I recently spent three days in Yerevan on a mission to learn a bit more about Armenia’s overall development challenges for a World Bank study on “Connectivity”, before heading off to Tbilisi, Georgia and Baku, Azerbaijan to do the same.
It was my first time visiting Armenia, so it was a fascinating trip and I learned a tremendous amount about the country and its people.
Of course, in three days one can only get a small sample of the major issues that challenge development, rather than a rich flavor for the deep subtleties that represent the people or factors that drive the economy. But, given my basic knowledge of the country, the new information I gained was a tremendous leap forward.
The world is in turmoil - climate change is wreaking havoc across the continents and an Arctic winter is coming; the Brazilians lost 7-1 (did it happen?); Princess Kate is pregnant again (if it’s a girl will it be called Elizabeth?).
Against this backdrop, a fundamental question lingers in the back of every small depositors mind: “is my money safe?”
It’s not very often that the end of a talk is as exciting as its beginning. Perhaps that should be expected when one witnesses historical moments in time—what can be called true game changers. Harrison Karnwea, the managing director of Liberia’s Forestry Development Authority (FDA), recently joined us at the World Bank, just days after the UN Climate Summit in New York and the signing of a $150 million grant Letter of Intent for a Forests REDD+ program between his country and Norway to be facilitated by the World Bank.
Under the agreement, Liberia and Norway will work together to improve the framework for forest governance, strengthen law enforcement and support efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from deforestation and forest degradation in Liberia. Improved governance and adequate law enforcement in the forest sector and agriculture impede further destruction of Liberia’s rainforests and aim to avoid illegal logging and unsustainable agricultural practices. In a country where timber was once used to purchase weapons and helped fuel a devastating civil war, the partnership holds promise to reduce carbon emissions related to deforestation and forest degradation, facilitate green growth and enhance livelihoods.
Liberia has a population of approximately 3.5 million people and 4.5 million hectares of lowland tropical forests—one of the largest contiguous forest blocks that remains in West Africa. Liberia’s forests are also widely recognized as a global hotspot of diversity, boasting flora and fauna (like pygmy hippos) that is both rare and at risk.
Liberia plans to conserve 30 percent or more of its forests as protected areas with the remainder to be used for sustainable forest management and community forestry.
Your name is Sarah. You live in New York, or perhaps Nairobi, where you divide your time between caring for your young family and building a small business. Your life is more comfortable than your mother’s, and your children’s prospects are brighter than you might have hoped. Until your husband’s simmering resentment of your growing business turns violent, and he beats you badly.
Home is where the heart is. It’s also where the hearth is. And for the three billion people around the world who cook every day using traditional fuels, the hearth has a very dark side. Dirty, smoking cookstoves are responsible for killing over four million people a year. In fact, it is the fourth leading cause of death in the world. This was the message of former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, one of numerous global leaders to highlight these alarming facts at the Cookstoves Future Summit in New York City last week.
She and leaders of governments, companies and organizations like the World Bank Group were gathered to pledge record amounts of finance and country-level actions to tackle the insidious health and environmental challenges posed by the simple act of cooking.
Growing up in India, I have always been conscious of the daily grind that women and girls in remote, rural areas go through just to prepare one meal. There’s the long, arduous and sometimes dangerous walk to get firewood, sticks or charcoal – whatever one can afford to find or buy. There’s the walk home, loaded down with that fuel. This can take up to five hours in rural areas – time that could be spent at school, work or building a small enterprise. And then of course, there’s the time spent breathing in smoke as they cook an often simple meal of bread, rice, lentils or vegetables. In India alone, more than one million deaths a year are attributed to traditional cooking practices - a shocking figure by any reckoning.
About 4.5 billion people in developing countries are low-income, living on $8 a day or less (in 2005 purchasing power parity terms). They are the so-called base of the economic pyramid (BOP) and constitute a $5 trillion consumer market. While case studies abound on many of the well-known multinationals trying to break into this market, the success of local businesses has often been lost in the discussion of “BOP business” to date. Why are we not learning from the companies that are already succeeding with the BOP?
Imagine a football team at the World Cup, just standing around the field watching as the other team breezes right past them and scores a goal. Without taking action to not only help the sick, but protect the healthy, then we, as global citizens, are letting Ebola win this game of life and death.
According to the World Health Organization, as of Nov. 9, a total of 14,098 confirmed, probable, and suspected cases of Ebola virus disease have been reported in six countries. There have been 5,160 deaths. Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone have seen the highest number of cases.
Small and medium sized companies are the backbone of Latin America’s economy. They represent more than 90 percent of all enterprises in the region, generating over half of all jobs and a quarter of the region’s gross domestic product. They are essential to economic growth, yet their success is often blocked by one key obstacle: lack of credit. Nearly a third of companies in the region identified lack of credit as a major constraint, according to recent surveys.
Take the case of Sonia Arias, who owns a small textile business in Medellin, Colombia. When she opened her business seven years ago, she took an informal loan that left her with sky-high interest rates and little cash to reinvest. “When I was paying these loans,” she said, “it felt like we were being hit with a stick.”
I came to a stark realization recently while working on a report called Poland: Saving for Growth and Prosperous Aging. 20 or 30 years from now, the life I will lead will be vastly different to the lives my parents lead. And, I will have aged alongside many more people: between now and 2050, the percentage of Poland’s population aged 65 and older will almost triple from 21% to 58%.
When I look at the rate of resource depletion, at soil erosion and declining fish stocks, at climate change’s impacts on nearly every ecosystem, I see a physical world that is slowly but inexorably degrading. I call it the "receding reality"—the new normal—slow onset phenomena that lull us into passivity and acceptance of a less rich and diverse world.
In my lifetime, I have seen waters that were teeming with multi-colored fish, turn dead like an empty aquarium. I have seen the streets of Bogota, my home town, lose thousands of trees in a matter of years.
It’s tempting to feel demoralized. But as the world’s protected area specialists, conservationists and decision makers gather in Sydney, Australia, this week for the World Parks Congress, there is also much to hope for.