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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Senegal - Successful Innovation in the Water Sector

(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2005-07) Mohan, P.C.

The water sector project's overall development objectives were to address: (a) sustainability, by improving the management, pricing and cost recovery and reducing government subsidies for industrial, domestic and irrigation water; (b) poverty alleviation and health, by increasing access to safe potable water and adequate and more affordable sanitation for the urban poor; and (c) private sector participation, by engaging a private company to manage urban water supply. Implemented over the period 1996-2004, with a credit of US$100 million, the project design and implementation were regarded as highly satisfactory. Donors such as Agence Francaise de Developpement, the European Union and the Banque Ouest Africaine de Developpement (the West African Development Bank) actively participated in the design of the project.
Migrant Labor Remittances in Africa : Reducing Obstacles to Developmental Contributions

(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2005-02) Sander, Cersten ; Mainbo, Samuel Munzele

Migrants have received heightened international recognition from the development community in recent times. New World Bank estimates on the volume of remittances show that documented remittance flows continue to increase at a rapid rate, putting global annual flows at US$88 billion for 2002 (revised up from earlier estimates of US$80 billion reported in the 2003 World Bank Global Development Report) and projecting $90 billion for 2003, based on trends in the first half of the year. Actual figures are generally accepted to be much higher. This means that remittance flows constitute the largest source of financial flows to developing countries after Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), and indeed in many countries exceed FDI flows.
Kenya - The Arid Lands Resource Management Project

(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2005-02) Mohan, P.C.

The project ( 1996-2001 - US$22 million credit ) was uniquely designed as a risk management instrument - it conceived the establishment of a viable, government-run system of drought management, through early warning systems, contingency plans, mitigation and quick response. The design also devolved responsibility to the district and community level, encouraging civil servants and other district development actors to empower local communities in the design and implementation of development projects. The project built on the experience of others before it such as the Netherlands-supported Drought Management Project ( DMP ) and subsequently, the Drought Preparedness, Intervention and Recovery Project ( DPIRP ). The IDA-financed Emergency Drought Recovery Project (EDRP ) also provided useful insights.
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.
Helping Parliaments to Help the Poor

(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2003-01) Stapenhurst, Frederick C.

One of the key features of the PRSP process is that, while government led, there should be broad consultations within countries and wide participation by civil society, to ensure "country ownership." The involvement of Parliaments could be even more pervasive, however, given that, in many countries, parliaments have become key pressures for government reform, aiming to see that governments work more effectively, efficiently, and openly. How this was done depended on circumstances and opportunities to achieve positive change. The strengthening of parliamentary committee capacity seems to offer the most promise, but significant improvements in performance which committees work to achieve are often necessary to have such an impact.
Private Sector Participation-based Roadmap for Reforms in Water and Sanitation

(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2002-12) Kriss, Paul

Political interference and low tariff policies have led to inefficiency and chronic financial weakness of public utilities. The inability of water supply and sanitation (WSS) utilities to maintain and extend services has led typically to situations where in fact subsidized services are denied to the poor who have to rely on more costly and lower quality alternatives. A well-performing utility is a necessary condition for enhancing the economic efficiency of cities and for accelerating the provision of services to low-income areas. However, water utilities in Africa have limited prospects for improving their performance unless they undergo structural reform. Service delivery is not keeping pace with demand, especially for the fast growing number of low-income households living in informal settlements.
Niger : The Natural Resources Management Project

( 2002-05) Mohan, P. C.

The Natural Resources Management Project (1996-2002), was intended to provide assistance to the Government of Niger to (a) assist rural communities in designing and implementing community-based land management plans by providing them with the necessary know-how, information, technical and financial resources, and proper institutional and legal framework for implementation; and (b) assist the Borrower in building capacity to promote, assist and coordinate various natural resources management initiatives within the framework of a long term national program. Project design capitalized on experience gained in Niger and the sub-region by the Bank and other donors (multilateral and bilateral) in community-based operations and natural resources management. During the first phase (1996-1999), efforts focused on capacity building at both Institutional and community level, and by January 2000, when the MTR was implemented, the 95 communities originally targeted for implementation had drafted their community development plans including CBNRM (Community-Based Natural Resources Management). An episode of acute food crisis in 1998 resulted in these plans focusing initially on food security and the establishment of community cereal banks. At the Mid term Review (January 2000), community based procurement was introduced, and implementation was extended to a further 30 communities bringing the total number of beneficiaries to half a million.
Burkina Faso : Structural Adjustment Credit III

(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2002-03) Mohan, P. C.

The overall objective of the US$25 million credit, which closed in June 2000, was to support a reform program aiming at: a) enhancing the competitiveness of the Burkinabe economy to substantially raise growth rates over the medium term and alleviate poverty; b) improving public finance management, particularly with regard to tax policy and the use of public resources; and c) completing the third phase of the common external tariff (CET) adopted by the west African Economic and Monetary Union (WAMEU). This Note discusses the impact on the ground and the lessons learned from the project implementation.