Other Infrastructure Study

377 items available

Permanent URI for this collection

https://hdl.handle.net/10986/2204

Items in this collection

Now showing 1 - 10 of 74

Azerbaijan Rural Digital Needs Assessment
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-03-17) World Bank
This report identifies the unique technological challenges and opportunities faced by various Azerbaijani communities when using digital tools and services, particularly in rural areas. The findings will support the Government of Azerbaijan in its design of the interventions necessary to create a more equitable digital landscape for all and to bridge the gap between the urban and rural areas. The assessment is comprehensive, and the threefold data collection included (a) a survey of household and village needs, (b) focus group discussions (FGD), and (c) semi-structured interviews. To comprehend the current existing digital landscape, the survey established the current digital skills and needs of village households; the FGDs included a diverse population segment that provided qualitative insight into community digital access and usage; and the interviews were held with local stakeholders (i.e., Internet service providers (ISP), small businesses, and local government officials). These three approaches helped identify the various challenges relating to rural and urban communities and the opportunities available to them, thus informing the strategies to establish Azerbaijan’s digital future more inclusively. The assessment was conducted under the Azerbaijan Rapid Technical Assistance Facility (AZTAF), financed by the European Union (EU) and implemented by the World Bank.
Resilient Telecommunications Infrastructure - A Practitioner's Guide
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-12-18) World Bank
Connectivity drives economic development and underpins critical services in the aftermath of disastrous weather events or earthquakes. However, nearly all types of climate and natural hazards can cause damage to telecommunications (telecom) networks and threaten service delivery. For countries that experience multiple types of climate hazards, building telecom infrastructure is a challenge for public practitioners and telecom operators. This guide provides recommendations for practitioners in designing, preparing, and implementing resilient telecom infrastructure projects. For instance, resilience-building measures, such as risk analysis, redundancy, backup power, customization, and disaster planning, are important for strengthening the resilience of telecom infrastructure deployments. While no single intervention will make telecom infrastructure fully resilient, investment in a range of coordinated actions can reduce the probability of failure and enable operators to maintain acceptable service in the face of increasing climate hazards.
Digital Sustainability Framework: Experiences from KSA’s Digital Government Transformation
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-12-17) World Bank
In the near term, achieving sustainability is one of humanity’s most vital objectives. For sustainability to become a mindset and not merely a goal, it needs to encompass all fields, including digital. This white paper elaborates on the Saudi Government's steps toward digital sustainability. The paper will first present the concept and mechanisms of digital sustainability and then, in-depth, the digital sustainability framework and the Saudi Government’s implementation process to move toward digital sustainability. Cognizant that the path toward digital sustainability is complex, the Saudi Government wishes to engage with the global community through knowledge exchange and research jointly with the World Bank, one of its valued knowledge partners. The report acknowledges that integrating a digital transformation agenda and a digital sustainability agenda at the level of an entire country is a significant undertaking. KSA is moving in this direction and has started collecting experiences while dealing with legacy business ways rooted in culture, structure, and traditions. Therefore, these experiences represent the beginning of the process, not the result. By sharing these experiences and collecting new ones from other countries, the hope is to enable a stable integration of sustainable goals in the digital development agenda across the globe to the benefit of people and society.
The Cloud Imperative: Strategies and Practices from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-12-17) World Bank
This white paper also discusses the challenges ahead, such as closing the digital skills gap, navigating data localization requirements, and addressing the energy efficiency of data centers. An essential note for developing countries is that overcoming these challenges can be done with the right competencies and skills within a government's normal operations and budget. In conclusion, this white paper emphasizes that, if implemented thoughtfully, cloud solutions can be a catalytic force to build 21st-century governments that are more agile, data-driven, and responsive to citizens. To realize the potential of the cloud, developing country governments will need to adjust the KSA experiences to fit the context of their local cloud ecosystem and local governance. This paper is a part of a larger body of research created and distributed by the World Bank Group regarding the cloud agenda as a key element of public digital infrastructure (PDI). Ongoing research encompasses the enabling ecosystem required to facilitate cloud solutions, the economic implications of cloud migration, the sustainability of cloud solutions and data centers, and the legal and regulatory considerations that play a crucial role in determining the most suitable cloud service options.
Armenia Firms’ Adoption of Digital Technologies
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-12-11) World Bank
This report analyzes the digital technology adoption of Armenian firms based on the findings of the Armenia ICT Survey administered to over 1,900 firms in 2023 by the Statistical Committee of the Republic of Armenia (ARMSTAT), with the technical assistance of the World Bank and support of the European Commission. The survey is comparable with the ICT Usage in Enterprises Survey implemented in EU. It also assesses the technologies used in key business functions following the World Bank Group’s Firm level Technology Adoption Survey. This rich set of data allows for a detailed assessment of the digital maturity of Armenian firms by showing the specific digital technologies adopted by firms and the extent to which firms use advanced digital solutions across core business functions. The findings from the survey were complemented by qualitative case studies to gain further insights on firms’ experiences with technology adoption and the key barriers they face on their path to digitalize.
Benchmarking Infrastructure Development: PPP Regulatory Landscape - Assessing Quality and Exploring Reform
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-10-09) World Bank
Despite its intrinsic relevance and policy makers’ efforts to address the infrastructure gap, progress has been limited. A confluence of challenges from macroeconomic shocks and political instability to weak institutional capacity has hindered the capacity of countries to develop infrastructure that meets demand. Increasing efficiencies in delivering infrastructure services is at the core of addressing the gap. Numerous countries have turned to private sector participation in infrastructure development to achieve these efficiencies and catalyze private capital investments. Although there are different modalities to procure infrastructure, public-private partnerships (PPPs) have been extensively used by many countries to deliver successful programs. This report examines one of the key elements of an overall sound PPP ecosystem, the crucial role that the quality of PPP regulatory frameworks plays in fostering a conducive ecosystem for successful PPP programs while acknowledging that it is just one of several critical factors. This report incorporates new empirical analysis from primary data collected through Benchmarking Infrastructure Development 2023 (BID 2023). It also uses country case studies to illustrate and draw lessons from how countries have created robust PPP ecosystems and strengthened PPP regulatory frameworks over time. This report is aligned with the Knowledge Compact Agenda’s focus on evidence-based decision-making by providing evidence-based knowledge that can inform development strategies and PPP operations. Additionally, it focuses on fostering the PPP ecosystem that is conducive to private sector investment, thereby contributing to the Private Capital Enabling (PCE) objectives that will ultimately support Private Capital Mobilization (PCM), two critical corporate objectives of the World Bank Group to help to close the infrastructure gap.
Unlocking the Potential of Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) in Latin America and the Caribbean: A Region-specific Perspective - A World Bank-IADB Technical Note
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-08-06) World Bank
Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) first came to wider public attention at a session on the future of digital cooperation during the UN General Assembly in 2022. During 2023, international interest in DPI grew during India’s Presidency of the G20. The World Bank defines DPI as foundational and re-usable digital platforms and building blocks such as digital ID, digital payments, and data sharing - that underpin the development and delivery of trusted, digitally-enabled services across the public and private sector. Although India and Estonia are the most often cited country examples of DPI in practice, digital public platforms are also emerging in LAC. This report produced under a joint Memorandum of Understanding between the World Bank Group (WBG) and the Inter-American Development Bank (IADB) aims to help improve digital infrastructure and connectivity to drive stronger results for people living in LAC. Its objective is to highlight the state of the potential for DPI across the LAC region, including understanding policymaker’s awareness and acceptance of DPI, and the maturity of DPI building blocks across the region. It aims to connect a long-standing discussion in LAC around effective digital transformation with emerging global DPI discourse, and at the same time the report explores specifically how, and where, DPI manifests in LAC and how it can be helpful in future.
Leveraging Private Sector Investment in Digital Communications Infrastructure in Eastern Africa
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-08-02) World Bank; CEPA
This study provides guidance on World Bank involvement in Digital Communications Infrastructure (DCI) projects in which finance has been extended to support build-out. In particular, the study provides guidance to inform World Bank projects in Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, Madagascar, Somalia and South Sudan where more than US$1 billoin has been committed by the World Bank for improving digital infrastructure, services and skills. Through competitive procurement processes that engage private sector network operators, it is possible to amplify the funds available to countries by leveraging funds from network operators to ensure sustainable network deployment. The report looks at mechanisms such as reverse auctions, anchor tenant models, public-private partnerships and invstment guarantees to assess which work best in different marekt environments.
Riding the Wave of Digital Transformation: Insights from Japan’s Journey
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-05-30) World Bank
In the dawn of the new millennium, Japan found itself lagging in the global race to embrace information and communication technology (ICT). In 2000, its internet penetration was only at a modest rate of 30 percent, dwarfed by other peers of the advanced economies. Japan faced the urgency of advancing its digital development as acutely acknowledged by the government that the country lagged not only in internet usage but also in integrating ICT into businesses and public administration, and that the gap could further jeopardize the nation’s competitive edge in an era of rapid digital revolution (Japan Prime Minister’s Office, 2001). By 2008, Japan had turned around its internet status completely. Japan’s internet penetration surged to 75 percent, marking a significant leap that brought it on par with major comparators, Canada 77 percent, New Zealand 72 percent, US 74 percent, South Korea 81 percent. While the development of the broadband infrastructure and the penetration of the Internet into business and private practices saw significant progress during the first decade of the 21st Century, the implementation of applications for public sectors and the integrations of data separately developed and stored in public organizations were stranded due to the lack of clear and robust strategies and these have resulted in Japan’s setback of digitalization and digital transformation behind other countries like Korea and Singapore. The transformative journey, nevertheless, continued, and in another eight years’ time, Japan unveiled its visionary digital transformation initiative, Society 5.0, in 2016. This ambitious vision showcased Japan’s determination to not only keep pace with but to take a lead in shaping a future where digital technologies will elevate residents’ quality of life. This report analyzes the key components of digital transformation in Japan over time and across key sectors. In Japan’s digital journey, importance of sound governance, solid infrastructure investment, and smart city development are intricately woven together with the challenges posed by a stagnating economy, an aging society, archaic business processes, and major disasters. The inclusion of smart city development perspectives is a key feature of this report as it provides critical insight into how social, economic, and environmental challenges in cities can be addressed through digital technologies. Four key components stand out as critical areas in Japan’s digital transformation journey and would collectively pave the way for other societies to embark on their own.
Equatorial Guinea Digital Economy Diagnostic
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-05-22) World Bank
This report provides an assessment of Equatorial Guinea’s digital economy, as part of the World Bank’s Digital Economy for Africa (DE4A) initiative. Prepared to support the implementation of the Digital Transformation Strategy for Africa, approved by the African Union in February 2020, the World Bank’s DE4A Initiative aims to help drive Africa’s digital transformation and sets out a bold vision to ensure that every African individual, business and government is digitally enabled by 2030. The initiative leverages an integrated and foundation-based diagnostic framework to examine the development of the digital economy across Africa. Based on this framework, this assessment provides a comprehensive overview of the five DE4A foundational elements in Equatorial Guinea: digital infrastructure, digital public platforms, digital financial services, digital businesses and digital skills.