Cross-border trade in services is growing rapidly, with both industrial and developing countries among the most dynamic exporters. Despite the substantial global benefits from such trade, the adjustment pressures created in importing countries could provoke a protectionist backlash-some signs of...

This paper reviews the Bank involvement in the vocational education and training (VET) sub-sector in the 1990s. The paper aims to do just that, by mainly seeking answers to the following questions: 1) How has the Bank performed in its lending services to its clients in VET? 2) How have VET...

This report serves as a conceptual background piece for the development of the Social Strategy Paper (SSP). To develop the conceptual underpinnings, the objectives and instruments of strategy papers (SP) are viewed under the rubric of Social Risk Management (SRM). SRM consists of public measures...

What are linkages between rural infrastructure investments, and household welfare? In the past, most of the evaluations to assess the effectiveness of a project, focused on physical outputs, and success of project implementation. In recent years, more attention has been given to the impact of...

Since 1987 the Bank's operational guidelines have required President's Reports supporting structural adjustment loans (SALs) to pay particular attention to an analysis of the short term impact of the adjustment program on the poor and to measures proposed to alleviate negative effects. The...

Market-oriented reforms of infrastructure in developing countries tend to focus primarily on commercially viable services in urban areas. Nevertheless, an increasing number of countries are beginning to experiment with extending the market paradigm to infrastructure services in rural areas that...

Imagine several mountain climbers, scaling a cliff face, who want protection from falling. One way to protect them would be to place a net at the bottom of the cliff to catch any climber just before he hits the ground. Another would be to provide a rope, and a set of movable devices that can be...

The authors provide empirical evidence on the impact that private participation in infrastructure has had on key macroeconomic variables in a sample of 21 Latin American countries from 1985-98. Specifically, they look at the effects on GDP per capita, current public expenditures, public...

This paper contains abstracts of Policy Research Working Paper series Numbers 2300-2362.

The authors analyze the considerations that lead policymakers to undertake extension investments as a key public responsibility, as well as the complex set of factors and intra-agency incentives that explain why different extension systems'performance vary. The authors provide a conceptual...