Each year developing countries seek billions of dollars of investment in their infrastructure, and private investors, mostly in rich countries, seek places to invest trillions of dollars of new savings. Private foreign investment in the infrastructure of developing countries would seem to hold...

The World Bank's assessments of corporate governance practices in 25 countries across five continents have revealed a general commitment to comply with international principles. But the necessary legal changes are slow and subject to political compromise. Moreover, most countries have a poor...

A franchise is a type of business model in which a firm (the franchiser) licenses independent businesses (franchisees) to operate under its brand name. A firm might choose to expand its business through franchising because the arrangement shifts capital investment and day-to-day managerial...

In 1988, Chile put in place a new regulatory regime for water and sanitation, allowing rates to reflect the actual cost of providing services. The government then reorganized the sector under 13 state-owned regional water companies and, in 1998, started to partially privatize some of them. Four...

Many of the world's most controversial private infrastructure projects originated as unsolicited proposals to governments. This Note explores critical questions for developing policies to deal with unsolicited proposals. For example, under what conditions should governments allow unsolicited...

Internet access depends on four critical players: First, providers of telecommunications infrastructure (bandwidth capacity) for international access to the global Internet backbone. Second, providers of national long-distance telecommunications transmission capacity (such as leased lines) to...

The increasing mobility of international firms and the gradual elimination of barriers to global capital flows have stimulated competition among governments to attract foreign direct investment, often through tax incentives. This note reviews the debate about the effectiveness of tax incentives,...

Investment flows to infrastructure projects with private participation in developing countries grew by 12 percent to US$64 billion in 2004. Telecommunications investments drove the growth, rising by 35 percent, while investment flows to other infrastructure sectors fell by 20 percent. Greenfield...

In recent years the renegotiation and, even more, the cancellation of private infrastructure projects in developing countries have made the headlines in the world's financial press. For a variety of reasons the renegotiation of projects is not an unusual occurrence. But as this Note explains,...

Drawing on the World Bank's private participation in infrastructure project database, this note reviews developments in 2001 and summarizes trends in 1990-2001. Data for 2001 show that total investment in projects with private participation was US$57 billion back to 1995 levels and 150 projects...