Other ESW Reports
241 items available
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This includes miscellaneous ESW types and pre-2003 ESW type reports that are subsequently completed and released.
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Publication
Unlocking Blue Carbon Development: Investment Readiness Framework for Governments
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2023-09-11)The purpose of this paper is to provide a practical framework to guide governments in catalyzing and scaling up public and private investment in Blue Carbon as part of their blue economy development. It does this by describing in detail a Blue Carbon Readiness Framework, a step-by-step, well-illustrated guide with simple checklists. Client countries can use the illustrations and checklists to determine their readiness to catalyze and scale up investment in blue carbon credit finance. The Blue Carbon Readiness Framework consists of three pillars: 1. Data and Analytics; 2. Policy and Institutions; 3. Finance. -
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The Leaders of the Twin Transition in Asia: Mapping Capabilities through Digital and Green Patents
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2023-08-17)This report examines how technology affects digital and green transitions in 128 cities across 17 Asian countries. It identifies cities that lead, follow, or have the potential to develop green and digital technologies using patent data analysis. Relatedness Density maps are produced for each digital and green technology, indicating the level of potential and the relative position each city has to develop Twin Transition technologies. A complementarity indicator is used to identify potential partner cities that can provide complementary capabilities to a city to develop green or digital technology. The analysis finds that digital and green technologies are not necessarily closely associated with each other, though some technologies can be used for both, such as smart grids. Furthermore, digital capabilities affect the development of both digital and green technologies. Based on the findings, the research suggests cities need to consider the relative strengths of their technologies instead of following a 'one-size-fits-all' approach, and cities need to target partners cities that can offer complementary capabilities to enable the green and digital transitions. -
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From Concept to Action: Boosting Resilience in Africa - Lessons Learned from the Resilience Booster Tool
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2023-06-30)This Lessons Note analyzes project reports and outputs to identify the value addition of resilience efforts, with a special focus on the Resilience Booster Tool. The AFRI-RES grantee projects covered 20 projects spanning 21 countries in Africa3 and eight Global Practices (GPs), benefitting a wide cross-section of stakeholders. A streamlined set of recommendations provide lessons learned from the Resilience Booster’s application to Round II AFRI-RES grantee projects and suggest approaches for improving its application going forward. -
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The Big Push for Transformation through Climate and Development: Recommendations of the High-Level Advisory Group on Sustainable and Inclusive Recovery and Growth
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2023-02)This report makes the case for a big investment push for EMDEs’ sustainable recovery and development, assesses the magnitude and composition of such investment, presents actions needed for an energy transition, looks at the role that innovations and state capacity can play in facilitating GRID, and proposes actions that governments, the private sector, MDBs, the IMF, and donors can undertake to mobilize financing at the large scale needed. The report summarizes the insights derived from the meetings of the High-Level Advisory Group (HLAG) on Sustainable and Inclusive Recovery and Growth, jointly led by Mari Pangestu, Ceyla Pazarbasioglu, and Nicholas Stern, and composed of experts from research institutions, the private sector, and governments, as well as senior World Bank Group and IMF staff members. The work of the HLAG, and thus this report, focuses on EMDEs and delves in greater depth into climate investment and financing, particularly for energy transition, as it is a less researched area. While doing so, it recognizes that policy and investment decisions in high-income countries, which accounted for only 16 percent of the global population in 2019 and yet for 32 percent of total greenhouse gas emissions (World Bank 2023a, 2023b), will be critical to whether the Paris Agreement goals can be reached. It also recognizes that these countries must play a key role in contributing financially to EMDEs’ transition to low-carbon economies. -
Publication
Assessing Financial Risks from Physical Climate Shocks: A Framework for Scenario Generation
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2022-02-01)Climate change has become a main concern of ministries of finance, central banks, and financial regulators. In response, a suite of scenarios and tools have been developed tthe potential scale of climate risks and underprice investments in resilience. This is particularly important for emerging markets and developing economies where exposure to physical climate risks is already high and is expected to further increase with climate change. The paper identifies five areas, or risk drivers, that make a material contribution to physical climate risks to the financial sector and that are not consistently included in current scenarios and tools: (1) extreme weather events; (2) uncertainties in climate models; (3) compound scenarios; (4) indirect economic impacts of shocks; and (5) feedback between the real economy and the financial sector. We derive a framework for generating scenarios to assess acute physical climate-related financial risks, which is inspired by the “Realistic Disaster Scenarios” that are used in risk management and supervision in the insurance sector. The framework is illustrated through an application of the EIRIN macroeconomic model. This framework aims to complement recent work by the Network of Central Banks and Supervisors for Greening the Financial System (NGFS) and the Financial Stability Board (FSB) to inform ministries of finance, central banks, financial regulators, and financial institutions on climate financial risk assessments, both for micro- and macroprudential risk management, and to incorporate climate risks into wider financial decision making and disclosures.o assess the financial risks from physical climate shocks (for example, hurricanes, droughts, wildfires, flooding). However, those scenarios do not fully capture such shocks, which could lead financial institutions to underestimate. -
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South Africa - Financial Sector Assessment
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2022-01-01)The South African financial system has weathered the shock of COVID-19 but faces growing risks emanating from a weak macroeconomic outlook. The pandemic crisis hit South Africa hard, with nonresident capital outflows accelerating and the domestic and global slowdown precipitating a6.4 percent GDP contraction in 2020. A brief period of liquidity stress was managed with new central bank facilities and a lowering of liquidity requirements; and banks proved resilient thanks to sound capital and liquidity buffers. Asset management and pension assets saw falling valuations, but redemption pressures quickly dissipated as markets stabilized. The intensification of the sovereign financial system nexus emerging from the crisis poses risks going forward, and a resurgence of the pandemic could deteriorate asset quality. Banks are resilient in the FSAP’s baseline; however, amedium-term adverse stress scenario would cause a significant decline in capital although most banks would remain sufficiently capitalized. Under stress, banks could face some liquidity gaps, particularly at very short maturities, highlighting the importance of continued close monitoring. The impact of COVID-19 on insurers has thus far been contained, but prudential rules should be strengthened to ensure the measure of capital is sufficiently robust. -
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Driving Revolutionary Ideas into Practice: Infrastructure for Climate Change, Poverty Reduction 2.0, Human Development on Mobile Government, Disrupted
(Washington, DC, 2022)In the business of making policies, decisions are based on experience and guided by political concerns. However, in the business of delivering policies, the machinery of government is often taxed by delays and inefficiencies, and constrained by insufficient resources, management tools, and just-in-time information. The result is that governments operate well below the efficiency frontier. For most of our history, research has been disconnected from policy and has moved slowly to build knowledge relevant to designing policies. The authors introduce some of the principles that govern this young institution in the chapters that follow, each designed to exemplify the value of doing better research for doing better development. In these chapters, they present four overarching ideas that they have worked into development practice. Overall, Development Impact Evaluation (DIME’s) approach is to inform the path of development through a capacities-based and iterative process of evidence-informed adaptive policy change. To do so, DIME has developed and implemented a model of co-production with agencies on the ground that transfers capacity and know-how to partners, enables them to make mid-course corrections and motivates the scale-up of more successful policy instruments to achieve policy outcomes and optimize development impact. Finally, DIME invests in public goods to improve the quality and reproducibility of development research around the world. -
Publication
Defueling Conflict: Environment and Natural Resource Management as a Pathway to Peace
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2022)Fragile and conflict-affected situations (FCS), environmental degradation, and natural disasters are on the rise and threaten to reverse development gains. In the past decade, violent civil conflicts have tripled and the number of people living in proximity to conflict has nearly doubled, with forced displacement at a record high. The World Bank Group (WBG) Strategy for Fragility, Conflict and Violence (FCV) 2020–2025 marks a shift in the World Bank’s work in fragile and conflict situations, as it adopts a more holistic approach to prevention. The Strategy seeks to enhance the World Bank Group’s effectiveness in supporting countries’ efforts to address the drivers and impacts of FCV and strengthen their resilience, especially for their most vulnerable and marginalized populations. The FCV Strategy explicitly recognizes the importance of climate change as a driver of FCV and as a threat multiplier, as well as the need to address the environmental impacts and drivers of FCV. Delivering on this shift toward preventing conflict underscores the importance of understanding the role the environment and natural resources can have. This report seeks to build a strong narrative on the need for the World Bank Group to engage and invest in environment, natural resource management, and climate change resilience in FCV-affected situations. It further aims at facilitating the integration of a conflict-sensitive lens into World Bank operations and programs addressing natural resource degradation and climate change. The report is divided in six sections: Section 1 sets the Background, Context, and Approach; Section 2 describes the risks associated with the interplay between natural resources, climate change, fragility, and conflict across the conflict cycle; Section 3 connects those causal chains to the delivery of the FCV Strategy across its four pillars; Section 4 showcases a suite of options to improve conflict-sensitive project design and implementation; and Section 5 presents an annotated questionnaire that serves as a complementary tool to the report. -
Publication
Charting a Course for Sustainable Hydrological and Meteorological Observation Networks in Developing Countries
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2022)Over the past 20 years, developing countries have invested in upgrading hydrological and meteorological networks, often with the assistance of development partners. In most of these projects, the share of the investment in the modernization of networks has been between 40 and 50 percent of the total project costs. The objectives of these initiatives have been to create reliable analyses, numerical predictions, and forecasts to inform early action, response, and planning across the whole of society. In some countries, monitoring networks have been sustained and improved over the decades. But in others, maintaining them operationally has remained elusive, resulting not only in inoperable or poorly maintained observational infrastructure and systems but also in a failure to realize the intended benefits. Why did some succeed where others did not That is a question that this report tries to answer by exploring the underpinnings of the successes and the possibilities of replicating these successes elsewhere, and thereby contribute to the body of knowledge on observation networks. This report aims to facilitate the development of more strategic and viable roadmaps for investments in weather and climate observation networks where those investments are likely to be substantial in the coming decades, as countries improve resilience to natural hazards and economies transform in response to climate change challenge. -
Publication
Developing Ecotourism in Cambodia: Cambodia Policy Note
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2021-01-30)Cambodia is blessed with a vast array of spectacular landscapes and pristine natural riches. This natural beauty, along with the country’s cultural wonders, is what ecotourists come to Cambodia for. The opportunities for supporting the expansion of the ecotourism industry to meet this demand are immense. Ecotourism involves traveling to areas of pristine nature, usually protected, to appreciate the environment while causing minimal impact. Ecotourism offers multiple benefits. However, the impact of Coronavirus (COVID-19) on the tourism industry in Cambodia has been significant. The epidemic has escalated rapidly from a health emergency to a full economic crisis. Since the beginning of the outbreak, several local and international surveys have been conducted that can help us understand the impacts of Coronavirus (COVID-19) on Cambodia’s tourism sector and guide the recovery. This note presents policy options to support the sustainable development of ecotourism as part of a broader strategy for sustainable management of the country’s natural capital. In addition, the policy note provides recommendations to the Royal Government of Cambodia (RGC) to help the recovery of the tourism sector post-COVID-19.