Why are fertilizer prices so high, and what can countries in Central America do about this?

Luis Flores, Viviana Perego, Diego Arias |

Costa Rica lost the momentum for poverty reduction towards the end of the twentieth century. This makes Costa Rica an outlier in a region that conti…

Jacobus de Hoop, Agustin Arakaki |

Central America and the Dominican Republic have a good track record of economic growth. Between 1991 and 2019, Central America grew by an average of 4.5% per year, and the Dominican Republic by an…

Michel Kerf |

Corredor Seco, Honduras. Copyright: Angels Maso. World Bank.  A few weeks ago, we had the opportunity to visit the "Federico Boquín" water treatment plant and dam in Tegucigalpa, one of…

Seynabou Sakho, Marco Antonio Aguero |

Four years ago, Juan Angel Sandoval, a resident of Barrio Buenos Aires in the Honduran municipality of Siguatepeque, received water at home only three times a week. His was not an isolated reality…

Seynabou Sakho |

We are all too familiar with these figures: on average, only 50% of the population in Latin America is connected to sewerage and 30% of those households receive any treatment. These figures are…

Diego Juan Rodriguez |

Here are some facts that you might not know: Over the last 60 years, Guatemala has lost almost half of its forests, much of it due to illegal logging. Built-up area around Lake Laguna in the…

Stig Johansson |

This blog originally appeared on the World Bank's Governance for Development Blog, which informs and stimulates debate on how governments can help end poverty and boost shared prosperity. The…

Laura De Castro Zoratto, Courtney Price Ivins |

 Photo: Curt Carnemark / World Bank Crises in access to water are making headlines around the world. Among difficult policy pathways to respond, convincing people to change their behavior and…

Laura De Castro Zoratto, Courtney Price Ivins |

When economists think about price shocks, they consider how a change in price will affect the supply and demand of a product. But when that product is human – i.e., a worker – interpreting the…

Elizabeth Ruppert Bulmer, Claire H. Hollweg |