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Chile

What if crossing the road was the last thing you did?

Verónica Raffo's picture

What do the former South African president and Nobel Prize winner Nelson Mandela and Uruguayan soccer star Diego Forlán have in common? Both of their families have experienced tragedies caused by unsafe roads and have turned their pain into a commitment to do something about it.

Three years ago, Zenani Mandela was hit by a drunk driver as she was returning home from the World Cup opening ceremony in South Africa.  Zenani was just 13 years old. Forlán’s sister ended up in a wheelchair after a serious car accident 20 years ago.

Grassroots Leaders: Empowering Communities is Resilience Building

Margaret Arnold's picture

Margaret Arnold/World Bank​
Participants at the first Community Practitioners Academy meeting, which was held ahead of the Fourth Global Platform for Disaster Reduction in Generva. - Photos: Margaret Arnold/World Bank

Communities are organized and want to be recognized as partners with expertise and experience in building resilience rather than as clients and beneficiaries of projects. This was the common theme that emerged from the key messages delivered by grassroots leaders at the Fourth Global Platform for Disaster Reduction taking place in Geneva this week, organized by the UN International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (UNISDR). The Global Platform is a biennial forum for information exchange and partnership building across sectors to reduce disaster risk.

Ahead of the Global Platform, 45 community practitioners from 17 countries - Bangladesh, Chile, Ethiopia, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, India, Indonesia, Japan, Kenya, Nicaragua, Peru, Philippines, Samoa, Uganda, Venezuela, and the United States - met for a day and a half to share their practices and experiences in responding to disasters and building long-term resilience to climate change, and to strategize their engagement in around the Global Platform. I had the privilege to participate in this first Community Practitioners Academy, which was convened by GROOTS International, Huairou Commission, UNISDR, the World Bank, Global Facility for Disaster Risk and Reduction (GFDRR), Act Alliance, Action Aid, Japan NGO Center for International Cooperation (JANIC), Cordaid, and Oxfam, and was planned in partnership with the community practitioners from their respective networks.

Panama: plan, prepare, mitigate – key actions for disaster prevention

Jeannette Fernandez's picture

Tiny homes made of non-reinforced concrete blocks, without columns in the corners or ties where the walls and roof and the walls and foundation meet. These are dwellings that can collapse like a deck of cards in the event of an earthquake. Photo: World Bank.

I have lived in Panama City for nearly two years and there are two things that still capture my attention: the traffic that gets worse by the day due to the more than 36,000 new vehicles on the road every year and the pace of construction.
The number of new buildings popping up in the city daily is amazing.

Huge, luxurious, expensive buildings in fashionable areas, but also housing projects promoted by the national government and a large supply of houses for the Panamanian middle class responsible for the private sector.

Latin America: Should this Earth Day be different from others?

Karin Erika Kemper's picture

También disponible en español e português

It’s tempting to think that this is just another Earth Day – after all, it has been celebrated since 1970. But perhaps this year should be different, at least in Latin America and the Caribbean.

This year marks the third year of drought for Northeast Brazil - still affecting some 10 million people, according to recent reports; a year when Buenos Aires and Rio de Janeiro suffered torrential rains and floods, impacting hundreds of thousands of people in these large metropolitan areas.

Salt, health's silent enemy

Sumito Estévez's picture

También disponible en español

Também disponível em português

kitchen

This year, World Health Day focuses on hypertension. Specialists report a clear link between excessive salt consumption and high blood pressure. In this blog, Venezuelan chef Sumito Estévez explains how the use of salt in our cooking has changed. He also shares some ideas for reducing salt consumption and reminds us that governments are also responsible for taking measures to decrease consumption.

Coq Au Vin (Chicken in red wine) is a delicious traditional French dish. Those who have had the privilege of preparing this slow-cooked recipe know that once the sauce has thickened, practically no extra salt is needed.

Latin America: violence threatens a decade of progress

Hasan Tuluy's picture

También disponible en español

Behind Latin America’s economic boom is hidden a wave of crime and violence, hurting all citizens, particularly the poorest, who have no way of protecting themselves.

Citizen insecurity has a variety of complex causes, ranging from organized crime, to outdated, ineffective justice and law enforcement systems, to domestic violence, which affects one in three women worldwide.

Colombia: the cup of coffee that changed the life of a whole community

Willem Janssen's picture

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Last Friday was International Women’s Day, but before adding to the general celebratory messages in cyberspace, I would like to tell you about a specific case that truly deserves to be celebrated.

If you are reading this blog while drinking coffee or after a coffee break, this story has to do with you.

Institutions and Systems Matter for Health and Social Development

Patricio V. Marquez's picture

This past week, I attended a couple of interesting seminars at the World Bank’s Human Development Forum on how some mineral-rich countries have been able to translate their newfound riches into sustained economic growth, improved living conditions, and  better nutrition, health and education levels for their populations.

Apps against domestic violence: 21st-century solutions to an old problem

Hasan Tuluy's picture

También disponible en español

There is a statistic that both astonishes and troubles me: the leading cause of injury to women is not traffic accidents, crime or serious disease. It is domestic violence.

One in four women will fall victim to this type of violence in her lifetime. In other words, a quarter of the female population, a shocking figure that reminds us that these are not anonymous women, but rather acquaintances, colleagues, neighbors, people we run into on the subway every day. 

Prospects Daily: Global stock markets rallied on Friday

Financial Markets…Global stock markets rallied on Friday, with the benchmark MSCI world equity index hitting a 20-month high level of 552.16, as positive economic data from the two world’s largest economies boosted market sentiment. Along with robust U.S. labor and housing market reports, China’s better-than-expected fourth-quarter GDP growth (y/y), buoyant industrial production and retail sales figures added to signs that the global economic recovery is gaining traction.

Prospects Daily: US consumer confidence falls; inflation moderated in Chile, Peru and Mexico but rose slightly in Brazil


Financial Markets…U.S. Treasuries slid for the first time in four days, with the benchmark note yields 3 basis points to 1.62%, as a government report showed U.S. employers added more than forecasted jobs in November. U.S government bonds have advanced 2.8% this year as of yesterday, after gaining 9.8% in 2011 and 5.9% in 2010.

Latin America 4 degrees warmer? Not cool!

Erick Fernandes's picture

También disponible en español y portugués

So you may be wondering if those scenes from the movie 2012 are not too much of a stretch after all, huh?

In the Hollywood blockbuster, apocalyptic images of rising oceans, erupting volcanoes and crumbling cities prelude the end of the world as we know it. Well, let me tell you that even though I’m not a great fan of end-of-days films –I think they oversimplify issues and de-sensitize the public-- I do believe that the world as we know it is on a path to dangerous climate change

Growing the middle class

Francisco Ferreira's picture

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Shoppers in Chile

Since the Great Recession of 2008, there has been a widespread sense of malaise among the American middle class. Their incomes are close to stagnant, employment has not recovered, and the gap between them and the famously rich top 1% continues to grow. Look south of the Rio Grande, though, and it is quite a different picture. In the last decade, moderate poverty (under U$ 4 a day) in Latin America and the Caribbean fell from over 40% to 28%.

Prospects Weekly: Private capital flows to developing countries eased in October

Private capital flows to developing countries eased in October, but remain close to their highest level in more than a year, led by robust bond issuance by emerging market sovereigns and firms. Business sentiment has strengthened in some countries, including the US and several emerging markets, but remains weak in general amid US “fiscal cliff” and Euro Area risks.

The Mysterious Case of Chilean Service Exports

Sebastián Sáez's picture

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Chile has long been known as a superstar in liberalization reforms and innovative export-led growth strategies. The country successfully exports tourism and transportation services.

But these successes are, in some ways, yesterday’s news. The country’s performance in more modern service exports – internet and communications technology, business process outsourcing and others – has been less remarkable. Chile is no India.


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