World Bank warns of collapse in money sent home by migrant workers

Posted on April 22, 2020 by Admin

Covid-19 unemployment expected to cause $110bn drop in remittances to developing world

The amount of money migrant workers send back to their home countries is expected to decrease by almost $110bn this year as the Covid 19 pandemic increases unemployment across the world.

Remittances to low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) are projected to fall by nearly 20% to $445bn (£360bn), “representing the loss of a crucial financial lifeline for many vulnerable households”, the World Bank said.

Calls for debt relief to help world’s poorest nations fight coronavirus

Posted on April 12, 2020 by Admin

Australia urged to use its influence to push for the permanent cancellation of all debt due from vulnerable countries in 2020

Low-income countries need their debts for 2020 forgiven, alongside billions in emergency grants to survive the Covid-19 crisis, civil society groups around the world have said, arguing the viral pandemic will hit hardest the poorest people in the poorest countries.

More than 100 civil society organisations internationally have called on creditor nations to permanently cancel all debt repayments as the “fastest way to keep money in countries and free up resources to tackle the urgent health, social and economic crises resulting from the Covid-19 global pandemic”.

Coronavirus crisis demands that the G20 give debt relief to sub-Saharan Africa

Posted on April 11, 2020 by Admin

With the IMF and World Bank spring conference approaching, research underlines need to bail out world’s poorest countries

For more than two years the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund have warned that sub-Saharan Africa stands on the verge of a debt crisis. Ever since commodity prices began to fall in 2015, the public finances of nations stretching from Nigeria to Kenya and Chad to South Africa have deteriorated.

If China is the manufacturing centre of the world, Africa is its chief supplier of essential materials, from oil and copper to the rare-earth minerals used in mobile phones. As China’s manufacturing waned in the middle of the last decade, so did the crucial foreign earnings that keep African nations afloat.

Tanzania to ease education ban on pregnant girls – but not in classrooms

Posted on April 10, 2020 by Admin

Official announcement greeted with cautious optimism but World Bank comes under fire over $500m education loan

Tanzania has pledged to improve access to education for pregnant girls after receiving a controversial $500m (£402m) World Bank loan, but has stopped short of readmitting them to mainstream classrooms.

The World Bank has been accused of undermining human rights and has faced criticism from local and international civil society groups over the Tanzania secondary education quality improvement programme loan. Campaigners say approval should not have been given without first securing a commitment from the government to reverse its discrimination towards pregnant girls and end compulsory pregnancy tests.

Global leaders urge G20 to tackle twin health and economic crises

Posted on April 6, 2020 by Admin

Letter calls for $8bn emergency fund to bolster health systems in world’s poorer countries

A group of 165 global leaders has called for immediate and coordinated international action to tackle the twin health and economic emergencies caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.

Past and present politicians – including three former UK prime ministers – joined academics and civil society representatives to warn the G20 that the virus will return unless urgent action is taken to bolster health systems in poor countries of Africa and Latin America.

Debt relief allows Somalia to rejoin global economy after 30-year exile

Posted on March 26, 2020 by Admin

IMF and World Bank sign off $5bn in assistance with help of bridge financing from Norway, Italy, the UK and the EU

Somalia’s debt will be slashed to a fraction of its current levels after almost $5bn (£4.1bn) of assistance was approved by the International Monetary Fund and World Bank.

A joint statement from the global financial institutions praised Somalia’s efforts at economic reform, allowing it to qualify for a debt relief programme and reintegrate into the global economy after 30 years.

Africa leads calls for debt relief in face of coronavirus crisis

Posted on March 25, 2020 by Admin

IMF and World Bank lend their support in bid to help poorest countries strengthen their health systems

Government ministers across Africa have called for the suspension of debt interest payments as the Covid-19 crisis deepens.

The numbers of cases being reported in Africa are still behind Europe and the US but rises are being confirmed in South Africa, Kenya, Egypt, Algeria and Burkina Faso, among others, and there is fear of what economic consequences the pandemic might wreak.

World Bank accused over ExxonMobil plans to tap Guyana oil rush

Posted on March 8, 2020 by Admin

Washington DC-based bank grants funds to redraft south American state’s oil laws by lawyers linked to oil giant

The World Bank is to pay for Guyana’s oil laws to be rewritten by a legal firm that has regularly worked for ExxonMobil, just as the US producer prepares to extract as much as 8bn barrels of oil off the country’s coast.

The World Bank has pledged not to fund fossil fuel extraction directly, but it is giving Guyana millions of dollars to develop governance in its burgeoning oil sector, as the south American country prepares for an oil rush led by ExxonMobil and its partners.

World Bank’s $500m pandemic scheme accused of ‘waiting for people to die’

Posted on February 28, 2020 by Admin

Bonds designed to provide fast funding for poor countries branded ‘obscene’ because of complex payout criteria

A flagship $500m World Bank scheme to help the poorest countries deal with a health emergency is “too little too late” for the coronavirus outbreak, say health experts.

The first pandemic emergency financing (PEF) bonds were launched in 2017 by Jim Yong Kim, the bank’s president at the time, after the Ebola outbreak in west Africa. Designed to potentially “save millions of lives and entire economies” by speedily funnelling money to nations facing pandemics.

World Bank urged to scrap $500m loan to Tanzania over schoolgirls’ rights concerns

Posted on January 26, 2020 by Admin

Campaigners say education funding would be ‘inappropriate if not irresponsible’ in light of ban on pregnant girls attending school

An opposition MP and activists in Tanzania are urging the World Bank to withdraw a $500m (£381m) loan to the country, amid concerns over deteriorating human rights, particularly for women and girls.

In a letter addressed to the bank’s board members, Zitto Kabwe said he feared the money would be used by the ruling party “to distort our electoral processes’” and ensure an easy victory in an election year.

China steps in as Zambia runs out of loan options

Posted on December 11, 2019 by Admin

Southern Africa’s third largest economy is a textbook example of the increasing debt facing a fast-growing continent

Zambia’s capital, Lusaka, was having a power cut, so the only light in the restaurant was from Fumba Chama’s mobile phone. The rapper, better known as PilAto, had just finished uploading a new track to Twitter. The bitter-sweet lyrics (in Bemba) of Yama Chinese describe the concerns of many Zambians: “They put on smart suits and fly to China to sell our country. The roads belong to China. The hotels are for the Chinese. The chicken farms are Chinese. Even the brickworks are Chinese.”

Donald Trump calls for World Bank to halt all China lending

Posted on December 6, 2019 by Admin

President says China has plenty of money amid market jitters about trade talks and Beijing vow to be ‘strong backup’ for Hong Kong police

Donald Trump has called for the World Bank to stop lending money to China, a day after the institution adopted a lending plan to Beijing despite Washington’s objections.

The World Bank on Thursday adopted a plan to aid China with $1bn to $1.5bn in low-interest loans annually until 2025. The plan called for lending to “gradually decline” from the previous five-year average of $1.8bn.

Up to 90% of 10-year-olds in world’s poorest countries struggle to read

Posted on October 18, 2019 by Admin

World Bank targets ‘learning poverty’ as research shows major shortfall in basic reading skills among least privileged children

Nine out of 10 children in the world’s poorest countries are unable to read a basic book by the age of 10 – a situation mirrored in reverse in rich countries, where only 9% cannot do so by the same age.

Data compiled by the World Bank and the UN also shows that when low- and middle-income countries are taken together – a total of 135 states – more than half of all children cannot read a simple text at 10 years old.

What’s in our water? Report warns of growing ‘invisible’ crisis of pollution

Posted on August 20, 2019 by Admin

Climate emergency and population growth blamed for deteriorating water quality, with ‘cocktail of chemicals’ changing as countries become richer

The planet is facing a mounting and “invisible” water pollution crisis, according to a hard-hitting World Bank report, which claims the issue is responsible for a one-third reduction in potential economic growth in the most heavily affected areas.

The study, which assembled the world’s largest database of water pollution, assesses how a combination of bacteria, sewage, chemicals and plastics suck oxygen from water supplies and transform water into poison for people and ecosystems.

Cyclone Idai caused $2bn of damage and affected millions, says World Bank

Posted on April 12, 2019 by Admin

Global lender says the cyclone affected about 3 million people, damaging infrastructure and livelihoods

A strong cyclone that cut a deadly swath through Malawi, Mozambique and Zimbabwe last month is expected to cost the three countries more than $2bn, the World Bank has said.

Early estimates pointed to Cyclone Idai costing $2bn “for the infrastructure and livelihood impacts,” the World Bank said in a statement after a meeting in Washington on Thursday.

Only six countries in the world give women and men equal legal work rights

Posted on March 1, 2019 by Admin

Sweden and France among states found by the World Bank to enshrine gender equality in laws, but implementation haphazard

If you’re a woman and want to be on an equal footing with men, it’s best to live and work in Belgium, Denmark, France, Latvia, Luxembourg or Sweden. The World Bank, which has tracked legal changes for the past decade, found these were the only countries in the world to enshrine gender equality in laws affecting work.

The bank’s women, business and the law 2019 report, published this week, measured gender discrimination in 187 countries. It found that, a decade ago, no country gave women and men equal legal rights.

Trump’s unseemly haste shows World Bank must no longer be in thrall to US

Posted on February 14, 2019 by Admin

The race to head the World Bank opened with the US candidate already known. Other countries must stand up and be counted

With characteristic lack of restraint, the Trump administration last week jumped the gun on the World Bank presidential election process by naming David Malpass as its preferred candidate to succeed Jim Yong Kim.

The formal nomination process, which did not begin until the following day, is based on selection principles agreed in 2011 that put the emphasis on an “open, merit-based and transparent” appointment. It is high time those principles were put in practice.

‘Ridiculous’: report Ivanka Trump could lead World Bank meets scorn

Posted on January 12, 2019 by Admin

First daughter’s name said to be ‘floating around Washington’ but it wouldn’t be her first unconventional role

The Financial Times reported on Friday that the name of Ivanka Trump is “floating around Washington” regarding the need for a new president of the World Bank.

The role will soon be open due to the surprise departure of the current president, Jim Yong Kim. But on politics Twitter, at least, the idea that his replacement might be the first daughter met with widespread derision.

IMF’s Lagarde: US tax overhaul ‘desperately needed’

Posted on October 8, 2017 by Admin

IMF chief Christine Lagarde on Friday urged the United States to proceed with a tax overhaul, saying it was "desperately needed" to boost growth in the world's largest economy. "It has to eliminate all the exemptions and the exonerations and the various exceptions that make the system so complicated."

Pro-Trump mayor of sinking island questions Al Gore on CNN

Posted on August 1, 2017 by Admin

In this April 3, 2013, file photo, Tangier Island Mayor James "Ooker" Eskridge drives his boat to town on Tangier Island, Va. Eskridge, an enthusiastic Trump supporter who is mayor of a Virginia island that's sinking into the Chesapeake Bay, will debate former Vice President Al Gore on climate change during a CNN town hall that airs Tuesday, Aug. 1, 2017.

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Category Archives: World Bank

World Bank warns of collapse in money sent home by migrant workers

Calls for debt relief to help world’s poorest nations fight coronavirus

Coronavirus crisis demands that the G20 give debt relief to sub-Saharan Africa

Tanzania to ease education ban on pregnant girls – but not in classrooms

Global leaders urge G20 to tackle twin health and economic crises

Debt relief allows Somalia to rejoin global economy after 30-year exile

Africa leads calls for debt relief in face of coronavirus crisis

World Bank accused over ExxonMobil plans to tap Guyana oil rush

World Bank’s $500m pandemic scheme accused of ‘waiting for people to die’

World Bank urged to scrap $500m loan to Tanzania over schoolgirls’ rights concerns

China steps in as Zambia runs out of loan options

Donald Trump calls for World Bank to halt all China lending

Up to 90% of 10-year-olds in world’s poorest countries struggle to read

What’s in our water? Report warns of growing ‘invisible’ crisis of pollution

Cyclone Idai caused $2bn of damage and affected millions, says World Bank

Only six countries in the world give women and men equal legal work rights

Trump’s unseemly haste shows World Bank must no longer be in thrall to US

‘Ridiculous’: report Ivanka Trump could lead World Bank meets scorn

IMF’s Lagarde: US tax overhaul ‘desperately needed’

Pro-Trump mayor of sinking island questions Al Gore on CNN