Sustainable development attempts to support the growth of individuals, communities, and cultures to attain a reasonable and equitable quality of life, healthcare, and education worldwide. Entrepreneurship and digitalization are widely acknowledged to be important in achieving sustainable...

This evaluation assesses the World Bank Group's contributions to supporting electricity access in Sub-Saharan Africa during 2015-24. Electricity access is an end user's ability to use an energy supply for the desired energy services. As such, electricity access includes both supply and demand...

This study investigates whether investment in the health sector matters for achieving sustainable growth via the Dumitrescu-Hurlin heterogeneous panel non-granger causality test and the dynamic panel threshold model for 28 sub-Saharan African countries (SSA). We report evidence of a...

"Making Refugee Self-Reliance Work: From Aid to Employment in Sub-Saharan Africa" advocates for the enhancement of refugee self-reliance as a strategic, humane, development approach to refugee assistance. Facilitating refugees' capacity to support themselves through gainful work not only upholds...

Recently, countries in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) have shown increasing interest in transitioning to renewable energy due to climate change. However, the health impacts of renewable energy use are not thoroughly studied in the African context. This study investigates the impacts of renewable...

This paper investigates the causal impact of free primary education (FPE) on fertility decisions among parents in sub-Saharan Africa, focusing on the interplay between the policy, intra-household bargaining, and cultural norms. Using Demographic and Health Survey data and exploiting the...

The COVID-19 pandemic intensified existing structural challenges in Africa, including poverty, weak healthcare systems, and fragile agricultural supply chains. Consequently, examining its effects remains a critical area of study. This research investigates the effect of food prices on the...

Most African countries are grappling with long-term fiscal slippages and escalating debt burdens due to high levels of non-concessional and overcapitalized borrowing. At the same time, the continent is paradoxically deemed a net creditor to the rest of the world owing to excessive capital...

I combine multiple rounds of geo-coded household survey data with a globally gridded climate dataset to quantify the impact of heat exposure on child disease incidence in sub-Saharan Africa. I construct hour-degree bins of temperature exposure and find that 10 additional hours of exposure to...

The modern world is confronting interconnected challenges, such as achieving sustainable health system financing for poverty reduction, amid limited guidance for stakeholders. Adhering to SDG-3 guidelines for good health and well-being could aid in accomplishing SDG-1 for eradicating poverty....

This study aims to analyze the impact of government and external health spending on OOPHE across 30 SSA countries from 1995 to 2021. Using advanced econometric techniques, including the cross-sectionally augmented autoregressive distributed Lags (CS-ARDL) model and the dynamic common correlated...

This edition of the Macro Poverty Outlooks periodical contains country-by-country forecasts and overviews for GDP, fiscal, debt and poverty indicators for the developing countries of Sub-Saharan Africa. Macroeconomic indicators such as population, gross domestic product and gross domestic...

Sub-Saharan Africa is home to nearly half of the world's fragile and conflict-affected states, where weak institutions and social cohesion, governance failures, and economic instability trap millions in poverty. Some countries have transitioned out of extreme fragility by implementing sound...

Historical experience suggests that stabilizing debt across sub-Saharan Africa is still achievable in most cases, even though debt levels are elevated and vulnerabilities are high. Countries in the region, over recent decades, have often been able to consolidate (stabilize or reduce) their debt...

A hard-won recovery in sub-Saharan Africa has been overtaken by recent events. The sudden shift in the global outlook has clouded the region's short-term prospects and significantly compli¬cated policy making. After four years of crisis, sub-Saharan Africa's authorities had already faced a...

Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) faces growing climate vulnerability, with rising temperatures and extreme weather threatening agriculture, food security, and economic growth. These challenges worsen poverty, fiscal constraints, and limited human capital investment. To address these risks, SSA countries...

This paper takes stock of developments and policy issues related to digital payments innovations across sub-Saharan African (SSA), including central bank digital currency (CBDC), fast payments systems (FPS), mobile money, and crypto assets, which are now at the forefront of policymakers'...

This paper examines the current state of the gender digital skills divide in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), drawing on a broad set of data sources to assess disparities between men and women across key dimensions of digital readiness. The analysis explores differences in educational attainment,...

The rapid expansion of the digital economy in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) presents opportunities and challenges in addressing the gender digital skills divide. This report analyzes comprehensive, gender responsive policy approaches to bridge this gender divide and promote equitable access to...

We study the effect of having an older sister on the likelihood that girls in sub-Saharan Africa marry before reaching adulthood. Relying on the randomness of the firstborn sibling's sex, we show that having an older sister (as opposed to an older brother) reduces the likelihood of marrying...

In recent decades, decentralization reforms have surged across the Global South, aiming to bring governance closer to citizens. Despite extensive debate on their effectiveness, systematic methods to assess local government performance remain underexplored, particularly in data-constrained...

Climate-related disasters have increased over recent decades, with severe human and economic consequences. While research has examined their macroeconomic effects and impact on households' income and consumption patterns, little attention has been given to their impact on tax morale-taxpayers'...

This paper explores the impacts of politically empowering women on the connection between health occupation workforce (HOW) and inclusive growth (IG) in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) over the period 2000-2019. Results show that: (a) HOW, women's political empowerment (WPE) and their combined effect...

This study investigates the effect of the relative size of agricultural exports on sustainable development across 46 sub-Saharan African countries between 1999 and 2020. Using data on adjusted net savings and sustainable development indices as proxies for sustainable development, the empirical...

This article examines the relationship between human capital accumulation, household income, and shared prosperity using 2005-2018 household surveys in Cameroon, Ethiopia, Kenya, Nigeria, and Uganda. Human capital is found to be positively and significantly correlated with household wellbeing in...

Access to electricity is important for delivering quality healthcare. This study explores innovative and comprehensive approaches to electrifying rural health facilities in Sub-Saharan Africa by integrating renewable energy solutions and innovative financial mechanisms. It assesses funding...

With President Trump’s return to office, United States (US) trade and development policy has undergone a decisive shift – marked by sweeping cuts to the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), shifting alliances, escalating trade tensions, and a broader retreat from...

This Brief examines the challenges in implementing laws protecting women's land rights in Sub-Saharan Africa. While some progress has been made in enacting legal protections, remaining discriminatory legislation, weak enforcement mechanisms, and conflicting rules and norms, notably, those...

Sub-Saharan Africa is highly vulnerable to climate change, with rural women dis- proportionately affected due to pre-existing gender inequalities that both increase their need for adaptation and constrain their ability to adopt strategies. This paper reviews empirical evidence on key barriers to...

I evaluate the impact of abortion policies in sub-Saharan Africa to understand the potential consequences of a reduced international support for women’s rights following the overturn of Roe v. Wade. I find that decriminalizing abortion reduces fertility through two complementary channels. For...