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Begin New Search Topic Foreign Aid Political Geography Africa Content Type Policy Brief Publishing Institution Center for Global Development

1. How Can the World Bank Group Improve Its Private Sector Projects in African Fragile States?

Author:
Vijaya Ramachandran, Benjamin Leo, and Ross Thuotte
Publication Date:
04-2012
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Center for Global Development
Abstract:
In recent years, the World Bank Group has made increasingly strong and explicit commitments to fragile and conflict-affected states, putting them at the top of the development policy agenda. These commitments are promising, but give rise to significant operational challenges for the various arms of the World Bank Group, including the International Development Association (IDA), the International Finance Corporation (IFC), and the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA). The bank also faces steady pressure from shareholders to scale up involvement in fragile states while also improving absorptive capacity and project effectiveness.
Topic:
Development, Economics, Markets, Foreign Aid, and World Bank
Political Geography:
Africa

2. Regional Development Banks (ABCs of the IFIs Brief)

Author:
Jenny Ottenhoff
Publication Date:
09-2011
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Center for Global Development
Abstract:
The regional development banks (RDBs) are multilateral financial institutions that provide financial and technical assistance for development in low- and middle-income countries within their regions. Finance is allocated through low-interest loans and grants for a range of development sectors such as health and education, infrastructure, public administration, financial and private-sector development, agriculture, and environmental and natural resource management. The term RDB usually refers to four institutions:
Topic:
Development, Economics, Foreign Aid, and Foreign Direct Investment
Political Geography:
Africa, Europe, and Asia

3. The ABCs of the General Capital Increase (ABCs of IFIs Brief)

Author:
Todd Moss, Sarah Jane Staats, and Julia Barmeier
Publication Date:
09-2011
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Center for Global Development
Abstract:
The international financial institutions dramatically increased their lending in 2008–09 to help developing countries cope with the global financial crisis and support economic recovery. Today, these organizations are seeking billions of dollars in new funding. The IMF, which only a few years ago was losing clients and shedding staff, expanded by $750 billion in 2009. The World Bank and the four regional development banks for Africa, Asia, Europe, and Latin America have asked to increase their capital base by 30 to 200 percent. A general capital increase (GCI) for these development banks is an unusual request. A simultaneous GCI request is a oncein- a-generation occurrence.
Topic:
Development, Foreign Aid, and Financial Crisis
Political Geography:
Africa, Asia, Latin America, and Ethiopia

4. Leadership Selection at the International Financial Institutions

Author:
Jenny Ottenhoff
Publication Date:
09-2011
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Center for Global Development
Abstract:
The International Financial Institutions (IFIs) are multilateral agencies. The term typically refers to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which provides financing and policy advice to member nations experiencing economic difficulties, and the multilateral development banks (MDBs), which provide financing and technical support for development projects and economic reform in low- and middle-income countries. The term MDB is usually understood to mean the World Bank and four smaller regional development banks: African Development Bank (AfDB). Asian Development Bank (ADB). European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) Inter-American Development Bank (IDB).
Topic:
Development, Economics, International Monetary Fund, Foreign Aid, and World Bank
Political Geography:
Africa, America, Europe, and Asia

5. Think Long Term: How Global AIDS Donors Can Strengthen the Health Workforce in Africa

Author:
Nandini Oomman and Christina Droggitis
Publication Date:
09-2010
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Center for Global Development
Abstract:
For the past decade, global AIDS donors—including the U.S. President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEFPAR), the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria (the Global Fund), and the World Bank's Multi-Country HIV/AIDS Program for Africa (the MAP)—have responded to HIV/AIDS in sub-Saharan Africa as an emergency. Financial and programmatic efforts have been quick, vertical, and HIV-specific. To achieve ambitious HIV/AIDS targets, AIDS donors mobilized health workers from weak and understaffed national health workforces. The shortages were the result of weak data for effective planning, inadequate capacity to train and pay health workers, and fragmentation and poor coordination across the health workforce life-cycle. Ten years and billions of dollars later, the problem still persists. The time has passed for short-term fixes to health workforce shortages. As the largest source of global health resources, AIDS donors must begin to address the long-term problems underlying the shortages and the effects of their efforts on the health workforce more broadly.
Topic:
Development, Globalization, Health, Human Welfare, Humanitarian Aid, and Foreign Aid
Political Geography:
Africa