Transition to a new world order with more diffuse distribution of economic power is under way. This first edition of a new World Bank flagship report, 'Global Development Horizons 2011', focuses on three major international economic trends: the shift in the balance of global growth from...

A competitive city is a city that successfully facilitates its firms and industries to create jobs, raise productivity, and increase the incomes of citizens over time. Worldwide, improving the competitiveness of cities is a pathway to eliminating extreme poverty and to promoting shared...

The Central African Economic and Monetary Community (CEMAC), which consists of Cameroon, the Central African Republic, Chad, the Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea and Gabon, is one of the oldest regional groupings in Africa. The main objectives for achieving this are: (i) the creation of a...

Slavonia's economy is now amongst the poorest in the European Union (EU) and has been growing more slowly than comparable regions. Some Polish and Romanian counties were less advanced until 2013 but have now overtaken Slavonia. Achieving a turnaround is difficult: only 9 percent of lagging...

Latin America and the Caribbean suffered the largest death toll from Covid?19 across developing regions and the sharpest decline in economic activity. With fewer school days and lower employment rates, with higher public debt and more firms under stress, the effects could be long?lasting. The...

This report aims to deepen the understanding of barriers to and incentives for the acceptance and use of electronic payments, from the perspective of micro, small and medium retailers (merchants). Developing and accelerating acceptance of electronic payments by these merchants is essential to...

Worldwide, Vocational Education and Training (VET) is receiving increasing attention, particularly as a potentially useful instrument to address high unemployment rates among youth. In 2016, the World Bank started providing technical assistance to the self government of Poland's Swietokrzyskie...

Aligned with the message of the World Bank's 2018 World Development Report: Learning to Realize Education's Promise, 'Every Learner Matters' argues that for children with disabilities, the focus needs to shift from school access to prioritizing learning. This paper examines education systems and...

Little research attention has been paid to documenting and analyzing attempts of education systems moving quickly and at scale to provide online learning when all or many schools are closed. Related 'good practices' are considered rare, and on the whole, activities and initiatives of these sorts...

Before the outbreak of the global novel coronavirus pandemic, the world was already dealing with a learning crisis, as evidenced by high levels of Learning Poverty. With the spread of the Coronavirus disease (COVID-19), among many disruptions to normal life, 160 countries have mandated temporary...