The World Bank and poverty

During the 1970s it was World Bank policy to use its funds to raise the productivity and living standards of the poor. It has increased its lending for sector and subsectors considered to offer the most direct benefits to the poor such as rural development, population, health, and nutrition. Projects with particular emphasis on poverty have benefitted large numbers of poor people and have had good economic rates of return. Lending for rural projects increased in the 1970s from US$2.6 billion in 1969-73 to over US$13 billion in 1978-81; rural development projects audited in 1979 benfitted 660 small farmers for every US$1 million loaned compared with 47 farmers/US$1 million in other agricultural projects. Some problems are: 1) low-risk technical packages appropriate for poor farmers in semi-arid rainfed areas are not readily available; 2) the Bank's rural development strategy seeks mainly to raise the production of small farms, but other aspects need to be emphasized; 3) domestic pricing and postharvest policies often undermine the success of projects aimed at the rural poor; and 4) success in rural development often rests on sociological and cultural factors, difficult areas that deserve more attention. For urban areas the Bank has strongly endorsed providing "sites and sources" instead of structures; since 1972, 52 Bank projects centered on urban shelter involving US$1.6 billion have been undertaken. Cost recovery is established at 66-95%. About 5% of Bank lending is for education and despite the importance of population, health, and nutrition, these areas absorb less than 1% of the Bank's total lending program. Only US$400 million in population loans were made to 13 countries in the 1970s and only recently have separate health projects been started. Emphasis for the 1980s must be on rural development, urban shelter, primary education, health, education, and population.     

世界银行的作用和局限性

世界银行一直在减少贫困、促进发展中国家经济发展等方面进行不懈努力。但是，世界银行在履行其使命的过程中，由于受各种因素的制约，其作用的发挥必然是有限的。     

Bank interconnectedness and financial stability: The role of bank capital

This paper builds a network model to study the relation between financial stability and interconnectedness among banks. In the model, banks adopt a Value-at-Risk rule to determine capital ratios. It is shown that interconnectedness may hurt financial stability by amplifying the banks’ mistakes of underestimating risk, and that interconnectedness increases systemic risk. The results in the paper suggest that financial integration may hurt financial stability, and that bank interconnectedness is more harmful when the economy turns abruptly from boom to recession. In addition, banks should be given incentives to reduce interconnectedness if systemic risk is a serious concern for regulators.     

Population and the World Bank

The World Bank Group regards excessive population growth as the single greatest obstacle to economic and social advance in the underdeveloped world. Since 1969 the Bank and the International Development Agency have provided countries with technical assistance through education, fact-finding, and analysis and given 65.7 million dollars for population projects. These projects, in India, Indonesia, Iran, Jamaica, and Malaysia provide training centers, population education, research, and evaluation as well as actual construction of clinics and mobile units. Because population planning touches sensitive areas of religion, caste, race, morality, and politics, the involved nation's political commitment to plan population growth is critical to the success of any program.     

世界银行准备中的项目

世界银行是我国改革开放以来积极利用外资的一条重要渠道.随着各种来源的外资的增长,世行资金所占比例相对有所下降,但仍然是我国重要的外资来源