urban expansion, particularly through its work on land administration, land‐use planning, and land development. These three key factors determine how urban areas grow.
Land administration
Land administration is the process of establishing, recording, and disseminating information about the ownership, value, and use of land and its associated resources. Making available such fundamental reference information through wider records systems is key towards recognizing a continuity of property rights and ensuring the security of tenure. This, in turn, will motivate households to invest in dwellings and contribute towards creating functioning land markets, which are crucial for the development of cities.
World Bank support to land administration is successfully strengthening property rights through land titling, which contributes to land market development. However, countries eligible for IDA, the World Bank’s fund for the poorest countries, have faced challenges with land titling and land records data management systems, which, in turn, affects their ability to develop land markets. This is partially due to limited technical capacity locally and issues related to political economy. Government planning and policies regarding land administration may not be sufficiently adapted to the local context, including the diverse and, sometimes, conflicting political and economic incentives and motivations that are at play at the local level. The political economy around land administration laws is often complex, and the time taken to reform them typically goes beyond the duration of related projects, and at times, political cycles.
Land‐use planning
Land-use planning helps regulate the use of space, focusing not only on the physical aspect, but also the economic functions, social impact, and the location of different activities within the urban environment. One of the critical functions of land-use planning is the allocation of land to private and public uses, including infrastructure and services. World Bank support to clients on land-use planning has generally been successful, but it rarely supports implementing land-use planning tools that focus on preventing the emergence of new slums or informal areas. This is critical to managing urban spatial growth. The Bank has been encouraging the establishment of independent planning agencies, which help develop preventative approaches, but it has not provided the operational support that is needed for such agencies.
Land development
Land development is the transformation of land through investments and this evaluation assessed it through two components: first, urban upgrading, which is the improvement of conditions in existing slums and preventing the growth of new ones, and second, urban transport, which includes integrating transportation with land use. These components shape how land is used and how its use evolves over time, in turn, defining how productive and inclusive cities will become in the future.
World Bank support to land development has been generally successful, but Bank projects on urban upgrading have tended to focus on upgrading existing slum areas and improving the access of slum-dwellers to infrastructure and housing. It has focused less on preventing the emergence of new slums and informal areas. On urban transport, because of the traditional focus on mobility and access, the Bank’s support does not systematically consider land prices and land markets. Excluding land market assessments from urban transport projects leads to underestimating the total economic benefits of these projects as well as not fully accounting for the benefits and opportunities that an increase in the value of land offers to various income groups, especially those from lower-income segments.
There is also a lack of systematic geolocation of the World Bank’s investments, which further limit the Bank’s ability to support countries in assessing changes in land use, increases in land values, and the associated distributional impacts.
Lessons learned and way forward
There are three specific areas where the World Bank can enhance its support to countries in managing their urban spatial growth.
Adopting a framework that links determinants of urban expansion with strategies for managing it, in an integrated way: The framework could act as a reference for the design and delivery of the Bank’s lending and analytical work on urban spatial growth. The framework could reflect the approach of the Planning, Connecting, and Financing Cities report, the World Bank Group housing framework, the transport-oriented guidelines and recent findings from Pancakes to Pyramids: City Form to Promote Sustainable Growth report.
Adopting preventive approaches in addition to curative ones: This could be done by securing rights of way and financing basic infrastructure in emerging neighborhoods to accommodate new urban dwellers. The World Bank should support the use of public transit, walking, and cycling as primary modes of transportation. It should also expand the use of land‐based planning tools and approaches, such as scenario planning, which is a process to support informed decision-making helping urban planners navigate future uncertainties.
Identifying and recording precise project locations and collecting land market data: The World Bank should strengthen its data collection protocols and increase the use of technologies such as the Geo‐Enabling Initiative for Monitoring and Supervision and the Smart Supervision Application. It should also improve the collection of land market data, including mainstreaming land market assessments in World Bank investments in urban areas.
When countries manage well the factors that determine urban expansion, it can lead to fewer slums, efficient and resilient use of land, functioning land markets, and integrated urban transport systems. These, in turn, will ensure that the expansion in urban areas occurs in ways that are sustainable, efficient, and equitable.
The World Bank Group will need to adopt new approaches, frameworks, and technologies that enhance its ability to support clients, especially IDA countries, on urban expansion. This will contribute directly to Sustainable Development Goals 1 and 11, which address the need for equitable, inclusive, and sustainable use of and access to economic resources, including land, and will help the World Bank Group respond more effectively and efficiently to the twin goals – poverty reduction and shared prosperity. In addition, this will also support countries in managing their urban expansion in ways that consider the infrastructure and services that are needed to help them be more resilient towards chronic stresses and future shocks, such as pandemics and natural disasters. This will facilitate the World Bank Group’s goal of green, resilient, inclusive development.
Read IEG's Evaluation: Managing Urban Spatial Growth World Bank Support to Land Administration, Planning, and Development
pictured above: City view of Bogotá, Colombia on January 11, 2016. Photo © Dominic Chavez/World Bank
Managing Urban Spatial Growth
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This evaluation offers IEG’s first systematic assessment of the World Bank’s support to the management of urban spatial growth.
This evaluation offers IEG’s first systematic assessment of the World Bank’s support to the management of urban spatial growth.