A joint analysis of poverty and living standards was conducted by a technical team from the Ministry of Planning and Finance, Government of Myanmar, and the Poverty and Equity Global Practice of the World Bank. Poverty has previously been estimated using data from the Integrated Household Living...

The Enterprise Surveys (ES) focus on many aspects of the business environment. These factors can be accommodating or constraining for firms and play an important role in whether an economy's private sector will thrive or not. An accommodating business environment is one that encourages firms to...

This note uses data from the Bhutan living standards survey (BLSS) for 2007, 2012, and 2017 to examine trends in poverty reduction and shared prosperity and to assess the drivers of poverty reduction in the last decade. The note documents the remarkable progress that Bhutan has made in reducing...

As a region, the Mashreq has seen more than its share of deaths, economic losses, and instability for the last decade. The region has braved massive economic and social shocks that would challenge even the most advanced economies in the world. The conflict in the Syrian Arab Republic has...

The 2020 Africa Country Policy and Institutional Assessment (CPIA) report covers the period from January to December 2019. The addition of Somalia brought the number of the region's International Development Association (IDA)-eligible countries to 39. The overall CPIA score for the region's 39...

South Sudan has suffered multiple shocks in 2020, potentially derailing an economic recovery and peace building process. The FY21 budget seeks to stabilize the economy, provide basic services, consolidate peace, and address Coronavirus (COVID-19) effects. While South Sudan is currently faced...

The High-Frequency Phone Survey for refugees in Uganda (URHFPS) tracks the socioeconomic impacts of the COVID-19 crisis on refugees. The World Bank (WB) in collaboration with the Uganda Bureau of Statistics (UBOS) and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) launched and...

Sudan, like the rest of the world, has been experiencing the unprecedented social and economic impact of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. The Sudanese authorities attempted to act quickly in the face of the spreading virus. In March 2020 the government established a high-level emergency...