This issue includes the following
headings: finding the right broadband public-private
partnership (PPP): whats key for emerging economies?; reform
has its rewards: telecom takes off in Myanmar; e-gov
excellence: models from Colombia, Ghana, India, and
Portugal; know what you know: creating a government
technology strategy; and closing the gap: Facebook and intel
connect the unconnected.

While the negative impacts of climate
change on urban areas are well-known and widely discussed,
its implicit impacts on historic downtowns have not been
studied as extensively. In recent years, cultural heritage
conservation and valorization have increasingly become
drivers of local economic development. Many projects
supported by the World Bank in this field help leverage
cultural heritage for economic development while developing

Uttar Pradesh (UP) is one of the most
densely populated states in India with high rates of
poverty. The state is a major contributor to the
agricultural staples of the country and, at present, a large
percentage of the state s labor force is engaged in
low-productivity agricultural activities with the
agricultural sector employing 60 percent of all formal
workers at the state level. The purpose of this report is to

The trend toward ever greater
urbanization continues unabated across the globe. According
to the United Nations, by 2025 closes to 5 billion people
will live in urban areas. Many cities, especially in the
developing world, are set to explode in size. Over the next
decade and a half, Lagos is expected to increase its
population 50 percent, to nearly 16 million. Naturally,
there is an active debate on whether restricting the growth

This country program evaluation (CPE)
evaluates World Bank Group (International Bank for
Reconstruction and Development (IBRD), or the Bank,
International Finance Corporation (IFC), and Multilateral
Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA) operations in Brazil from
FY2004 through FY2011. It seeks to answer two questions: to
what extent was the Bank Group program relevant to
Brazil's development needs?, and how effective were

Urbanization deserves urgent attention
from policy makers, academics, entrepreneurs, and social
reformers of all stripes. Nothing else will create as many
opportunities for social and economic progress. The
urbanization project began roughly 1,000 years after the
transition from the Pleistocene to the milder and more
stable Holocene interglacial. In 2010, the urban population
in developing countries stood at 2.5 billion. The developing

Uganda is one of the poorest countries
in Africa with a gross national income (GNI) per capita in
2010 of United States (U.S.) $500 compared with the
Sub-Saharan regional average of $1,170. Uganda's
population growth of over 3 percent per year, one of the
highest in the world, puts a considerable strain on public
sector service delivery, not just for water and sanitation
but also in other areas such as health, education, and

Rapid urbanization in Sub-Saharan Africa
places immense pressure on urban services to meet the needs
of the burgeoning urban population. Although several
country- or city-level reports offer insight into the
housing challenges of specific places, little is known about
regional patterns affecting housing markets. This lack of
clear knowledge on the relative importance of the factors
influencing households' housing demand in countries in

The great 21st-century migration into
cities will present both a great challenge for humanity and
a significant opportunity for global economic growth. This
paper describes the diverse patterns that define this
metropolitan migration. It then lays out a framework for
understanding the costs and benefits of new arrivals through
migration's externalities and the challenges and policy
tradeoffs that confront city stakeholders. The paper

The enabling environment for the
development of Nepal has improved, but opportunities need to
be effectively leveraged through focused policy action.
Nepal has significant resources in the form of remittances
from abroad, but the economy cannot use these resources in a
productive manner to enhance the overall welfare of all
citizens. Specific priorities for development include: (1)
creating a growth promotion vision and agenda; (2)

Across the world, the housing sector
plays a key role in local and national economies, and
expanding access to housing can encourage more equitably
shared economic growth. This report surveys current policy
interventions designed to encourage affordable housing in
East Asia and the Pacific (EAP). The purpose of this report
is to provide a general overview of the recent trends in
urbanization and development in EAP and to consider

Many developing countries display
remarkably high degrees of urban concentration that are
incommensurate with their levels of urbanization. The cost
of excessively high levels of urban concentration can be
very high in terms of overpopulation, congestion, and
productivity growth. One strand of the theoretical
literature suggests that such high levels of concentration
may be the result of restrictive trade policies that trigger