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Brazil's dream goal for 2014

Mariana Ceratti's picture

Tamires Rodrigues, a Brazilian student, has some things in common with some of the world’s best strikers: she has, for example, a clear target and knows exactly how to send the ball straight into the goal.

Just as Tamires, Brazil wishes to score a dream goal – and it has got nothing to do with the upcoming World Cup. The country seeks to enroll 1 million people in the National Programme for Vocational Education and Employment (Pronatec, its acronym in Portuguese) until the end of 2014.

Em 2014, o Brasil quer ganhar muito mais do que a Copa do Mundo

Mariana Ceratti's picture

A estudante piauiense Tamires Rodrigues tem um ponto em comum com alguns dos melhores artilheiros do mundo: começa de baixo, enxerga longe e sabe exatamente como quer botar a bola no gol.

Is organic food more expensive to produce? Fact or fiction

Mary L. González's picture

My work with small-hold cocoa farmers in Nicaragua has taught me that it is not true that organic production is more expensive, complicated to learn and unsustainable.
 
The Sustainable Agroforestry Cocoa Production Project (COCOA-RAAN) was implemented within the Autonomous Region of the North Atlantic, the largest in Nicaragua, with a budget of just US$ 1.9 million.  
 

Mapping the Kyrgyz Republic’s Poverty Distribution

Sarosh Sattar's picture

A significant share of the population in the Kyrgyz Republic – 37 percent – lived below the poverty line in 2011, according to the latest available data. And despite a relatively modest population of about 5.5 million, poverty rates across oblasts (provinces) span a striking range -- from 18 percent to 50 percent.

Why? Well, that is a surprisingly difficult question to answer.  

Will Little Rahul Be Poor in 2030?

Onno Ruhl's picture

“Bye sir!” Rahul was running ahead into the distance. It was hard for me to imagine how he could be running… The cracked soil was incredibly hot and extended all the way to what looked like a lake in the distance. It was not a lake…it was a mirage.

“He wants to be a doctor,” said his mother, who was walking next to me. “His sister does not know yet. She is only 2...”

When I came home from my visit to Gujarat, where we met Rahul Kalubhai Koli in Dhrangadhra in Surendranagar district, I could not stop thinking about him. He is 4 1/2, and he wants to be a doctor.

Women's Untapped Potential: Examining Gender Dynamics in Global Trade

Cornelia Staritz's picture

A woman inspects her broccoli crop in Honduras. Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/feedthefuture/6942506316/Maria knows she is good at selecting ripe tomatoes, but she doesn’t know any women who own nurseries like the one where she works in Honduras. Susan does housekeeping for a hotel in Kenya, but there is little chance that she would ever lead a safari. Salma, at a call center in Egypt, can calm down angry customers, but she has never seen a female manager in her office.

Global value chains (GVCs) are essential to modern trade, and women’s labor is essential to many products and services that are traded across countries. But many limitations hold women back from participating more fully and equally to men in this important and growing global labor force, as we show in a collaborative project by the International Trade Department and the Gender Division at the World Bank. Though the names above are fictional, the situations are representative of what we found in case studies in the horticulture sector in Honduras, the tourism sector in Kenya and the call center sector in the Arab Republic of Egypt.

Think Big, Start Small

Ismail Radwan's picture

Join an online discussion with Ismail on Tuesday, April 2nd at 8-11AM on the World Bank's South Asia Facebook page to ask questions and learn more about his experiences.

The Dalai Lama once said - that if you ever feel you are too small to make a difference then try sleeping in a room with a mosquito. And the same goes for business. Every big business starts as a small business. General Electric was at one time the world's biggest company and it started with a simple but revolutionary idea - the invention of the incandescent light bulb in 1878 and the vision of just one person Thomas Edison.

Walmart started with a single store in 1945 and is now the largest private employer in the world. Starting with one store and the idea of making lots of cheap goods available all over the US, Walmart has created more than 2 million jobs. And of course more recently we have lots of examples in the technology and innovation space Apple, Microsoft, Google, Amazon, Ebay, Dell and Facebook. All are multi-billion dollar companies that started out in a single room, a basement or garage with a simple idea shared at first by a one or two people.

Can Citizen Feedback Strengthen Development? (Replay Chat)

Lauren Clyne Medley's picture

Read this post in: Español, Français

Citizen Voices ConferenceThat was the first question up for debate at the Citizen Voices Conference on March 18. And the communal answer was a clear and resounding "yes."

The next question up posed more of a challenge – How do we build our public and private institutions so citizens can access information and influence decisions impacting their own lives? The answer to this was pulled apart for eight hours by technology innovators, development specialists, government officials, academics, civil society representatives, and members of the private sector at this interactive and multilingual conference.

Using Technology to Create Value

Rukmankan Sivaloganathan's picture

SAR TechnologyJoin an online discussion with Sri Lankan youth entrepreneurs on Friday, 22nd March at 3-5pm on the World Bank's Sri Lanka Facebook page and learn from their experiences in the online field.

The internet is now an indispensible part of our lives for most of us. Whether it be checking email or Facebook or looking up something on Google or Wikipedia, we just can’t live without it (or at least, we feel that way!). However, it’s the way in which the Internet, by converging audio-visual, telecom, and computer networks into what we now call Information and Communications Technology (ICT), has made it easier for anyone with an idea or a dream to go out there and use these tools to create solutions, services, and products and create value, that makes it so powerful and empowering.

Citizen Engagement in Development Projects: What We Know, What We Need to Do and Learn

Caroline Anstey's picture

Read this post in Español, Français

Remember the old saying "the customer is always right"? The motto used by a number of prominent retailers (like Marshall Field) was all about placing value on customer satisfaction. In essence it was about listening to the customer – the final point person at the end of the retail line.

Today we are seeing business build far more sophisticated means of using modern technology to get feedback from their customers. It begs the question – if business can do that, why can't we try and do the same in the business of development - with the benefit of modern technology?

I've seen the evidence that we can do it. Last October at the World Bank, we applauded the work of teams in Bangladesh, Brazil, Cambodia and India, who've been using the mix of modern technology and development to boost results.

Bringing Art to Life!

Mary Ongwen's picture

The great artist Pablo Picasso once said, "The purpose of art is washing the dust of daily life off our souls." It was with a similar vision that the South Asia region of the World Bank organized the art exhibition, 'Imagining Our Future Together' last month. The purpose was to unite South Asian artists from all countries to highlight the lack of unity that hinders progress in the region and to create a vision of a more cooperative and prosperous future.

As someone who joined the South Asia region fairly recently, the art brought to life for me the development challenges the region faces in terms of identity, conflict, and gender inequality. As I listened to Guest Joint Curator, Elena Grant, explain the stories depicted in the art work, I couldn’t help but marvel at the beauty of the art and the depth of the themes communicated: from the symbolism of the four animals represented on the Indian national emblem to the hopes and dreams of a single young woman dashed by the dark realities of an early marriage.

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

Willem Janssen's picture

También disponible en español

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.

Russia’s growth prospects: what about aging?

Kaspar Richter's picture

Spare a thought for the economist.

While in the past, people might have resorted to reading tea leaves to figure out what their future has in store for them, these days, at least on economic matters, people turn to the next available economist. But while economists are great at analyzing the past, predicting the future is still a complicated task.

In order to come up with projections, economists look at data. Now, it turns out that economists are often making long-term assessments based on the latest news. Take a look at these growth projections for ten years ahead for Russia, based on polls of economists conducted by Consensus Economics, along with actual growth in the year of the projections (Figure 1).  Clearly, while long-term projections are less volatile, the two are correlated – the better the present the better the future, and vice versa. In particular, long-term projections have noticeably nudged down since the crisis.

Figure 1: Actual Growth and 10-Years Ahead Growth

 

Projections for Russia (percent), 2004 to 2012

Women in the Workforce – a Growing Need in Emerging Europe and Central Asia

Sarosh Sattar's picture

Emerging Europe and Central Asia (ECA) is an interesting region because what you expect is not always what exists. Since this is written in honor of International Women's Day, discussing women’s labor market participation seems appropriate. The standard indicator used for this is the “female labor force participation” (LFP) rate, which is the proportion of all women between 15-64 years who either work or are looking for work. 

Since much of the region has a common socialist legacy, you would expect to see similar labor market behavior among women. However, the proportion of women who work ranges from a low of 42 percent in Bosnia and Herzegovina to 74 percent of adult women in Kazakhstan. And it wasn’t 20 years of social and economic transition that led to this divergence. Even in 1990, the range was about the same. The exception was Moldova which saw a 26 percentage point decline.


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