African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) promises to be a game changer. It would create a single market that unites 54 countries with a combined population of 1.3 billion and GDP of $3.4…

Wamkele Mene |

Learn how nature-based solutions are increasingly recognized as an essential tool in mitigating disasters and supporting climate resilience.

Brenden Jongman, Sally Judson |

Global poverty estimates were updated today on the Poverty and Inequality Platform (PIP). This update includes new regional poverty aggregates in 2020 and 2021 for Latin America and the Caribbean…

Samuel Kofi Tetteh Baah, R. Andres Castaneda Aguilar, Carolina Diaz-Bonilla, Tony Fujs, Christoph Lakner, Minh Cong Nguyen, Martha Viveros |

In November 2022, more than 45,000 world leaders and climate activists convened in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt, for the preeminent international climate conference, COP27. Indeed, climate action – and…

Dieter Wang, Bryan Gurhy, Fiona Stewart |

With the global economic challenges that followed the COVID-19 pandemic, combined debt stock of low- and middle-income countries rose by 5.6%, from $8.6 trillion in 2020 to $9 trillion in 2021.…

Kifaye Didem Bayar, Anthony Tin Yu To, Ogma Dessirama Bale |

Last month, the World Bank issued a five-year outcome bond that aims to provide clean drinking water to around two million school children in Vietnam. A lack of clean drinking water causes an…

David Malpass |

March 22 is World Water Day. Water is vital for human health and survival, and access to water is recognized as a human right. Over the past 21 years, global access to safely managed drinking…

Haruna Kashiwase, Tony Fujs |

Natural capital - nature’s bounty - is the wealth of the poor. Its degradation and loss are their burden to carry. Degradation of nature could cause the poorest countries to lose 10% of their GDP…

Valerie Hickey |

In the early 1990s, there was a near complete overlap between poor people and poor countries, with more than 9 out of 10 of the world’s extreme poor living in low-income countries at the time.

Daniel Gerszon Mahler, Nishant Yonzan, Christoph Lakner |

Coal prices have been retreating from their highs in 2022 but they remain well above the 2017-2021 average. Global coal consumption levels reached an all-time high in 2022, led by India and China…

Paolo Agnolucci, Peter Nagle, Kaltrina Temaj |