Indonesia has begun to emerge into middle-income status, yet persistent poverty and stark inequalities continue to affect young children's development. This book tells the story of Indonesia's efforts to change the trajectory of development for poor children. Many countries have similar aims, but several aspects of what is reported here are especially valuable and perhaps unique. The study offers data on all aspects of health and development in a sample of rural young children, collected with internationally-validated measures, as well as household information, information about parenting...

Cities currently account for about two-thirds of the world's annual energy consumption and about 70 percent of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. In the coming decades, urbanization and income growth in developing countries are expected to push cities' energy consumption and GHG emissions shares even higher, particularly where the majority of people remain underserved by basic infrastructure services and where city authorities are underresourced to shift current trajectories. These challenges are faced by many cities and millions of people in the East Asia and Pacific (EAP) Region, which is...

Urbanization beyond Municipal Boundaries informs policy priorities to manage India's urbanization. Incisive analysis of the patterns of India's urbanization using geo-referenced data from various rounds of the population and economic census highlights rapid suburbanization of people and fi rms around the country's largest metropolitan areas. However, the move to the suburbs is accelerated by land and housing shortages in metropolitan cores, coupled with high transport costs between the metropolitan core and its periphery, and much worse infrastructure access and quality for water,...

It has been over twenty years since the Brazilian Sistema Unico de Saude (Unified Health System or SUS) was formally established by the 1988 Constitution. The impetus for the SUS came in part from rising costs and a crisis in the social security system that preceded the reforms, but also from a broad-based political movement calling for democratization and improved social rights. Building on reforms that started in the 1980s, the SUS was based on three overarching principles: (i) universal access to health services, with health defined as a citizen's right and an obligation of the state; (ii)...

By 2021, the 50th anniversary of its independence, Bangladesh seeks to attain middle-income status. To accelerate growth enough to do so, Bangladesh needs to build a competitive urban space that is innovative, connected, and livable. Bangladesh: The Path to Middle-Income Status from an Urban Perspective investigates the drivers and obstacles to creating a competitive urban space by focusing on one of the country's most successful industries: the garment sector. In analyzing a survey of 1,000 garment firms, this study reveals that Bangladesh's urban areas are falling behind in all the three...

The withdrawal of most international troops by 2014 will have a profound and lasting impact on the country's economic and development fabric. This book explores some of these ramifications. Development progress since 2001 has been mixed. The country has recorded some major achievements such as rapid economic growth, relatively low inflation, better public financial management, and gains in basic health and education. Key social indicators, including life expectancy and maternal mortality, have improved markedly, and women are participating more in the economy. Yet in other respects,...

On Norms and Agency explores some of the power dynamics of gender relations within the household and communities in different contexts. These processes are analyzed from the perspectives of groups of men and women and boys and girls who participated in focus groups in 97 communities around the world. From gender differences and inequalities to intra-household decision making, more than 4,000 women and men in 500-plus single-sex focus groups reflected on how social norms that define what it means to be and act as a woman or a man affect their life outcomes and their access to opportunities....

Given the labor market challenges that countries in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region are facing---notably high unemployment, prevalence of skills mismatches, low labor market mobility, and lack of formal employment networks---employment services could be a relevant policy instrument to help unemployed individuals find jobs. Despite high and increasing unemployment rates, employers in the region have a hard time finding workers whose competences and skills fit their employment needs. This book first surveys international best practices for the delivery of employment services and...

The temporary movement of labor is one mode of delivering services across borders. Unlike the movement of capital, and despite significant returns to mobility, labor movement remains highly restricted and politically sensitive. To circumvent this problem, the use of bilateral labor agreements (BLAs) may serve as a potential complementary means of increasing temporary labor mobility, particularly among workers in the services sector. BLAs are generally not part of trade agreements, nor are they designed to promote services exports by the sending country, although they could be used to do so....

Bangladesh is undergoing a double transition--demographic and epidemiological. Increasing life expectancy and declining fertility entail a demographic transition fueling a shift in the disease burden toward noncommunicable diseases (NCDs). Yet due to absence of a robust routine health information system in the country, it is hard to accurately assess the disease burden and corresponding risk factors. So, using a wide range of sources, this book looks at the status of major NCDs in Bangladesh (and briefly in South Asia), touches on their economic impact, analyzes their common risk factors, and...