Global Economic Prospects

Global Economic Prospects 2009: Commodities at the Crossroads

The world financial crisis has dimmed short-term prospects for developing countries and the volume of world trade is likely to contract for the first time since 1982. The sharp slowdown has caused commodity prices to plummet, ending a historic five-year boom.

Global Economic Prospects 2008: Technology Diffusion in the Developing World

Rapid technological progress in developing countries has helped to raise incomes and reduce the share of people living in absolute poverty from 29 percent in 1990 to 18 percent in 2004. Despite these gains, the technology gap between rich and poor countries remains enormous, and the capacity of developing economies to adopt new technology remains weak. Developing countries must improve their capacity to absorb and use technology.

Global Economic Prospects 2007: Managing the Next Wave of Globalization

Over the next 25 years developing countries will move to center stage in the global economy. Global Economic Prospects 2007 analyzes the opportunities - and stresses - this will create. While rich and poor countries alike stand to benefit, the integration process will make more acute stresses already apparent today - in income inequality, in labor markets, and in the environment.

Global Economic Prospects 2006: Economic Implications of Remittances and Migration

This year’s edition of Global Economic Prospects focuses on the flow of international migrant remittances and improving their development impact. It presents available data on migration flows and examines current thinking on issues pertaining to migration and its development impact. The bulk of the book covers remittances, including their size, determinants, development impact, and steps to strengthen financial infrastructure and reduce transaction costs.

Global Economic Prospects 2005: Trade, Regionalism, and Development

This report examines the proliferation of bilateral and regional preferential trading arrangements and what this means for the multilateral Doha trade negotiations. It tackles three main questions: What types of agreements help promote—and which ones impede—development? Do bilateral and regional agreements promote a deeper integration that the multilateral system cannot deliver on? Do they negatively impact a country’s incentive to engage in multilateral Doha trade talks?

Global Economic Prospects 2004: Realizing the Development Promise of the Doha Agenda

The Doha Development Agenda of the Fourth Ministerial Conference of the WTO opened many contentious and important questions. This report analyzes the most critical multilateral trade issues and suggests policy options that would raise living standards in developing countries and reduce global poverty.

Global Economic Prospects 2003: Investing to Unlock Global Opportunities

In the face of uncertainties in the global environment, the report outlines steps that can be adopted by rich and poor countries to increase growth rates and accelerate poverty reduction. Though global GDP is expected to rise by 2.5 percent in 2003 as a result of improved business health and policy stimulus in the U.S. and Europe, the chances of the world economy sliding toward recession are real. Regional variations in growth in developing countries are striking: 6.1 percent in East Asia compared to 1.8 percent in Latin America. The poverty targets are likely to be achieved by most regions, except for Africa which lags behind. .

Global Economic Prospects 2002: Making Trade Work for the World's Poor

This report reviews the global economic environment and its implications for the developing countries over the next decade. Realizing the promise of the new global initiatives to expand trade requires concerted effort to move development to center stage in trade policy formulation. This report is dedicated to that agenda. It begins with a review of global prospects and ways globalization links the fates of industrial and developing countries. The report then considers issues in four broad areas that are particularly important to developing countries: merchandise trade, services, transport, and intellectual property rights. A final chapter summarizes the forward-looking policy agenda, and assesses the potential impact of further global integration and more rapid growth for the standards of living in poor countries everywhere.

Global Economic Propsects and the Developing Countries 2001

The global economy is likely approaching a cyclical high in 2000, while policy reforms and improvements in health and education in developing countries over the past decade have substantially increased their potential for long-term growth. However, volatility in the global economic environment presents major risks for developing countries that could depress prospects.

Global Economic Prospects and the Developing Countries 2000

This report analyzes the prospects for the global economy and the implications for poverty reduction; reports on the enormous social impact of the crisis in the most affected countries; reviews progress in corporate and bank restructuring in the East Asian crisis countries; and traces the impact of volatile commodity prices on exporters of primary commodities.

Global Economic Prospects and the Developing Countries 198/99: Beyond Financial Crises

This report analyzes future prospects for developing countries in the wake of the East Asian crisis; maps out policies to deal with crises once they erupt; and focuses on ways to prevent future crises on the scale of East Asia’s experience.