The World Bank Group's (WBG) safeguards and sustainability policies were put in place to prevent or mitigate adverse impacts of its projects on people and the environment. These goals remain critical given current environmental and social trends. Recent global experience in the financial and...

The purpose of this study is to update the review of World Bank experience in Irrigation (IEG 1994) and to broaden the scope of evaluation to include all water lending for agricultural development. Since that first study, the proportion of World Bank lending for agricultural water management...

This evaluation assesses knowledge-based activities in nine country programs selected from 48 knowledge-intensive programs supported by the Bank Group. It identifies the factors in the success or failure of those activities as they contribute to policy making or development outcomes. It also...

World Bank Group management welcomes Independent Evaluation Group (IEG) review of innovation and entrepreneurship. The global financial crisis required developing economies to actively seek new sources of economic growth. Natural resource-intensive economies are pursuing new ways to diversify...

Good public procurement practices are a major determinant of the effectiveness of public expenditure. On behalf of their citizens, governments typically spend as much as 5-20 percent of their gross domestic product on procurement of goods and services, and effective procurement policies enable...

Good public procurement practices are a major determinant of the effectiveness of public expenditure. On behalf of their citizens, governments typically spend as much as 5-20 percent of their gross domestic product on procurement of goods and services, and effective procurement policies enable...

Good public procurement practices are a major determinant of the effectiveness of public expenditure. On behalf of their citizens, governments typically spend as much as 5-20 percent of their gross domestic product on procurement of goods and services, and effective procurement policies enable...

Population aging-resulting from falling fertility rates, declining mortality, and increased longevity-shapes the profile and the needs of a growing number of countries. How effective has the World Bank been in tailoring its support to provide an adequate response to this evolving challenge? This...

Sound public financial management and public debt management are critical to informing and implementing fiscal policy and to achieving the World Bank Group's twin goals. When support for these two areas is complementary, public finance and debt management (PFDM) ensures that scarce public...

The World Bank Group's success rests on its ability to help its client countries achieve the development outcomes they desire. This demands a strong outcome orientation at the country-level, defined as the Bank Group's ability to generate feedback on what works, what does not, and why, use this...