Person:
Damania, Richard

Sustainable Development Practice Group, The World Bank
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Fields of Specialization
Development Economics, Environmental Economics, Natural Resource Economics, Agricultural Economics, Water Economics, Game Theory
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Last updated: November 29, 2023
Biography
Richard Damania is the Chief Economist of the Sustainable Development Practice Group. He has held several positions in the World Bank including as Senior Economic Advisor in the Water Practice, Lead Economist in the Africa Region’s Sustainable Development Department, in the South Asia and Latin America and Caribbean Regions of the World Bank. His work has spanned across multiple sectors and has helped the World Bank become an acknowledged thought-leader on matters relating to environment, water and the economy. Prior to joining the World Bank he held positions in academia and has published extensively with over 100 papers in scientific journals.
Citations 33 Scopus

Publication Search Results

Now showing 1 - 2 of 2
  • Publication
    Quality Unknown: The Invisible Water Crisis
    (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2019-08-20) Damania, Richard; Desbureaux, Sébastien; Rodella, Aude-Sophie; Russ, Jason; Zaveri, Esha
    Water quantity—too much in the case of floods, or too little in the case of droughts—grabs public attention and the media spotlight. Water quality—being predominantly invisible and hard to detect—goes largely unnoticed. Quality Unknown: The Invisible Water Crisis presents new evidence and new data that call urgent attention to the hidden dangers lying beneath water’s surface. It shows how poor water quality stalls economic progress, stymies human potential, and reduces food production. Quality Unknown examines the effects of water quality on economic growth and finds upstream pollution lowers growth in downstream regions. It reveals that some of the most ubiquitous contaminants in water, such as nitrates and salt, have impacts that are larger, deeper, and wider than has been acknowledged. And it traces the damage to crop yields and the stark implications for food security in affected regions. An important step toward tackling the world’s water quality challenge is recognizing its scale. The world needs reliable, accurate, and comprehensive information so that policy makers can have new insights, decision making can be evidence based, and citizens can call for action. The report calls for a paradigm shift that emphasizes safer, and often more cost-effective remedies that prevent pollution by combining smarter policies with newer technologies. A key message of Quality Unknown is that such solutions exist and change is possible.
  • Publication
    Water, Well-Being, and the Prosperity of Future Generations
    (World Bank, Washington, DC, 2017-03) Chase, Claire; Damania, Richard
    Water-related diseases are a major health burden for populations, especially the poor. Meeting global aspirations for poverty reduction will require addressing the global water and sanitation challenge. This discussion paper provides an overview of the poverty-related impacts of inadequate water supply and sanitation services, and highlights the new policy challenges that have emerged in a more populated, polluted, and urbanized world with finite water resources. New approaches that assure sustained changes in individual behavior, more equitable access to services, and incentives for improved water resource stewardship are needed.