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East Asia & Pacific is facing some great development challenges today: urbanization, protection of the environment, the need to find renewable energy sources and many others. This site wants to create a conversation around those important issues. More »

Education

Supporting education in remote areas of Western Sichuan, China

Submitted by Emmanuel Jimenez on Tue, 2009-10-20 16:17
There were perhaps too many children to a class, but these were clearly participatory.

It’s usually pretty hard for a World Bank sector director to make a spontaneous site visit.  But this one was fortuitous.  The informal school visit was hastily arranged when I realized my vacation tour would run through remote townships where World Bank projects have been supporting government in improving education through the Basic Education in Western Areas Project (BEWAP)…townships that had not, to my knowledge, been visited by previous missions.  I wasn’t sure exactly when I would arrive at each town on this trip so the visits could not be pre-arranged in advance.  Luckily, the whole province is almost totally ‘wired,’ so, the day before, I was able to call our Beijing office, which made arrangements for the Ministry of Education to contact the headmaster of the Tagong Township School with no difficulty.  In fact, the quality of the telecom coverage was better than that in many parts of Washington DC – like my office where my cell phone often doesn’t work unless the weather is clear and I press my face up against the window. 
 

A quick look at 60 years of China's development

Submitted by James I Davison on Thu, 2009-10-08 16:18

Last week’s 60th anniversary celebrations marking the founding of the People’s Republic of China seemed to generate a lot of coverage and interest on news and social media websites. Business magazine Fast Company used the occasion to consider 15 different development-related statistics – comparing then to now.

Most of the figures are striking, and the graphic’s triangles illustrate how rapid and staggering the changes have been in China in just six decades. Interesting data (although the magazine doesn't specify its sources) in the infographic include:

  • The average life expectancy has increased from 35 to 73 years old.
  • The rate of illiteracy was 80 percent in 1949 and is 9.1 percent now.
  • The enrollment rate for primary-school children went from 20 percent to 99.3 percent.

Take a closer look at the chart here. (Hat tip to Cool Infographics.)

Timor-Leste: Reflections on the 10th anniversary of independence

Submitted by Gabriela Leite ... on Thu, 2009-09-10 14:20

Ten years after Timor-Leste became an independent state, new schools are built every week and more students are going to school than ever before.

After hundreds of years of being a colony, in 1999 the United Nations administered a popular consultation, which allowed the people of Timor-Leste to decide in a referendum whether they wanted to become an independent state. I was 15 years old when the referendum took place. Just a few weeks before the consultation day, my family dropped me off on the island of Flores to attend high school. I remember clearly that as I waited on the dock of the ferry that took me away from the capital city of Dili, I prayed for peace to my country. I swore only to return after my country found its final freedom from colonization.

On the morning of August 30, 1999, I sat in my literature class listening to my teacher and other classmates discussing Timor-Leste and its future. My classmates asked my teacher why the Timorese wanted independence. My teacher looked at me and asked, “What do your parents think of this referendum? Do they also want Timor-Leste to become independent?” Fearing for the safety of my family and myself, I looked away and said that I had no idea where my parents stood on this issue. My heart ached to scream “Viva Timor Leste!” – but I knew full well that it would be asking for trouble to do that. That evening, sitting in front of TV, along with my other flat mates, we watched how the Timorese were dressed up early in the morning to go to the polling place. Many were dancing “dahur”, a Timorese traditional dance, as the long awaited day had finally arrived.

Zai jian – Goodbye – See you again: a look back on China's progress upon leaving the World Bank

Submitted by David Dollar on Thu, 2009-07-02 10:46

This is my last week in the World Bank, after working at the institution for 20 years, the last five as country director for China and Mongolia.

A few weeks ago I had the unique opportunity to camp out on top of the Great Wall, which was a fitting exclamation mark at the end of my five years as the World Bank's China Country Director. It was a cloudy, drizzly day as we started, but then cleared up and turned into a lovely evening. The large group of kids we had with us slept in one of the guard towers along the wall, but I and a few others opted to sleep under the stars. The next morning opened with some mist, but then turned into a spectacular blue day. Some long-term Beijing residents hiking with us noted that they couldn’t recall ever seeing the countryside so green.

Beijing’s dry climate sets a limit on how green and blue it’s ever going to get, but the improvement over five years is noticeable and is one of the two most striking achievements of China in this period. In many cities, air pollution has declined as a result of policies that include banning the use of coal in inner cities, strengthening public transportation, discouraging car use (gasoline now costs 50% more than in the U.S.), moving heavy industry out of inner cities, and more stringent enforcement of environmental regulations.

Making rural life a little less vulnerable for Mongolian herders

Submitted by David Dollar on Tue, 2009-06-23 14:17

Better materials and student participation characterize the READ schools project. (photo by Prateek Tandon)

Mongolia’s extreme climate was brought home to me again last week as I went with our World Bank team on a retreat about an hour and a half out of the capital city Ulaanbaatar. Wednesday afternoon was hot and summery, but on Thursday a cold front brought extreme storms that knocked out power and left a dusting of snow on the hills around UB. The life of the rural population, mostly herders, is inherently vulnerable in this extreme environment. Yet a number of projects supported by the World Bank have reduced this vulnerability somewhat in recent years.

Traveling around the countryside now I am struck by the fact that – for better or worse – my Blackberry keeps me connected most of the time. One of our innovative projects has offered subsidies, which private phone companies have competed for, to expand coverage in the countryside. The economics of cell phones is such that a one-time subsidy to erect towers will enable private companies to offer connectivity on a commercial basis.

Imagine a new Indonesia: Spending to improve development

Submitted by Wolfgang Fengler on Thu, 2009-06-04 10:00

Imagine how the new Indonesia would prosper if everyone had affordable health insurance, every child completed secondary education and highways were in place connecting Indonesia’s three biggest cities: Jakarta, Surabaya and Medan.

The good news is that today Indonesia’s main challenge is not to save resources but to spend them wisely. This still remains the case, even in the face of the global financial crisis. Despite its position of relative strength, Indonesia has two main weaknesses: the allocation of funds and the implementation of its budget. Despite some impressive steps to rein in subsidies, significant resources are still being spent on subsidies that benefit the well-off, mainly on fuel, electricity and fertilizers. In 2008, subsidies consumed an estimated 23 percent of total government spending. Indonesia also spends a disproportionately large share on “government apparatus,” at 13 percent of the total budget (see chart 1). Interestingly, this is not due to a bloated central government civil service. Instead, it is driven by regional governments, who spend a staggering 32 percent on themselves.

Amid soccer celebrations, first MBA on carbon finance hints at a solid future for green businesses

Submitted by Florian Kitt on Thu, 2009-05-28 13:30

Display at Carbon Expo in Barcelona.

It was my best intention to write my blog posts in a somewhat chronological way, but events, as they often do, just surpassed me. FC Barcelona’s convincing and clear 2-0 win against Manchester United in the Champions League final yesterday completely overshadowed Carbon Expo this morning. Some participants clearly showed signs of having joined the many street parties that lasted until the early morning and the game dominated discussions on the morning of the expo’s second day. Join me in a quick O le le, Oh la la, Barca!!

But back to business. Yesterday the Carbon Expo truly started only in the afternoon and after the plenary sessions. Carbon Expo truly is a marketplace where participants are looking for financing, projects, and jobs. Discussions become very specific, and companies and intermediaries show great interest in the World Bank’s expertise and knowledge on developing countries. Networking is a must and that includes going from stand to stand to grab information and presents, talk to possible business partners or join one of the multiple “have a drink, a bite, and talk to us” receptions.

Can China become the engine for world economic growth?

Submitted by David Dollar on Wed, 2009-05-20 12:40

This somewhat provocative question was the title of a conference hosted by Oxford and Standard Charter this week in London.  My answer was: "No, not tomorrow; but yes, eventually – especially if China continues to vigorously pursue economic reform."
 
The reason that China cannot be the engine of global growth tomorrow is straight-forward.  For the last decade an awful lot of the final demand in the world has come from the U.S.  That era is over for the time being as U.S. households now concentrate on rebuilding their savings.  No one country can fill the gap left by the slowdown in U.S. consumption: Japan, Germany, and China together have less consumption than the U.S., so no one of them can replace the U.S. as the major source of demand in the world.  It's not realistic to expect China to play that role.  But we are probably moving into a more multi-polar period in which there is more balanced growth in all of the major economies. 

Using social media to do good

Submitted by James I Davison on Wed, 2009-04-29 09:35

I came across a small, but interesting online effort to raise donations for an organization that works to improve child literacy in Laos. Called Library for Laos, the effort aims to raise $5,000 by May 1– just five days after it started. The money raised is intended to go to Big Brother Mouse, a neat, Laos-based project that publishes, teaches and distributes books to children in a country they say desperately needs it.

It's a nice concept for a good cause, but what sticks out to me are the coordinators' clear attempts to use social media to spread the word about their effort. On their website, they bank on the ease of PayPal for donating money and the viral nature of social media: "How many people follow you on Twitter? How many friends do you have on Facebook? Let's see how valuable they are!" It's early to tell if they're succeeding. After the first day, they had apparently raised $500 dollars.

Either way, the endeavor highlights how social sites like Facebook, which permeates everyday life for many of us, can serve the world's poor. For example, you have the option to join various "causes" on Facebook. And on Twitter, information can spread like wildfire through retweets (rebroadcasting content to your own set of followers). What do you think? Would you ask your online friends and/or followers to donate money to a good cause?

(Found via: Escape the Cube). Image credit: rustystewart at Flickr under a Creative Commons license.

China and stimulus packages: the best way to respond to more bad news?

Submitted by Louis Kuijs on Tue, 2009-03-24 13:57

A few days ago, our country director David Dollar blogged about the two-sided picture we see when we look at China's economic growth. The economy saw very weak export demand, which partly carried over into weak investment in manufacturing and other "market-based" sectors. Continued growth in other parts of the domestic economy was supported by policy stimulus.

China has weathered the crisis better than many other countries because it does not rely on external financing, its banks have been largely unscathed by the international financial turmoil, and it has the fiscal and macroeconomic space to implement forceful stimulus measures. China’s government has made use of this policy space by pursuing pretty forceful fiscal and monetary stimulus. From early November last year onwards, the government's 10-point plan ("RMB 4 trillion package") is being implemented. This plan emphasizes infrastructure and other investment, financed in part by government budget spending, and in part by bank lending. And the government has taken some additional, more consumption-oriented measures.