Building a Sustainable Future : The Africa Region Environment Strategy

This environment strategy outlines the
current thinking in the World Bank Group Africa Region about
priorities and actions for the institution in the
environmental arena. The Africa Region Environment Strategy
(ARES) outlines the Bank's commitment to help its
clients achieve sustainable poverty reduction through better
environmental management. It identifies the most urgent
issues at the interface of environment and poverty and
discusses targeted actions for addressing them. It reviews
the lessons from experience to date and proposes new
approaches. The strategic context in which the ARES has
evolved and will be implemented is defined by the
Bank's mission statement and operational policies, the
World Bank Environment Strategy (WBES), and by the
Bank's broader objectives, priorities, and strategies
in the Africa Region. Like the WBES, the ARES approaches
environment through a "poverty lens" and targets
four main objectives: a) ensuring sustainable livelihoods,
b) improving environmental health, c) reducing vulnerability
to natural disasters, and d) maintaining local, regional,
and global ecosystems and values. Key elements of the ARES
include integrating environment into development and poverty
reduction strategies; building an enabling environment and
the institutional and human capacity for sustainable
environmental management; promoting environmentally
sustainable and equitable private sector-led economic
development; improving governance; and encouraging decentralization.