Nicaragua remains one of the poorest countries in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC). About 30 percent of the population lived below the official poverty line in 2014, and eight percent were considered extremely poor. GDP per capita stood at about USD 2,087 in 2015, the second lowest in LAC...

Nigeria is an entrepreneurial economy with an estimated thirty seven million Micro, Small, and Medium-sized Enterprises (MSME) in the country, and their contribution to economic growth and job creation is significant. There are also a large number of self-employed entrepreneurs who support...

Sri Lanka is a country of paradoxes. With the lowest poverty rates, best social indicators, and highest per capita income in South Asia, Sri Lanka's economic performance since independence had generally been hailed as a success before the current debt crisis. However, past performance occurred...

Diamonds have been at the center of Botswana's growth miracle for decade - but the urgency to diversify is stronger than ever. Although Botswana's economy has undergone transformation over the past decades, the shift has been largely into non-tradable services, with limited gains in employment,...

The report is organized as follows: the first part gives an overview of recent economic and private sector trends, followed by an in-depth review of the cross-cutting constraints that affect private sector participation. The CPSD recommends putting a special focus on resolving three types of...

This report presents an updated methodology to estimate the number of SME jobs created as a result of SME loans.5 It analyzes job multipliers across developing countries through a firm-level regression of annual employment change on loan size. Put simply, the framework presented here analyzes...

The Role of Trade in Ending Poverty looks at the complex relationships between economic growth, poverty reduction and trade, and examines the challenges that poor people face in benefiting from trade opportunities. Written jointly by the World Bank Group and the WTO, the publication examines how...