This paper is part of a series of four Urban Policy Notes that provide a critical review on emergent challenges to Bhutan's increasing urbanization and its ramifications for growth, livability and sustainability in line with the directives of the 12th Five-Year Plan (FYP) and the Vision 2020....

This report summarizes the results of the analytical work on housing market finance carried out by the World Bank Group at the request of the Ministry of Finance. The purpose of the work was to inform the policy dialogue about how best to develop a sustainable housing finance market in Nigeria,...

Government initiatives to reduce the housing deficit in Colombia go back more than a hundred years, but it was only after the creation of the Ministry of Housing as an independent agency, a decade ago, that national housing policy took on the relevance that it has today. Since then, Colombia has...

In less than fifty years, Brazil evolved from a predominantly rural society and economy to a highly urbanized country in which 85 percent of its people now live in urban areas and more than 90 percent of the country’s GDP is generated in the cities. This rapid urbanization process was...

In less than fifty years, Brazil evolved from a predominantly rural society and economy to a highly urbanized country in which 85 percent of its people now live in urban areas and more than 90 percent of the country’s GDP is generated in the cities. This rapid urbanization process was...

Bleak short-term economic outlook raises the risk that social and environmental achievements may not be sustained. The changed economic circumstances have exposed shortcomings in Brazil's development model, epitomized by the struggle to achieve a sustainable fiscal policy. Against this...

This study presents options for disaster risk financing in Brazil, drawing from international experience. The study presents a series of complementary options for disaster risk financing, based on a preliminary fiscal risk analysis and a preliminary review of the current budget management of...

A set of case studies were prepared as part of the World Bank's Water Global Practice initiative "Wastewater. Shifting paradigms: from waste to resource" to document existing experiences in the water sector on the topic. The case studies highlight innovative financing and contractual...

Evidence on the impacts of many teacher policies remains insufficient and scattered, and the impact of many reforms depends on specific design features. In addition, teacher policies can have very different impacts, depending on the context and other education policies already in place. Systems...