As pesticide traders are important sources of information about the health impacts of pesticides, a crucial understanding of their perception is necessary to guide further pesticide information dissemination efforts through this channel. To this end, a 2003 survey of 110 Bangladeshi pesticide traders was conducted with questions on the pesticides in stock, knowledge and training in pesticide use and handling, sources of information, protective measures, and health effects.

The authors explore the use of
cross-sectional analysis to measure the impacts of climate
change on agriculture. The impact literature, using
experiments on crops in laboratory settings combined with
simulation models, suggests that agriculture will be
strongly affected by climate change. The extent of these
effects varies by country and region. Therefore, local
experiments are needed for policy purposes, which becomes

Despite sustained output growth since 1997, low-income Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) countries (CIS-7) have not experienced growth in employment, a phenomenon observed elsewhere in transitional economies and labeled as "jobless growth." The author addresses the causes of this phenomenon in the CIS-7. He argues that the lack of job creation is explained by a combination of structural factors, including capital-intensive growth, large potential for productivity gains among existing workers, and compartmentalized economies best depicted by a dual labor market framework.

This report derives from the importance
of water for irrigation to the question, how will additional
food be produced as competition for scarce land and water
resources increases? The International Water Management
Institute (IWMI), Food and Agriculture Organization of the
United Nations (FAO), and International Food Policy Research
Institute (IFPRI) provide a partial picture of supply and
demand for food supply and irrigation-water by 2025 and

The competitiveness of firms in open
economies is increasingly determined by access to low-cost
and high-quality producer services - telecommunications,
transport and distribution services, financial
intermediation, etc. This paper discusses the role of
services in economic growth, focusing in particular on
channels through which openness to trade in services may
increase productivity at the level of the economy as a

Malawi, a landlocked country in
southern, central Africa, depends on its natural resources,
especially the agriculture sector, to meet the demands of a
population of about 11 million people. The country has
developed a remarkable fishing industry, keeping in mind
that about 20 percent of the area is covered by water,
including the famous Lake Malawi (called Lake Nyasa by the
riparian states, Mozambique and Tanzania). Lake Malawi/Nyasa

A "forest-hydrology-poverty
nexus" hypothesis asserts that deforestation in poor
upland areas simultaneously threatens biodiversity and
increases the incidence of flooding, sedimentation, and
other damaging hydrological processes. The authors use rough
heuristics to assess the applicability of this hypothesis to
Central America. They do so by using a simple rule of thumb
to identify watersheds at greater risk of hydrologically

The authors describe and analyze management in the Murray-Darling basin of Australia, long regarded as a model for integrated river basin management. This interior basin of over 1 million k

This investment climate assessment is
part of a series of analytical works on prepared by the
World Bank with the aim of laying out the basis for the
elaboration of the Bank's country assistance strategy
for the country. It is based on three pieces of work
undertaken in parallel in Algeria between January 2002 and
march 2003: an investment climate survey of 562 Algerian
firms, policy work resulting from a series of four missions

This paper uses the Ricardian approach
to examine how farmers in 11 countries in Africa have
adapted to existing climatic conditions. It then estimates
the effects of predicted changes in climate while accounting
for whatever farmer adaptation might occur. This study
differs from earlier ones by using farmers' own
perceptions of the value of their land. Previous research,
by contrast, has relied on either observed sale prices or

The main objective of this fiscal note
is to assist the Government of Andhra Pradesh (GoAP) in
meeting the challenges mentioned above. To this end, it
provides input into the state's rolling medium-term
fiscal framework exercise. The new Fiscal Responsibility and
Budget Management (FRBM) act requires that the government
will lay out in each financial year a medium-term fiscal
policy statement (together with three-year rolling targets

A tradable development rights (TDR)
program focusing on biodiversity conservation faces a
crucial problem defining which areas of habitat should be
considered equivalent. Restricting the trading domain to a
narrow area could boost the range of biodiversity conserved
but could increase the opportunity cost of conservation. The
issue is relevant to Brazil, where TDR-like programs are
emerging. Current regulations require each rural property to