World Bank // Current

Migingo- No Man's Island

Migingo Island in Kenya is only the size of one football field, yet in 2009 this small... more

neilgill
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11 days ago
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Folding the US Into a Single Global Currency

This is an interview with Morrison Bonpasse, President of the Single Global Currency... more

rodstradamus
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19 days ago
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4 comments

Riot Police, Protesters Clash Ahead of IMF/World Bank Meeting in Istanbul

Turkish police used water cannons and pepper spray on Tuesday to disperse protesters... more

animalia_libero
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1 month ago
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1 comment

IMF protest clashes in Turkey

Turkish police have fired tear gas to break up hundreds of protesters outside a... more

animalia_libero
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1 month ago
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1 comment

Democracy 101: Pittsburgh G20 Protests and the Police Occupation of Pitt University

Version 1 of a documentary about the recent Pittsburgh G20 Protests, and the Police... more

animalia_libero
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1 month ago
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Reparations for Climate Chaos

thought Climate Finance was boring? Think again.

joshuakahnrussell
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1 month ago
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PRSPs Now in Place in a Large Share of Low-Income Countries-IMF Factsheet

Full text

Factsheet

Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers (PRSP)
August 14, 2009

Successful plans to fight poverty require country ownership and broad based support from the public in order to succeed. A PRSP describes the macroeconomic, structural, and social policies and programs that a country will pursue over several years to promote growth and reduce poverty, as well as external financing needs and the associated sources of financing. They are prepared by governments in low-income countries through a participatory process involving domestic stakeholders and external development partners, including the IMF and the World Bank.

Country leadership in setting priorities key to reducing poverty
The PRSP approach, initiated by the IMF and the World Bank in 1999, results in a comprehensive country-based strategy for poverty reduction. The introduction of PRSPs was a recognition by the IMF and the World Bank of the importance of ownership as well as the need for a greater focus on poverty reduction. PRSPs aim to provide the crucial link between national public actions, donor support, and the development outcomes needed to meet the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which are centered on halving poverty between 1990 and 2015. PRSPs help guide Fund and Bank concessional lending as well as debt relief under the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) Initiative. They are made available on the IMF and World Bank websites by agreement with the member country.

Core principles of the PRSP approach
Five core principles underlie the PRSP approach. Poverty reduction strategies should be:

country-driven, promoting national ownership of strategies through broad-based participation of civil society;
result-oriented and focused on outcomes that will benefit the poor;
comprehensive in recognizing the multidimensional nature of poverty;
partnership-oriented, involving coordinated participation of development partners (government, domestic stakeholders, and external donors); and
based on a long-term perspective for poverty reduction.
Donors support design of realistic plans and governance reforms
The PRSP approach is by now well established in a substantial number of countries and has been associated with notable advances in country ownership, making poverty reduction more prominent in policy debates, and facilitating more open dialogue. As of end-June 2009, just over 90 full PRSPs have been circulated to the Fund Executive Board, as well as more than 50 preliminary, or “interim”, PRSPs. With PRSPs now in place in a large share of low-income countries, the focus in recent years has been on effective implementation.

The PRSP approach is continually being refined, including through periodic staff assessments. The most recent in-depth assessment was completed by the IMF and World Bank Boards in September 2005. In October 2007, the IMF Executive Board reviewed the role of the Fund in the PRS process and in its collaboration with donors.Full text Factsheet Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers (PRSP) August 14, 2009... more

kingfugazi
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1 month ago
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World Bank spends billions on coal-fired power stations despite own climate warnings

Well, the key word here is bank. They are not in this for philanthropic reasons. Why... more

JanforGore
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2 months ago
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10 comments

World Bank urges climate 'action now'

Climate change will be a serious barrier to growth in poorer nations and must be... more

WakeUpPeople
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2 months ago
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Opportunities Presented by Deglobalization

There are 11 key prongs of the deglobalization paradigm:

Production for the domestic market must again become the center of gravity of the economy rather than production for export markets.

The principle of subsidiarity should be enshrined in economic life by encouraging production of goods at the level of the community and at the national level if this can be done at reasonable cost in order to preserve community.

Trade policy - that is, quotas and tariffs - should be used to protect the local economy from destruction by corporate-subsidized commodities with artificially low prices.

Industrial policy - including subsidies, tariffs, and trade - should be used to revitalize and strengthen the manufacturing sector.

Long-postponed measures of equitable income redistribution and land redistribution (including urban land reform) can create a vibrant internal market that would serve as the anchor of the economy and produce local financial resources for investment.

Deemphasizing growth, emphasizing upgrading the quality of life, and maximizing equity will reduce environmental disequilibrium.

The development and diffusion of environmentally congenial technology in both agriculture and industry should be encouraged.

Strategic economic decisions cannot be left to the market or to technocrats. Instead, the scope of democratic decision-making in the economy should be expanded so that all vital questions - such as which industries to develop or phase out, what proportion of the government budget to devote to agriculture, etc. - become subject to democratic discussion and choice.

Civil society must constantly monitor and supervise the private sector and the state, a process that should be institutionalized.

The property complex should be transformed into a "mixed economy" that includes community cooperatives, private enterprises, and state enterprises, and excludes transnational corporations.

Centralized global institutions like the IMF and the World Bank should be replaced with regional institutions built not on free trade and capital mobility but on principles of cooperation that, to use the words of Hugo Chavez in describing the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas (ALBA), "transcend the logic of capitalism."There are 11 key prongs of the deglobalization paradigm: Production for the... more

Progresshiv
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2 months ago
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The Beginning of the End of US Hegemony - Class War & the G20 London Summit

G20 Summit Pittsburgh, PA Sept. 24-25th http://resistg20.org/ G20 Summit 2009 -... more

animalia_libero
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2 months ago
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G20: Climate of Fear

Once again, the corporate media has begun pushing fear to control and manipulate the... more

animalia_libero
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2 months ago
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1 comment

Join us at the Pittsburgh G-20 Summit!

An informational video about the upcoming G-20 summit in Pittsburgh, September 24-25... more

animalia_libero
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2 months ago
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Fourth World War

The Fourth World War is "a daring, courageous, heart-pounding intervention against... more

animalia_libero
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3 months ago
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6 comments

Global land grab or good business?

Despite the recent downturn in global FDI flows and predictions of gloomier times to... more

peoplesmovement
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3 months ago
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Israelis restrict Palestinians' water supply

World bank report: Israelis have access to four times as much water as Palestinians... more

therealnewsnetwork
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3 months ago
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1 comment

Agribusiness and hunger in the third world

One of the most evil schemes concocted for businesses to legally steal the land from... more

JanforGore
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3 months ago
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5 comments

The value of water

Drinking water is an abundant resource on the planet, but not equally. In temperate... more

hyperion74
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3 months ago
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5 comments

Why food sovereignty is the new food security

Most of us would agree that there is a serious problem vis-a-vis access to food in the developing world. According to the UN food agency, there are now more than one billion undernourished people worldwide. The need to do something about the broken food system is especially apparent in Haiti, where I have been on a working assignment with Grassroots International for the past few weeks.

Last year, before the financial crisis spun out of control, the global food crisis was front and center in the media in Haiti and around the world. Hungry rioters took to the streets of Port-au-Prince demanding fair prices for rice and grain. Some Haitians even built a micro-industry selling patties made from mud, oil, and sugar -- an ancient remedy to help alleviate hunger pangs.

Just because the financial crisis is getting all the attention these days doesn't mean that the food crisis is any less severe. Actually, the two have much in common, arising from 30 years of failed economic and agricultural policy.

Like many other countries, Haiti was subjected to trade liberalization and privatization in the mid 1980s by international financial institutions such as the World Bank and donor countries like the U.S. During this time, U.S. agribusinesses flooded the local market with massive quantities of cheap subsidized staple foods with which Haitian peasants couldn't compete. After the large-scale imports had succeeded in paralyzing local production, prices skyrocketed. A kilo of imported rice is now worth an average day's salary in the Artibonite, a region once known as Haiti's "rice bowl."

Dumping is not unique to the Artibonite, let alone Haiti. Mexican farmers import corn from the Midwest, Indian producers often depend on Texan basmati rice, and mass-produced U.S. beef fills the shelves of Korean supermarkets. Of course, many of these countries are also exporting their own agricultural products -- but from a place of comparative, rather than competitive advantage, leaving them vulnerable to shock and speculation on the marketplace.

Unfortunately, many aid and relief programs perpetuate these trade and agriculture policies in an attempt to achieve "food security." Traditional food security, on the most basic level, is access to enough food for survival. To that end, public and private aid has invested heavily in shipments of food aid to the most vulnerable parts of the world. These policies fail to stipulate that people have a right to define their own food sources and sustainable future access -- which would amount to real food security. What happens when these cartels inevitably dry up? Food insecurity returns with vengeance.

Take the U.S. Agency for International Development's (USAID) "Food for Work" program in Haiti as an example. USAID and international NGOs have continually implemented "Food for Work" in Haiti's most rural areas, especially during times of crises. Instead of spending their money revitalizing the agricultural sector, these programs round up small-scale farmers to build roads and clean out sewage systems. In return, they receive vouchers for imported rice, flour, and cooking oil. Since these programs usually work on a project-to-project basis, when the work runs out so does the food (not to mention that their farms were left inactive the entire time). "Charity" with the goal of "food security" is often redefining dependency in these cases, deepening the fissures between the "periphery" and "core" of wealth in the world.

But there's an alternative to this pseudo-food security -- and it is growing fast. "Food Sovereignty" is the new progressive version of "food security." Via Campesina, the more than 150 million-member strong global network of farmers and small-scale producers first coined the term in 1996. Food sovereignty rejects the proposition that food is just another commodity for international agribusiness. Instead, it puts providers and consumers at the center of decision-making.Most of us would agree that there is a serious problem vis-a-vis access to food in the... more

JanforGore
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3 months ago
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2 comments

Why Are People Resisting the G20?

Radical Students Against the G20 Why Do Twenty Voices Matter More than 6.7 Billion?... more

animalia_libero
added this
3 months ago
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2 comments

tagged w/ World Bank

Migingo- No Man's Island

Folding the US Into a Single Global Currency

Riot Police, Protesters Clash Ahead of IMF/World Bank Meeting in Istanbul

IMF protest clashes in Turkey

Democracy 101: Pittsburgh G20 Protests and the Police Occupation of Pitt University

Reparations for Climate Chaos

PRSPs Now in Place in a Large Share of Low-Income Countries-IMF Factsheet

World Bank spends billions on coal-fired power stations despite own climate warnings

World Bank urges climate 'action now'

Opportunities Presented by Deglobalization

The Beginning of the End of US Hegemony - Class War & the G20 London Summit

G20: Climate of Fear

Join us at the Pittsburgh G-20 Summit!

Fourth World War

Global land grab or good business?

Israelis restrict Palestinians' water supply

Agribusiness and hunger in the third world

The value of water

Why food sovereignty is the new food security

Why Are People Resisting the G20?

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