Africa Region Findings & Good Practice Infobriefs

415 items available

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http://hdl.handle.net/10986/9389

These briefs report on ongoing operational, economic, and sector work carried out by the World Bank and its member governments in the Africa Region.

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Now showing 1 - 10 of 22

Learning from the Extreme Poor : Participatory Approaches to Fostering Child Health in Madagascar

(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2007-08) Blanchard, Caroline ; Godinot, Xavier ; Laureau, Chantal ; Wodon, Quentin

Definitions of poverty in developing countries used by most development organizations focus on household income or consumption that falls below a given threshold, such as one dollar per capita per day, and on other quantified indicators. While such definitions have the merit of providing a standard by which to measure progress, the very poor use quite different terms and ideas to communicate what extreme poverty means to them. This paper discusses learning from the extreme poor in the form of participatory approaches to fostering child health in Madagascar.
Tanzania’s Tea Sector : Constraints and Challenges’

(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2004-12) Baffes, John

In 1968, the government initiated a smallholder tea development program in which all aspects of smallholder tea marketing and trade were turned over to the Tanzania Tea Authority which assumed a wide array of responsibilities. The Authority promoted smallholder tea production. Most of the smallholder tea leaf went to the eight Tea Authority-owned factories for processing, and the rest to factories owned by the estates. Despite its apparent success, there were numerous signs of distress in the smallholder sector. This note describes the constraints and challenges faced by the production of tea in Tanzania.
Mali : Exporting Mangoes to Europe

(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2003-10) Morgane, Danielou

European consumers were more likely, until recently, to eat Indian, Israeli or Brazilian mangoes rather than Malian ones. However, since 2001, sea-freighted Malian mangoes produced in the south of the country by small-scale farmers have been successfully exported and retailed in Northern Europe. This achievement was quite significant given the prior failure of similar projects and the overall difficulty in finding investors for the export of perishables from landlocked countries with poor transport connections, like Mali. The export of Malian products is controlled by Ivorian exporters with few returns to the producers on the other side of the border. Despite the high quality of its fresh fruit and vegetables, the high cost of airfreight was impeding the expansion of production and export. By establishing a multi-modal shipment system and improving every step of the supply chain, the mango export pilot project proved the feasibility and profitability of such innovation.
Mitigating the Food Crisis in Southern Africa : From Relief to Development

(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2003-03) Babu, Suresh

More than 10 million people in southern Africa-Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Swazilan, Zambia, and Zimbabwe-are currently threatened with famine, with the crisis being particularly severe in Malawi, Zambia and Zimbabwe. The immediate causes of the food shortage, namely of maize, the region's staple crop, are drought, flooding, and low levels of planting. However, what has made these countries so vulnerable to famine is chronic poverty, inadequate development policies and, in some cases, poor governance. Shocks such as drought bring collapse only to systems that are already weakened by these factors. The key to preventing food shortages and possibly famine, therefore, is effective and appropriate food security policies and responsible governance. Policies for mitigating the effects of a critical food shortage or famine lie on a spectrum ranging from immediate relief to recovery to initiating development. Preventing future famines requires long-term development policies. In addressing the crisis, policymakers should design measures that not only provide relief, but which also lay the foundations for development. Interventions must be combined and sequenced with each other, depending on a country's context, to generate the greatest possible short- and long-term benefits. Described here are policy approaches, that IFPRI research in Africa has shown to be effective in mitigating severe food shortage and enabling development.
The Eritrea Community Development Fund Project

(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2002-10) Bradley, Marilou

The Eritrea Community Development project was established to provide for poor communities especially in the rural and war-devastated areas. The project provided an important platform for harnessing local input in local development efforts, strengthened the capacity of communities to manage, and implement their own development priorities. The project supported better access to school facilities, health facilities, and health care services; increased access to safe water; and feeder roads increased access to rural communities, markets, and social services. The project supported community-based initiatives to protect and improve the environment. The project used loan funds to improve community livelihood, increase their self-confidence, and economic independence. The construction of market places provided access to the rural population, including urban dwellers, and veterinary clinics increased the access of households. The project developed human resources, expanded private sector employment and growth, and improved basic social and economic infrastructure. The project promoted local governance, transparency, accountability, local capacity building, and sustainability of local services.
Gender and Growth : Africa's Missed Potential

(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2001-12) Gelb, Alan

In the study "Can Africa claim the 21st century?" the author argues on the enormous unexploited potential the region has in its people, "a hidden growth reserve" as he refers to them, and, most importantly in its women, who now provide more than half the region's labor, but who lack equal access to education, concluding that gender equality can be a potential force for accelerated poverty reduction in Africa. The note looks at women and men in African economies, identifying that women work far longer hours than men, being prominent in agriculture, which leads to estimate that women contribute about two thirds of the total rural transport effort. Case studies show how gender inequality limits growth, and the note further compares this reality to the potential productivity, given a gender-inclusive growth, suggesting key tasks should focus on systematic sex-disaggregation of data, to include economic production data and integration of gender modules in statistical surveys, so as to be reflected in national accounts.
Food Production or Food Aid? An African Challenge

( 2001-09) Verheye, Willy H.

Food production is not keeping pace with Africa's rapidly growing needs. Aid programs in the 1970s and 1980s were considered a temporary solution to the most appalling famines, but Africa's food shortage appears to be worsening. This paper discusses the reasons for this situation and ways to address it. African policymakers should consider intensifying and diversifying local production and establishing systems for marketing and setting prices. Individual farmers or farmers' communities must take the initiative for the farmers while governments must take responsibility for developing and maintaining total networks.
Tourism in Africa

( 2001-07) Christie, Iain ; Cromption, Doreen Elizabeth

Governments in Africa are showing increasing interest in tourism as a source of growth and diversification. Recent work indicates that tourism in Africa can contribute effectively to economic development. The tourism industry throughout Africa often operates below international competitive standards, but several products already meet international standards of excellence. This Notes examines the government's role in ensuring economic, environmental, and cultural sustainability, poverty alleviation, and social inclusion.
Rural Electrification : Lessons Learned

( 2001-02) Sanghvi, Arun ; Barnes, Douglas

The note focuses on the external benefits of rural electrification (RE), i.e., improved access to communication, education, and economic opportunities, in addition to extended health services. It outlines key lessons to scaling up RE, namely macroeconomic stability, continued government commitments, and institutional capacity. However, it also suggests that grid extension is not always cost-effective, rather, decentralized delivery options, and alternative energy sources, such as solar photovoltaic, mini-hydro, and other renewable energy sources should be considered. Moreover, good practices indicate the need for power sector reform, regulatory framework with legal guarantees that utilities can operate autonomously, and, financial viability, that is, to ensure commercialization, and identify a cost-recovery system that takes into account capital investment costs, and contributions levels. Strongly emphasized is the involvement of local communities in the design, and implementation of RE, by setting rural electrification committees, and by establishing institutional, and organizational procedures for project planning.
Ghana - Financial Services for Women Entrepreneurs in the Informal Sector

( 1999-06) World Bank

The Ghana Microfinance Institution (MFI) action research network brings together organizations interested in providing financial services to the poor in Ghana. With World Bank support, the network carried out this study which provides brief descriptions of the innovations that informal, semi-formal, and formal MFIs have developed in providing financial services to female entrepreneurs in Ghana. It also makes recommendations on how such services can be strengthened and improved.