Topic: sustainable development

The United Nations projects that world population will rise from just over 7 billion in 2012 to nearly 9.6 billion by 2050. This paper examines the nature of the population challenge globally, the effect of population growth on food demand in Sub-Saharan Africa, and the potential benefits―in terms of food security, economic growth, and environment―of reducing fertility levels more quickly than currently projected. This paper then explores promising, non-coercive approaches for reducing fertility rates.

This is the third installment in the series that forms the foundation of the “World Resources Report 2013-14: Creating a Sustainable Food Future.”

About 24 percent of all calories currently produced for human consumption are lost or wasted. This paper examines the implications of this amount of loss and waste, profiles a number of approaches for reducing it, and puts forth five recommendations for how to move forward on this issue. “Reducing Food Loss and Waste” is the second installment in the series that forms the foundation of the “World Resources Report 2013-14: Creating a Sustainable Food Future.”

How can the world adequately feed more than 9 billion people by 2050 in a manner that advances economic development and reduces pressure on the environment? This is one of the paramount questions the world faces over the next four decades. “The Great Balancing Act” seeks to start answering this question by exploring the scope of the challenge and proposing a menu of potential solutions. This working paper is the first in a series that forms the foundation of the “World Resources Report 2013-14: Creating a Sustainable Food Future.”

The global landscape of development finance is changing. Some formerly poor countries are becoming richer, and new, large-scale investors have entered the field. At the same time, the global community is becoming increasingly aware of the need to enhance social well-being and environmental sustainability. This working paper looks at different ways in which the World Bank has attempted to navigate this landscape with its safeguard policies. It provides lessons for the Bank and other institutions that are looking to encourage national ownership over the safeguard process while holding both themselves and governments accountable to minimum social and environmental standards.

Limiting global temperature rise to 2°C above pre-industrial levels will require billions of dollars in investments each year to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions and shift to low-emissions development pathways. This report draws on the experiences of six developing countries to examine how public climate finance can help meet the significant investment needs of developing countries by creating attractive conditions for scaled-up investment in low-carbon energy. Building on lessons from the case studies, it provides a number of recommendations for international climate funds and institutions, in particular for the new Green Climate Fund.

This document provides a glossary of financing instruments and the mechanism of these instruments. These definitions may serve as a useful reference for public sector decision-makers evaluating the broad toolkit of options available to support private sector climate change mitigation projects in developing countries.