Other Financial Accountability Study

148 items available

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http://hdl.handle.net/10986/2186

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An Introduction to Developing a Risk-Based Approach to Financial Consumer Protection Supervision

(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2022-12) World Bank

Financial products and services play a significant role in enabling consumers to build their resilience, seize opportunities, and meet essential needs but consumers also face risks when engaging with such products and services. This is due to a range of factors, including information and power asymmetries and abusive or overly aggressive market practices. Although an ongoing effort, over the past decade significant progress has been made around the world to strengthen FCP regulatory frameworks. Policy makers have been incorporating a broader range of regulatory approaches to protect consumers from inappropriate market practices, assist consumers to make better-informed decisions regarding the use of financial products and services and ultimately achieve better outcomes for consumers. However, such regulatory frameworks must be operationalized, including through supervision, to be effective. Authorities are increasingly turning to the task of developing appropriate supervisory processes and frameworks to monitor and implement FCP regulation effectively and foster compliance across the financial market as well as good conduct and consumer outcomes more generally. Undertaking FCP supervision can be a daunting task given the wide range of financial products, providers, and issues to be considered, combined with limited supervisory capacity and resources. This note seeks to assist in addressing this critical knowledge gap by providing introductory guidance on key issues, constraints, and decisions that Authorities should consider when establishing RBS for FCP. Given the need to customize RBS models to the characteristics of each country and its existing supervisory infrastructure, this Note does not specify predefined solutions but provides Authorities interested in implementing an RBS model with an overview of various matters to be considered when designing a tailored RBS approach, with the aim of assisting the planning and development of a context-appropriate approach. A range of practical examples are provided as illustrations.
Introducing the New PPB - Pragmatic Program Budgeting: Overcoming Design Obstacles to Planning, Management, and Control

(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2022-01-24) Brumby, James ; Hashim, Ali ; Piatti Fuenfkirchen, Moritz

Program budgeting is a reform that intends to shift the focus of budgetary processes from control of inputs to producing measurable results. It aspires to enable governments deploy resources to priority areas and assess whether the resources have been translated into intended results. This paper identifies specific stumbling blocks for countries already implementing program budgeting that have caused implementation difficulties, especially in budget execution, and suggests means to resolve them. This paper aims to help resolve the tensions between planning, management, and control in pursuit of higher performance from governments. In doing so, the focus is not only observing and supporting the efficiency and effectiveness goals of program budgeting but also resolving the tensions arising from execution control and designing measures to support analysis and performance
A Toolkit for Corporate Workouts

(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2022-01) World Bank

This Toolkit is aimed primarily at policy makers, financial institutions, and enterprises. It examines different types of corporate restructuring procedures on the basis that one size does not fit across all jurisdictions. Recent experience of the operation of corporate restructuring regimes around the world demonstrates that such regimes must appropriately account for domestic considerations, including a jurisdiction’s institutional and regulatory framework. This Toolkit, a revised and updated version of the 2016 publication, incorporates wide-ranging updates that reflects this experience. It describes matters relevant to the adoption of workout frameworks for a broad range of types of corporate restructuring procedures, some of which provide for a role for courts or regulatory authorities. This widened perspective highlights considerations of particular relevance in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, a crisis that makes restructuring viable businesses especially important.
Toward More Accountable PPPs: A Review of the Development, Implementation, and Post-Implementation Experience of Improved Disclosure Practices in PPPs in Ghana, Honduras, Kenya, and Nigeria

(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-11-12) World Bank

In the face of declining fiscal space and the need to build back better after the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, governments are turning to public-private partnerships (PPPs) to deliver infrastructure assets and services. Disclosure of information plays an important role in PPP programs. Several clients of the World Bank Group, including those with well-established PPP programs, currently do not disclose PPP information in a structured way throughout the project life cycle. Responding to these challenges, the World Bank developed a series of knowledge products to understand disclosure in PPPs, as well as to provide tools to governments for improving PPP disclosure. Post implementation of national PPP disclosure frameworks in the pilot countries, it became important to document the process, as well as assess the experience and perceptions related to the changed disclosure environment culminating in the disclosure of information via public-facing web portals. To support this task, a study was carried out over 2019-2020 to capture the enhanced disclosure environment, understand the perceptions of stakeholders vis-à-vis structured disclosure, identify what was working well, as well as indicate areas for improvement. This paper is a culmination of this effort to document the process and analyze the experience gained from the four-country pilot carried out in Ghana, Honduras, Kenya, and Nigeria. Section 1 of the paper provides the general background within which PPP disclosure is located, as well as the key elements of the World Bank’s Framework for Disclosure in PPPs. Section 2 documents the process followed in developing and implementing customized national frameworks in the pilot countries.
Supreme Audit Institutions’ Use of Information Technology Globally for More Efficient and Effective Audits

(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-10-18) World Bank

Supreme audit institutions (SAIs) recognize the benefits of using technology to improve the quality and impact of their audits. This benefit has further intensified during the COVID-19 pandemic; SAIs with existing technology capacity have continued to perform their role effectively and efficiently. The paper explores how at a global level SAIs are using technology to perform more efficient and more effective audits. It provides a brief overview of how some SAIs are harnessing the possibilities created by advances in technology to develop new, innovative audit methods and procedures. It also seeks to identify the factors inhibiting other SAIs in particular SAIs in developing countries from implementing and using audit methods based on information technology (IT). Against this background, the paper suggests ways in which the World Bank, working with other stakeholders, can facilitate the more extensive and more effective use of IT-based tools and methods by SAIs. The impact of COVID-19 has introduced a new important consideration: namely, how IT has helped some SAIs respond with agility and resilience to the unprecedented and completely unforeseen circumstances created by the pandemic.
Supreme Audit Institutions Independence Index: 2021 Global Synthesis Report

(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-07-20) World Bank

This report aims to inform and better equip World Bank task teams and development partners to support the strengthening of Supreme Audit Institutions (SAIs) in client countries. It also aims to help focus the ongoing collaboration between the International Organisation of Supreme Audit Institution (INTOSAI) and development agencies to address the intractable SAI independence issue. The report also responds to yearnings of several development partners to better understand the degree of SAI independence in countries and regions.
Lessons from Implementing a National Financial Inclusion Strategy

(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-06-25) World Bank

A national financial-inclusion strategy (NFIS) helps policy makers, in coordination with a wide range of stakeholders, define objectives and outline a set of impactful, sequenced actions to accelerate progress toward achieving financial-inclusion goals. Achieving greater financial inclusion requires a deliberate, coordinated approach to identify barriers and opportunities, and a platform for diverse stakeholders to coordinate efforts to achieve shared financial-inclusion objectives. NFIS implementation typically involves operationalizing governance arrangements to oversee implementation, establishing a framework for monitoring and evaluation (M&E) to capture progress regularly, implementing action plans to achieve financial-inclusion targets, and making necessary adjustments to address changing landscapes. In 2018, the World Bank Group (WBG) released a toolkit that provides financial-sector authorities and other stakeholders with practical guidance on developing and operationalizing an NFIS. After launching an NFIS, many factors influence and shape progress and success, and no two countries travel the same path during NFIS implementation. This note aims to build on existing NFIS knowledge by sharing insights that have helped improve implementation postlaunch. When used together with the WBG NFIS Toolkit, this note aims to support countries that are working to draft, launch, and implement an NFIS effectively.
South Africa Financial Ombud System Diagnostic

(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-06-10) World Bank

The Finance, Competitiveness and Innovation Global Practice of the World Bank Group (WBG) aims to help countries build financial systems that are deep, diversified, inclusive, efficient, and stable essential to promoting economic growth, reducing poverty, and increasing shared prosperity. One core activity is supporting national authorities to achieve their objectives for financial inclusion, by supporting policy, legal, regulatory, and supervisory reforms in areas such as financial consumer protection, including financial-sector alternative dispute resolution (ADR). Through the South Africa Financial Sector Development and Reform Program, the WBG is supporting the national reform process, which includes achieving an efficient and effective ADR system, so that financial customers can hold financial institutions to account if there is a dispute. This diagnostic review valuates the current financial-sector Ombud system in South Africa, Compares it against international good practice, and recommends reforms to provide good-quality outcomes and good value for money for the future.
Building a Financial Education Approach: A Starting Point for Financial Sector Authorities

(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-06-01) World Bank

While the importance of financial capability has been studied empirically, questions remain about program effectiveness, whether and how effectively these skills can be taught to consumers, and if financial education programs lead to sustained behavioral changes that improve one’s financial wellness and inclusion. When studied analytically, the results of financial education have been mixed. The objective of this report is to help guide financial sector authorities to build a more effective approach to financial education. The report synthesizes available resources and complements existing knowledge about financial education. It also explores the appropriate role for financial sector authorities within financial education and outlines a practical approach for financial sector authorities who choose to develop financial education agendas or strategies. Lastly, the report provides an overview of the best tools and practices to improve the effectiveness of financial education initiatives.
Developing Insurance Markets: The Insurance Sector’s Contribution to the Sustainable Development Goals

(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-06) Holliday, Susan ; Remizova, Inna ; Stewart, Fiona

Insurance can play a significant role in helping countries achieve the UN SDGs in terms of economic growth, social inclusion, and environmental protection. This can be achieved through the risk transfer mechanisms of households, businesses, and the public sector. The paper has a twofold purpose. First, to help regulators and insurance policymakers in emerging markets make the case for supporting insurance market development through drawing more attention to contribution the sector can make to achieving national SDGs. Secondly, to help investors, donors, international organizations focus their insurance market development efforts in countries where the sector has the maximum potential to contribute to the achievement of SDGs. This paper considers the role of insurance companies as underwriters facilitating risk transfer, as investors and asset managers and as corporate citizens and employers. The underwriting dimension is currently the most significant but all three have a role to play in supporting the SDGs. The paper also discusses how insurance can contribute more to these goals, including through targeted interventions in countries where conditions for right for insurance market development and SGD targets will need greater support to be met. Countries were screened for performance vs. the selected SDGs, by the potential for insurance sector development, as well as for minimum necessary enabling conditions for market growth. The paper concludes that the role of insurance has been somewhat overlooked in the context of the SDGs and that this is largely because the current indicators largely do not capture metrics relating to insurance. To be able to better assess the role of insurance and motivate the industry to contribute more to the SDGs, more consistent and disaggregated data collection on the following is recommended: lines of business; invested assets; gender disaggregated data. The UN, governments and the insurance industry are also encouraged to put greater emphasis on developing the sector as a means to achieving the SDGs.