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December 5 , 2007
HIGHLIGHTS FULL CONTENTS 
 East Asia Remains Robust Despite U.S. Slow Down
Impact of the U.S. sub-prime crisis on East Asian economies should be modest, says World Bank’s half-yearly analysis of the region. East Asian economies are likely to remain robust in 2008 despite growing concerns about the U.S. sub-prime crisis and increasing global oil prices, says the World Bank’s latest East Asia & Pacific Update –Will Resilience Overcome Risk? Highlighting this, the report finds that for the first time, the number of poor people living below $2 a day in East Asia has fallen below 500 million – down from 1 billion in 1990.
Release | Full report | Key Country Indicators: pdf 30k - xls 239k | SPECIAL FOCUS: Agriculture for Development in East Asia
Keeping HIV/AIDS in Vietnam out of General Population
The Bank is funding a project that aims to keep HIV prevalence low in Vietnam. Though Vietnam has a relatively low rate of HIV infection, health officials in the country say the next few years are critical. According to the Ministry of Health, about a quarter of a million people in Vietnam were living with HIV at the end of 2003. The goal is to keep the disease out of the general population. Right now it is mostly confined to IV drug users and sex workers. What worries officials is that HIV rates among those groups are high-and rising.
Story | HIV/AIDS in East Asia & Pacific
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Japan Supports Thailand's Youth Helmet Use Program to Reduce Traffic Fatalities
An innovative campaign to reduce traffic fatalities among young Thais received significant support from the Japanese government through a US$859,200 grant signed in Bangkok. This grant will enable the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, host of the Global Road Safety Partnership, to implement its Youth Helmet Use Program in 120 communities in the Northeast, Thailand’s poorest and least developed region. In recent years, road accidents have become a leading cause of death in Thailand, causing about 1,000 fatalities a month. The grant is provided by the Japan Social Development Fund, a joint Japan-World Bank mechanism providing direct support to the poorest and most vulnerable groups in eligible member countries of the Bank.
National Roads Improvement and Management Program in the Philippines
Following a recent decision by the Bank to defer Board consideration of the Second Phase of the National Roads Improvement and Management Program, the Bank’s Vice President for the East Asia & Pacific Region, Jim Adams, said that the Program is the government of the Philippines’ main tool for modernizing the country’s road management–through stronger business processes and reformed institutions for financing and managing roads. During the first phase of the program (2000-2007), the government made major progress toward putting in place a modern, transparent and accountable national road management system. Some 90 percent of the project goals were achieved: 382 kilometers of roads were built or upgraded in provinces across the Philippines and a further 975 kilometers of existing roads resurfaced and maintained.
Bank Reviews Progress in Cambodia Country Assistance Strategy - pdf
Two years into the implementation of its Country Assistance Strategy (CAS) for Cambodia for 2005-2008, in early October 2007 the World Bank held a series of consultative meetings with the Government, development partners, private sector and civil society representatives to seek their feedback on CAS implementation so far and proposals for the future. The purpose of the consultations was to get feedback on whether the stakeholders feel that the CAS remains relevant and is on track in its implementation or whether it needs some adjustments based on all that has happened in Cambodia during the last two years and the new knowledge that has been accumulated on Cambodia during this period. This and more news in the Cambodia newsletter
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The World Bank Strengthens Partnership with Papua New Guinea
Bank Vice President for the East Asia and Pacific Region, James W. Adams, wrapped up his four-day visit to Papua New Guinea. During the visit, Adams reaffirmed the Bank’s commitment to Papua New Guinea, its largest partner in the Pacific. In close consultation with the government, the Bank has recently prepared a new four year Country Assistance Strategy for Papua New Guinea. The Strategy, expected to be approved by the Bank’s Board of Directors in December, opens a new chapter in the Bank’s relations with the country and is designed to launch a long term partnership aimed at addressing immediate service delivery needs while tackling longer term institutional and accountability challenges.
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IFC Awards Manila Water for Improving Lives
The International Finance Corporation (IFC) has selected Manila Water as the recipient of its 2007 Client Leadership Award. The award acknowledges a highly successful corporate client, which, in line with IFC’s mission, has demonstrated its management’s commitment to environmental and social sustainability and corporate governance, while achieving commercial success. Since 1997, the company has made water available and affordable to thousands of low-income families in the Philippines.
More Bank news at www.worldbank.org/news Back to top
East Asia & Pacific Update - Will Resilience Overcome Risk?
East Asian economies are likely to remain robust in 2008 despite growing concerns about the U.S. sub-prime crisis and increasing global oil prices, says the World Bank’s semi-annual analysis of the region.
Release | Full report | Key Country Indicators: pdf 30k - xls 239k | SPECIAL FOCUS: Agriculture for Development in East Asia Coinciding with the regional update, several World Bank country offices in East Asia release their own, detailed economic and social monitors:
Indonesia Economic and Social Update - 401k pdf
Lao PDR Economic Monitor - 2.26mb pdf
Mongolia Quarterly - 102k pdf
Philippines Brief - 52k pdf
Thailand Economic Monitor Back to top Raw Material Prices, Wages, And Profitability in China's Industry - How Was Profitability Maintained When Input Prices and Wages Increased So Fast? - pdf
China's industrial sector has faced large increases in raw material prices, and wages have also risen significantly. This paper aims at analyzing and quantifying the impact of the cost pressures on the profitability of industry, as well as the way that China's industry has responded to the pressures. Rebalancing China's Economy - Modeling a Policy Package - pdf
This paper discusses how China can rebalance its pattern of growth by implementing a package of policies and shows the results of a modeling exercise implementing this package using a computable general equilibrium model. Global growth and distribution: are China and India reshaping the world? Growth diagnostics for a resource-rich transition economy: the case of Mongolia Ideas and innovation in East Asia Psychological health before, during, and after an economic crisis : results from Indonesia, 1993 - 2000 More Bank publications and reports at www.worldbank.org/reference
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Approved: INDONESIA - Fourth Development Policy Loan
US$600 million to help the Government achieve three critical and mutually reinforcing objectives: (i) an improved investment climate; (ii) enhanced public financial management, governance, and anti-corruption efforts; and (iii) improved public service delivery.
Project details INDONESIA - First Infrastructure Development Policy Loan
US$200 million to support a carefully selected subset of Indonesia’s broader reform agenda on infrastructure, focusing on: (i) central government infrastructure expenditures; (ii) sub-national government infrastructure spending; (iii) public-private partnerships; and (iv) cross-sector infrastructure support such as land acquisition, environment and procurement reform.
Project details Press release for both loans
Back to top Summary of proposed projects for the East Asia & Pacific region
New and revised operational documents For more information on projects and programs, visit http://www.worldbank.org/projects Back to top 
UN Climate Change Conference 2007
Dec 3- 14
The Conference, hosted by the Government of Indonesia, brings together representatives of over 180 countries together with observers from intergovernmental and nongovernmental organizations, and the media. The two week period includes the sessions of the Conference of the Parties to the UNFCCC, its subsidiary bodies as well as the Meeting of the Parties of the Kyoto Protocol. A ministerial segment in the second week will conclude the Conference. New Country Development Marketplace competitions launched
The local Development Marketplaces are programs aiming to provide a platform for the most innovative civil society organizations and successful businesses, individuals and foundations in the respective countries to identify and support innovative bottom-up development ideas.
China
Papua New Guinea
Philippines Back to top
 Opening - Summer Internship Program
The International Finance Corporation (IFC) hires summer interns each year for a minimum period of four weeks to work on discrete projects in Washington, DC or in one of IFC’s field offices. IFC’s summer internships are paid positions. The program is very competitive: IFC receives over 1,500 resumes each year, from which 30-40 candidates are selected. Following a thorough evaluation process at the conclusion of the internship, a select set of summer interns are invited to interview for the Global Transaction Team Program. Candidates must be in the first or second-to-last year of an MBA or similar graduate program. For a full list of open positions and scholarships http://www.worldbank.org/jobs Back to top
 The Logistics Performance Index
A Bank study ranking 150 countries pinpoints the places where it’s easy or difficult to ship goods across countries, into and out of ports, and over borders. The Logistics Performance Index (LPI) and accompanying study, Connecting to Compete: Trade Logistics in the Global Economy, find that the countries with the most predictable, efficient, and best-run transportation routes and trade procedures are also the most likely to take advantage of technological advances, economic liberalization, and access to international markets. Like the Bank’s Doing Business report and the World Economic Forum’s Global Competitiveness Index, the LPI provides a set of indicators to gauge international competitiveness.
Some of the tools include:
The Country Scorecard - uses seven key dimensions to benchmark countries performance
The Cross-Country Comparison - allows bar-chart comparison of up to 20 countries on their overall LPI index and seven key dimensions
Online Tool for Data Analysis
The Bank's Enterprise Surveys team has launched a custom query tool called Do Your Own Analysis. It allows users to slice and dice firm-level, microeconomic data across 172 indicators from over 100 countries. Each query generates a custom graph that the user can cut and paste.These surveys measure business perceptions of the investment climate in countries, based on data from over 66,000 firms worldwide. They can be used to analyze job creation and growth trends. Back to top
Middle-Income Countries
Nearly seventy percent of the world’s poor, defined as people who earn less than $2 per day, live in middle-income countries. These countries borrow from IBRD and have a large unfinished social agenda that includes meeting and surpassing the Millennium Development Goals. Middle-income countries are increasingly important in terms of providing global public goods such as clean energy, trade integration, environmental protection, international financial stability, and the fight against communicable diseases. But most of these countries face constraints in mobilizing the funds needed to invest in infrastructure, health, education, and the reform of policies and institutions essential to improving the investment climate..
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