Natural Resources, Neither Curse nor Destiny

1. Natural Resources, Neither Curse nor Destiny Natural Resources: Neither Course nor Destiny brings together a variety of analytical perspectives, ranging from econometric analyses of economic growth to historical studies of successful development experiences in countries with abundant natural resources. The evidence suggests that natural resources are neither a curse nor destiny. Natural resources can actually spur economic development when combined with the accumulation of knowledge for economic innovation. Furthermore, natural resource abundance need not be the only determinant of the structure of trade in developing countries. In fact, the accumulation of knowledge, infrastructure, and the quality of governance all seem to determine not only what countries produce and export, but also how firms and workers produce any good. Now available at the World Bank Public Information Center/Poverty Reduction Strategy Resource CenterHeritage Plaza I, 1st floor, Kamaladi, KathmanduFor more information:E-mail: rshrestha1@worldbank.orgCall: 4238545, 4249731Monday – Friday, 9:00 am – 5:00 pm

2. Pakistan Higher Education Policy Note The Policy Note is an assessment of the Medium-Term Development Framework (MTDF), along with an estimate of the projected budgetary impact of the Framework, and an elaboration of some specific critical aspects. The MTDF is the Pakistani version of a higher education strategy. It is assessed for soundness, consistency, and realism of the objectives and associated programs. The Note tests the MTDF through the simulation of budgetary impact, and proposes alternative scenarios for funding the development of universities and the higher education subsector from both public and private sources. The Note complements the MTDF in the following areas: quality, relevance, and accreditation; public and private partnerships; governance and management; costs and financing of the MTDF; and communication. Now available at the World Bank Public Information Center/Poverty Reduction Strategy Resource CenterHeritage Plaza I, 1st floor, Kamaladi, KathmanduFor more information:E-mail: rshrestha1@worldbank.orgCall: 4238545, 4249731Monday – Friday, 9:00 am – 5:00 pm

3. Infrastructure in Latin America and the Caribbean, Recent Developments and Key Challenges Many Latin American and Caribbean countries have spent too little on transport systems, water, sanitation, and electricity, which has hampered growth, competitiveness, and poverty reduction. Governments, overestimating the promise of private sector participation, tried to off-load too much responsibility for infrastructure financing and management, especially in the 1990s. The result has been dashed hopes, insufficient improvement in public services, and a widespread backlash against privatization. Nonetheless, progress has been made and important lessons learned. Infrastructure in Latin America and the Caribbean explores the extraordinary transformations that have shaped infrastructure in the region over the past 15 years. It delves into the need for appropriate and responsible investment in infrastructure; examines the crucial role that governments must play in infrastructure financing, oversight, and provision; and encourages efforts to appropriately engage the private sector. In addition, it emphasizes the need for infrastructure policy to be sensitive to the social and political context. The recommendations made will be of special interest to policy makers, academics, and infrastructure professionals and investors. Now available at the World Bank Public Information Center/Poverty Reduction Strategy Resource CenterHeritage Plaza I, 1st floor, Kamaladi, KathmanduFor more information:E-mail: rshrestha1@worldbank.orgCall: 4238545, 4249731Monday – Friday, 9:00 am – 5:00 pm

4. Developing Annuities Market, The Experience of Chile Developing Annuities Markets: The Experience of Chile is part of a multicountry World Bank project analyzing the market for retirement products. Among countries that have reformed their pension systems since the early 1990s, the Chilean case has emerged as the most relevant for drawing policy lessons on the role of the private sector in the provision of retirement income for two reasons: the depth, sophistication, and efficiency of the country's retirement products market, and the fact that this market was successfully developed from scratch by a middle-income country. The book examines in detail Chile's efforts to build a sound regulatory framework for the payout phase, concluding that a market for annuities and other retirement instruments can be built from a low base, while also identifying the reform agenda that policy makers need to implement to maximize benefits for their retiring populations. "This book provides a rigorous analysis, supported by a careful data examination, of the annuity market in Chile. It should be a must-read for policy makers involved in pension reforms." Solange Bernstein, Director, Superintendency of Pension Funds, Chile "This volume offers a fascinating in-depth study of the Chilean annuity marketplace, a topic of direct interest to developing and developed nations as they prepare to design and regulate financial markets for the decumulation phase of life." Olivia S. Mitchell, Executive Director, Pension Research Council, The Wharton School Now available at the World Bank Public Information Center/Poverty Reduction Strategy Resource CenterHeritage Plaza I, 1st floor, Kamaladi, KathmanduFor more information:E-mail: rshrestha1@worldbank.orgCall: 4238545, 4249731Monday – Friday, 9:00 am – 5:00 pm

5. Pensions Panorama The accurate presentation of a country's pension system and the comparison of pension systems across countries are crucial parts of policy analysis and reform. This is equally valid for high-income countries of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development as it is for low- and middle-income countries. Pensions Panorama provides a compendium of facts and analysis that should inform policy making and public debate about retirement-income systems around the world. Reforming pensions is a central policy issue for all countries; it is challenging and controversial because it involves long-term planning by governments that face numerous short-term pressures. In Pensions Panorama, Edward Whitehouse combines painstaking, rigorous analysis with a clear, easy-to-understand presentation of empirical results. While the author does not advocate any particular kind of pension system or type of pension reform, the analysis presented can inform debates on retirement-income systems. A core concern is social sustainability, which involves the future adequacy of pension benefits, the impact of pension reforms on income distribution among older peoples, and the means to combat old-age poverty. Pensions Panorama is a useful resource for policy makers, government oficials, and others involved in pension reform. Now available at the World Bank Public Information Center/Poverty Reduction Strategy Resource CenterHeritage Plaza I, 1st floor, Kamaladi, KathmanduFor more information:E-mail: rshrestha1@worldbank.orgCall: 4238545, 4249731Monday – Friday, 9:00 am – 5:00 pm

6. The State of State Reform in Latin America Latin America suffered a profound state crisis in the 1980s, which prompted not only the wave of macroeconomic and deregulation reforms known as the Washington Consensus, but also a wide variety of institutional or 'second generation' reforms. The State of State Reform in Latin America reviews and assesses the outcomes of these less studied institutional reforms. This book examines four major areas of institutional reform: a) political institutions and the state organization; b) fiscal institutions, such as budget, tax and decentralization institutions; c) public institutions in charge of sectoral economic policies (financial, industrial, and infrastructure); and d) social sector institutions (pensions, social protection, and education). In each of these areas, the authors summarize the reform objectives, describe and measure their scope, assess the main outcomes, and identify the obstacles for implementation, especially those of an institutional nature. Now available at the World Bank Public Information Center/Poverty Reduction Strategy Resource CenterHeritage Plaza I, 1st floor, Kamaladi, KathmanduFor more information:E-mail: rshrestha1@worldbank.orgCall: 4238545, 4249731Monday – Friday, 9:00 am – 5:00 pm

7. At Loggerheads?: Agricultural Expansion, Poverty Reduction, and Environment in the Tropical Forests Despite the vast number of books and reports on tropical deforestation, there's confusion about the causes of forest loss and forest poverty, and the effectiveness of policy responses. At Loggerheads seeks to describe ways to reconciles pressures for agricultural expansion in the tropics with the urgent needs for both forest conservation and poverty alleviation. It diagnoses the causes and impacts of forest loss and the reasons for the association of forests and poverty. It looks at how policies - modulated by local conditions - act simultaneously on deforestation and poverty, creating tradeoffs or complementarities, depending on the situation. The report brings to the surface problems that impede adoption of favourable policies, describing institutional and technological innovations that might help overcome these impediments. Now available at the World Bank Public Information Center/Poverty Reduction Strategy Resource CenterHeritage Plaza I, 1st floor, Kamaladi, KathmanduFor more information:E-mail: rshrestha1@worldbank.orgCall: 4238545, 4249731Monday – Friday, 9:00 am – 5:00 pm

8. Aid That Works: Successful Development in Fragile States Research in recent years on aid effectiveness shows that significant obstacles in fragile states - insecurity, poor governance and weak implementation capacity - usually prevent aid from achieving the desired results in these environments. This study investigates the attributes and effectiveness of donor-supported programmes and projects that worked well under difficult conditions in fragile states. Presented in this study are nine development initiatives in six less developed countries - Afghanistan, Cambodia, Mozambique, Sierra Leone, Timor Leste and Uganda. The cases show that development initiatives, which engage local communities and local level governments, are often able to have significant impact. However, for more substantial improvements to take places, localized gains need to be scaled up either horizontally (other localities) or vertically (to higher levels). Given the advantages of working at the local level and the difficulty of working through mainstream bureaucratic agencies at higher levels in these countries, donors often prefer to create 'parallel-agencies' to reach out to larger numbers of beneficiaries. However, this may in the long run weaken the legitimacy of mainstream government institutions, and donor agencies may therefore choose to work as closely as possible with government officials from the beginning to build trust and demonstrating that new initiatives are non-threatening and help prepare the eventual mainstreaming of 'parallel agencies'. Now available at the World Bank Public Information Center/Poverty Reduction Strategy Resource CenterHeritage Plaza I, 1st floor, Kamaladi, KathmanduFor more information:E-mail: rshrestha1@worldbank.orgCall: 4238545, 4249731Monday – Friday, 9:00 am – 5:00 pm

9. Emerging Capital Markets and Globalization: The Latin American Experience Back in the early 1990s, economists and policy makers had high expectations about the prospects for domestic capital market development in emerging economies, particularly in Latin America. Unfortunately, they are now faced with disheartening results. Stock and bond markets remain illiquid and segmented. Debt is concentrated at the short end of the maturity spectrum and denominated in foreign currency, exposing countries to maturity and currency risk. Capital markets in Latin America look particularly underdeveloped when considering the many efforts undertaken to improve the macroeconomic environment and to reform the institutions believed to foster capital market development. The disappointing performance has made conventional policy recommendations questionable, at best. Emerging Capital Markets and Globalization analyzes where we stand and where we are heading on capital market development. First, it takes stock of the state and evolution of Latin American capital markets and related reforms over time and relative to other countries. Second, it analyzes the factors related to the development of capital markets, with particular interest on measuring the impact of reforms. And third, in light of this analysis, it discusses the prospects for capital market development in Latin America and emerging economies and the implications for the reform agenda. Now available at the World Bank Public Information Center/Poverty Reduction Strategy Resource CenterHeritage Plaza I, 1st floor, Kamaladi, KathmanduFor more information:E-mail: rshrestha1@worldbank.orgCall: 4238545, 4249731Monday – Friday, 9:00 am – 5:00 pm

10. Global Gains through Community-Based Approaches: The paper begins by discussing the underlying rationale for the structure of projects in the World Bank-GEF Africa Region portfolio. It next outlines key design principles of the projects. Finally, it tells the stories of specific projects in the portfolio to illustrate the principles and messages that are critical to fulfilling the GEF mandate, describes the lessons that are being learned, and examines the avenues for future project development suggested by these lessons. Now available at the World Bank Public Information Center/Poverty Reduction Strategy Resource CenterHeritage Plaza I, 1st floor, Kamaladi, KathmanduFor more information:E-mail: rshrestha1@worldbank.orgCall: 4238545, 4249731Monday – Friday, 9:00 am – 5:00 pm

11. Now available at the World Bank Public Information Center/Poverty Reduction Strategy Resource CenterHeritage Plaza I, 1st floor, Kamaladi, KathmanduFor more information:E-mail: rshrestha1@worldbank.orgCall: 4238545, 4249731Monday – Friday, 9:00 am – 5:00 pm

12. Now available at the World Bank Public Information Center/Poverty Reduction Strategy Resource CenterHeritage Plaza I, 1st floor, Kamaladi, KathmanduFor more information:E-mail: rshrestha1@worldbank.orgCall: 4238545, 4249731Monday – Friday, 9:00 am – 5:00 pm

13. Now available at the World Bank Public Information Center/Poverty Reduction Strategy Resource CenterHeritage Plaza I, 1st floor, Kamaladi, KathmanduFor more information:E-mail: rshrestha1@worldbank.orgCall: 4238545, 4249731Monday – Friday, 9:00 am – 5:00 pm