World Bank Group Libros

Focusing on the legal disparities between genders, this book analyzes how laws influence women's ability and motivation to work. It explores the impact of various regulations on women's roles as entrepreneurs and employees across 173 economies. By identifying these differences, it aims to inform better regulatory practices that can enhance women's economic opportunities.

The book examines the internet's transformative effects on economic growth and social opportunity, highlighting disparities in benefits among businesses, individuals, and governments. It delves into the factors that enable certain entities to leverage the internet for success while others struggle, providing insights into the efficiency of public service delivery in the digital age.

Enabling the business of agriculture assesses whether governments make it easier for farmers to operate their businesses. The indicators provide a measure of progress and identify regulatory obstacles to market integration and entrepreneurship in agriculture. With globally comparable data on regulations covering agricultural inputs, plant health, access to credit and markets, the study finds large disparities across the countries on the strength of regulations and the efficiency of their implementation.--description from page vii.

Focusing on education, the 2018 World Development Report explores the critical role it plays in global development. It examines the challenges and opportunities within educational systems, aiming to highlight effective strategies and policies that can enhance learning outcomes worldwide. This comprehensive report emphasizes the importance of education in realizing the potential of individuals and societies, making it a pivotal resource for policymakers and educators alike.

And recommendations -- The changing global burden of cancer : transitions in human development and implications for cancer prevention and control -- Breast cancer -- Cervical cancer -- Oral cancer : prevention, early detection, and treatment -- Colorectal cancer -- Treating childhood cancer in low- and middle-income countries -- Liver cancer -- Cancer pain relief -- Global hazards of tobacco and the benefits of smoking cessation and tobacco taxes -- Cancer services and the comprehensive cancer center -- Screening for cancer : considerations for low- and middle-income countries -- Surgical services for cancer care -- Radiation therapy for cancer -- Need for national commitments to cancer research to guide public health investment and practice -- Cancer in low- and middle-income countries : an economic overview -- Financing cancer care in low-resource settings -- An extended cost-effectiveness analysis of publicly financed HPV vaccination to prevent cervical cancer in China.

The Global Investment Competitiveness report presents new insights and evidence on drivers of foreign direct investment (FDI) in developing countries, and FDI's role in development.

Abstract: The report reviews lessons from the International Finance Corporation's (IFC) investment, and advisory experience in the developing world, which show the interactions between policy frameworks, and the volume and structure of foreign direct investments (FDI). Case studies show how the Corporation promotes successful project structures, and regulatory changes, as it tries to attain the strongest development impact for investments. In developing countries, FDI has flowed mainly into manufacturing, and processing industries. In the past, investment attractiveness had been closely linked to possession of natural resources, or a large domestic market, while production and trade globalization, competitiveness as a location for investment, and exporting, have become the main determinants of attractiveness. Sources of FDI in the past, came almost exclusively from industrial countries, though recently those sources have widened, emerging from developing countries in their own right, and for their own regions. IFC, as an international initiative to promote FDI in developing countries, is liable to promote bilateral trade agreements, bilateral and multilateral financial institutions, and investment promotion programs; its advisory role may vary from diagnostic studies overviewing constraints to FDI, to investment policy studies giving specific solutions on either changes, or strategies. The study further looks at how policy environment is set, and at finding investor opportunities, through project financing, largely structured as joint ventures. The inherent, fragile nature of joint ventures, restricts foreign ownership, thus limiting project structures; however, careful project design has lead to successful operations, by ensuring management, and financial arrangements. Still, to maximize benefits, an unfinished agenda of policy reform remains, and, as more countries open to FDI, this integration will lead to an overall increase in FDI flows

After more than three decades of average annual growth close to 10 percent, China's economy is transitioning to a 'new normal' of slower but more balanced and sustainable growth. Its old drivers of growth -- a growing labor force, the migration from rural areas to cities, high levels of investments, and expanding exports -- are waning or having less impact. China's policymakers are well aware that the country needs new drivers of growth. This report proposes a reform agenda that emphasizes productivity and innovation to help policymakers promote China's future growth and achieve their vision of a modern and innovative China. The reform agenda is based on the three D's: removing Distortions to strengthen market competition and enhance the efficient allocation of resources in the economy; accelerating Diffusion of advanced technologies and management practices in China's economy, taking advantage of the large remaining potential for catch-up growth; and fostering Discovery and nurturing China's competitive and innovative capacity as China approaches OECD incomes in the decades ahead and extends the global innovation and technology frontier.