Trade can dramatically improve women's lives, creating new jobs, enhancing consumer choices, and increasing women's bargaining power in society. It can also lead to job losses and a concentration of work in low-skilled employment. Given the complexity and specificity of the relationship between...

The exit of the United Kingdom from the European Union (Brexit) may have a negative impact on trade and investment flows not just for the UK, but also for the countries with the largest exposure to the UK. The indirect impact of a Brexit-induced recession in the UK -may also be felt in the EU...

With its impressive maternal and child health outcomes and control of communicable diseases, Sri Lanka is often depicted as a success story. The primary objectives of this study are to examine the prevalence and distribution of non-communicable disease (NCDs) and risk factors across...

Reducing gender inequality could increase GDP per capita by more than a fourth in Niger by 2030. These significant economic gains would be generated by enabling women to have the same earnings as men and reducing fertility and thereby population growth. Investing in girls' education and reducing...

Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, the world was living a learning crisis. Before the pandemic, 258 million children and youth of primary- and secondary-school age were out of school. And low schooling quality meant many who were in school learned too little. The Learning Poverty rate in low-and...

As of early July 2020, life in Hanoi appears to be back to normal or close to what it used to be before the COVID-19 (Coronavirus) pandemic. The government's policy helped contain the virus and contributed to saving human lives. Today, most social distancing measures have been lifted. However,...

This retrospective examines how the World Bank's strategic use of climate-related trust funds has enabled it to play an outsized role in catalyzing climate action worldwide for nearly 30 years. By looking back at the history of climate and carbon finance, with a focus on the pioneering role of...

The global COVID-19 vaccination campaign, the largest public health initiative ever undertaken, presents challenges unprecedented in scale, speed and specificities, especially in low and middle-income countries. In November 2020, anticipating the availability of safe and effective vaccines for...

In the face of the global economic crisis caused by the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, the World Bank delivered the largest crisis response in its history. This evaluation assesses the Bank Group's early response to the economic crises caused by COVID-19, and examines interventions over the 15...

Following the magnitude (Mw) 7.8 Turkiye-Syria Earthquake on February 6, 2023 and the Mw 6.3 earthquake on February 20, 2023, the World Bank carried out a remote, desk-based assessment of the physical damages in Syria using the Global RApid post-disaster Damage Estimation (GRADE) methodology....