Miscellaneous Knowledge Notes

589 items available

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http://hdl.handle.net/10986/9388

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Supporting Artisanal and Small-scale Mining Communities During the COVID-19 Pandemic

(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2023-08-01) World Bank

In 2020, the World Bank projected that the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic could push more than hundred million people into extreme poverty. The estimated forty-five million people around the world working in artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) were particularly vulnerable because of the informal, often precarious nature of their working conditions and lack of access to social safety nets. At the height of the initial lockdown, as mineral prices dropped and mining sites closed, artisanal and small-scale miners, their families, and their communities suffered large declines in income and rising food insecurity. Without intervention, they were at risk of sliding into poverty. At the same time, there was concern that gains made over several decades to formalize the sector would be eroded, particularly where community tensions were rising. To address these risks, the World Bank took early action. In May 2020, the extractives global programmatic support (EGPS) trust fund initiated a rapid global survey to identify miners’ needs and then used the results to mobilize an emergency response window that raised 6.6 million in support to ASM communities in 22 countries. This report describes the EGPS emergency response window for ASM Communities Impacted by COVID-19, what it achieved, and what the World Bank has identified as priority areas for action in ASM communities going forward.
The West Africa Unique Identification for Regional Integration and Inclusion (WURI) Program: Unique Identifiers to Enable Access to Human Development Services

(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2023-07-31) World Bank

Access to basic human development programs in West Africa is particularly low. Individually, the sub-region’s countries perform poorly on the Human Capital Index (HCI). It is the second-lowest African region in rank for social safety net coverage. By contrast, the subregion has the second highest transaction value of mobile money on the continent. This case study examines the West Africa Unique Identification for Regional Integration and Inclusion (WURI) Program, which aims to confront this challenge head-on. In 2022, the program was working in six countries across two phases in partnership with the governments, and with the ECOWAS Commission.
Ukraine - Human Development Update, February 2023

(Washington, DC, 2023-04-10) World Bank

The full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, has resulted in tens of thousands of civilian casualties, internal displacement of millions of people, widespread destruction of infrastructure, and disruption of services that are essential to human capital formation and protection. This Ukraine Human Development Update summarizes the cumulative effects of the war, highlights recent government responses, and provides an overview of World Bank support.
Public Services and COVID-19 - Reflections from the Pacific: Sustainable Wage Bills

(Washington, DC, 2022-12) World Bank

The purpose of this note is to identify good practice in public sector management drawn from Pacific Island public service experiences of navigating the COVID-19 pandemic. These experiences were brought together through a World Bank engagement with Pacific Island countries in 2021 and 2022. The engagement identified five core aspects of Pacific Island public service management in response to COVID-19: trust, preparation, adaptable system settings, adaptable operating models, and sustainable wage bills. This first note in the series of five focuses on the importance of trust. The primary audience is public service leaders in Pacific Islands. The note will also be of interest to anyone working on designing and leading public sector management systems through rapid change, uncertainty and crises.
Philippines Monthly Economic Developments: October 2022

(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2022-10) World Bank

Headline inflation accelerated in September driven by higher food and energy prices. In addition, core inflation remained elevated, indicating continuing price pressures and strong domestic demand. Robust domestic activity, amid declining COVID-19 cases, contributed to double-digit and broad-based growth of goods imports. Meanwhile, factory output accelerated in August, but goods exports contracted for the second consecutive month amid lingering weakness among main trading partners. Although the unemployment rate remained low in August, underemployment worsened.
Measuring Women’s Economic Empowerment in Payment Projects: A Short Module to Complement Context-Specific Measures

(Washington, DC, 2022-07) World Bank

Cash transfers and digital payments hold promise for women’s economic empowerment through their potential to enhance women’s privacy, financial autonomy, decision making and labor force participation. Yet, despite this potential, gaps in data and evidence persist. This brief aims to provide actionable advice on measurement for project teams working on digital government-to-person (G2P) projects, as well as practitioners and researchers working on cash transfer payments and financial inclusion more broadly. It is not meant to serve as a comprehensive guide to women’s economic empowerment. Instead, the brief provides short measures focused on key outcomes related to women’s economic empowerment as a complement to more in-depth context-specific measures. The indicators suggested in this guide can be used for measurement in impact evaluations, monitoring and evaluation, or general population descriptions.
Brazil – COVID-19 in Latin America and Caribbean: 2021 High Frequency Phone Surveys - Results Phase Two, Wave One

(Washington, DC, 2022-04) World Bank

Brazil has been one of the countries most affected by the COVID-19 pandemic in the region. In June 2021, it was the country with the second-highest rate of deaths per million and the fourth by the number of cases per million in Latin America and the Caribbean. The effects of the health crisis were broad and still evident a year and a half into the pandemic. In line with pre-existing vulnerability profiles, the pandemic affected the Brazilian population differently in the labor market. At the time of the survey, the proportion of people who lost their pre-pandemic job and were not working was 29.1 percent. This proportion was highest among the elderly (57.8 percent), those with primary education or less (42.7 percent), women (41.4 percent) and rural workers (38.7 percent). About 58 percent of those who lost their jobs became inactive, and most of the new inactive were women (68.9 percent). Simultaneously, 29.2 percent of the previously inactive entered the labor force during the pandemic, though one-quarter of them were unemployed in mid-2021. Women represented a majority among the new active (64.3 percent). Finally, the pandemic resulted in higher informality rates among those who remained employed.
COVID-19 in South Asia: An Unequal Shock, An Uncertain Recovery - Findings on Labor Market Impacts from Round 1 of the SAR COVID Phone Monitoring Surveys

(Washington, DC, 2022-04) World Bank

All countries across South Asia, faced with the rising risks of COVID-19 infection rates, implemented severe economic lockdowns in early 2020 with varying frequencies and time periods. While the exact nature and duration of these lockdowns varied across countries in the South Asia Region (SAR), almost all SAR countries imposed their first economic lockdown in late March 2020 in response to the growing health threat of COVID-19 infections. In India, for instance, the national lockdown was first introduced in late March 2020, which coincided with the imposition of similar lockdowns in Bangladesh, Nepal, and Sri Lanka, followed by a national lockdown in Pakistan on April 1, 2020. By April 17, 2020, the population of all SAR countries was under severe lockdown with varying rules and conditions based on national or local directives. The introduction of these lockdowns led to a drastic, abrupt disruption in all forms of physical mobility and economic activities. Trends from the Google COVID-19 Community Mobility data reveal this sharp drop in day-to-day mobility related to four different types of economic activity across 6 out of 8 SAR countries for which this data was available. Figure 1 plots the daily change in the Google Mobility index, which is constructed by taking an equally weighted mean across the four dimensions of economic activity for the five weeks before March 2020. In the six SAR countries, the average mobility remained approximately, on average, 58 percent below their respective pre-COVID levels during the first week of the lockdown. For example, in Nepal, where the lockdown was first introduced on March 24, 2020, mobility (as measured by the Google Mobility index) was 66 percent below pre-COVID levels on the first day of the lockdown; and it remained, on average, 71.5 percent below per-COVID levels between March 24, 2020, and March 30, 2020. We observe a similar pattern of immediate and large disruptions in mobility in all SAR countries, except in Afghanistan (22.5 percent below pre-COVID levels), where restrictions were more localized. The Google Mobility index closely follows these changes in rules and conditions in SAR countries, which varied over time within each country as well as across countries. In countries like Nepal, India, and Sri Lanka, with an extended period of restrictions imposed through national or local directives at different points in time, mobility had not returned to pre-COVID levels even as late as April 2021. In Nepal and Sri Lanka, where the second lockdown was introduced in August and November 2020, respectively, we observe a sharp drop again in mobility after a gradual recovery following the easing of the first lockdown. In other SAR countries like Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and Pakistan, mobility only returned to pre-COVID levels between September and October 2020. These results underscore the dramatic and prolonged impact that COVID-19 induced lockdowns have had on mobility and economic activity, which is perhaps unprecedented in the region, at least in recent history4. These lockdowns are likely to have important implications on various socio-economic dimensions of welfare, including labor market outcomes, both immediately and in the medium, to long-term. More importantly, the long-term impacts will also be determined by the nature and the pace of recovery observed in these countries in the months and years after the initial phase of lockdown. Moreover, the emergence of new mutants leaves open the possibility of future lockdowns as a policy response to mitigate the health effects of the virus, which could impact economic activity and reverse observed recoveries.
The Business Case for Investing in Women’s Employment in Iraq: Company Insight - Ashur International Bank for Investment - Advancing Women in Business Leadership & Management Banking/ Financial Sector, Iraq

(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2022) International Finance Corporation ; World Bank

In Iraq, women are generally absent from senior management and leadership positions, with an estimated representation of just 1 percent - even lower than the regional average. Women also account for more than half of the financial sector’s workforce, owing in part to government directives to appoint more females within Iraqi banks. In 2018, with International Finance Corporation (IFC) assistance, the Central Bank of Iraq required that every Iraqi bank’s board of directors should include at least one woman. Many private banks in Iraq are currently developing modern banking practices, with several of them prioritizing gender diversity in leadership positions. This company insight explores the experience of one such Iraqi bank, Ashur International Bank for Investment (Ashur Bank), which has been a pioneer for private banks in recruiting and promoting women to management positions. In Ashur Bank’s experience, these policies have improved the company’s performance, driven economic growth and profitability, and improved innovation. The sample size however is not statistically significant and cannot be used to draw definite conclusions but rather provides anecdotal evidence on the topic of this study.
Social Assistance Programs and Household Welfare in Eswatini: Study Brief

(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-12-17) World Bank

This study brief on “Social Assistance Programs and Household Welfare in Eswatini” examines the performance of Eswatini’s main social assistance programs. These programs employ varying combinations of categorical and self-targeting to reach the poor and vulnerable.