Providing Schooling for 72 million Children by 2015 
African Ministers Urge Donor Support for Fast Track Initiative

With support from EFA-FTI, the Education for All Fast Track Initiative, remarkable strides have been made in school enrollments and gender parity in Africa.  At the World Bank-IMF Annual Meetings in Istanbul last month, 14 African Ministers acknowledged this success and made a plea for more money for EFA FTI to help poor countries achieve the Millennium Development Goals on education. FTI partners will meet in Rome from November 4-6, 2009, to discuss next steps in the replenishment process and how to mobilize resources to fill the education financing gap in FTI countries.

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Education
READ for Results
Access to education matters but is insufficient--countries must ensure that children learn. That was the central message of the First Russia Education Aid for Development (READ) conference  held in Moscow from Sep 30-Oct 2, 2009. A Russian/World Bank partnership, READ is working in 7 countries to build capacity to measure and assess student learning and improve teaching.

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Health, Nutrition & Population
Record Vaccination Rates for Children in 2008. 
On October 21, 2009, WHO, UNICEF and the World Bank released The State of the World's Vaccines and Immunization report which showed that a record 106 million children were immunized in 2008. The report calls on donor nations to address a funding gap of US$1 billion per year over the next 10 years to reach the remaining millions of children still at risk, particularly in the poorest nations and communities, Click here to see main report, press release, short film and webcast of the launch 

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HIV / AIDS
Getting Medical Supplies to Where They are Needed Most
Increased donor support in recent years for HIV/AIDS and health has increased the flow of medical supplies to the developing world, creating an urgent need for more efficient supplies management. On November 3, the Bank will discuss results of new analyses of strategic supply chain network in the Dominican Republic, Ethiopia, Kenya and Lesotho.
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Social Protection & Labour
Russia Commits $50 million for Global Financial Crisis Response
At the Bank's Annual Meetings in Istanbul, Russia announced a $50 million contribution for the Rapid Social Response (RSR) Multi-Donor Trust Fund Facility managed by the World Bank. The RSR is helping low-income countries protect their poorest and most vulnerable citizens from the worst effects of the global crisis by promoting social safety nets, job creation programs, and maintaining key social services in education, health, and nutrition.  

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Children & Youth
Supplementing Nutrition in Early Childhood.
Compelling evidence is presented in this new publication on the role that simple early childhood stimulation inputs can play when accompanied by nutritional inputs. Joint stimulation/nutrition interventions are most effective. Click here to see publication and images of abnormal brain development following sensory neglect in a 3-year old.

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Regional Highlights
Find out how the Bank is doing in investing in people in various regions of the world
Africa: First Africa Health Insurance Workshop was held in Accra, Ghana(Oct19-23). Government officials, national health system officials, members of civil society and the private sector from Kenya, Nigeria, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zambia participated in the workshop along with observers from Liberia, Sierra Leone and Ethiopia. Read more

Eastern Europe & Central Asia (ECA): The World Bank and the Government of Montenegro co-hosted the Fifth Education Conference (Oct 27-29) in Montenegro. This year's conference focused on financing higher education in a time of economic crisis. Click here for more 

Latin America & the Caribbean: In an effort to focus on learning outcomes, the World Bank funded Early Grade Reading Assessments (EGRA) in Haiti, Guyana and Honduras in 2008. EGRA, a research tool to assess the most basic skills for literacy acquisition in the early grades, is being applied in 18 countries and in 23 languages. Read more  

 

Center for Strategic and International Studies' (CSIS) Commission on Smart Global Health is inviting people who are passionate and knowledgeable about global health to share their knowledge and ideas on actionable recommendations for a long-term, strategic U.S. approach to global health, culminating in a report to be released in early 2010. Click here to join their blog and/or enter their contest, deadline November 20. 

 

Groundbreaking Report Card on Child Protection 
Children worldwide experience violence. They are forced to fight in wars, forced into child marriages, sexually abused, and more than often punished violently for bad behavior. UNICEF released a report card on child protection in September 2009 that contains groundbreaking regional data on various forms and levels of violence children around the world experience.

UNESCO joins heads of state, football stars, business leaders and others in supporting 1Goal: Education for All. 1Goal is a new global advocacy initiative on emphasizing the importance of providing education for all. Centered on the FIFA 2010 World Cup, to be held in Africa for the first time in 2010, the 1Goal campaign aims to build on the unifying power of football to reach more than 30 million supporters worldwide.

MEET THE EXPERTS

Robin Horn
Sector Manager, Education
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NEW REPORTS

Courage and Hope: Stories of Teachers Living with HIV in Sub-Saharan Africa

UPCOMING EVENTS
Nov 9-11, 2009
Global Symposium on ICT and Education, Seoul, South Korea
Nov 11-12, 2009
Roma Education Fund Donor Conference, Brussels, Belgium 
Nov 12, 2009
Scaling Up Nutrition: What will it take? The Window of Development Opportunity, Washington D.C., USA 
Nov 9-20, 2009
World Bank Core Course on Pensions, Washington DC, USA
Dec 1, 2009
Keeping the Promise. Investing in the Future. World AIDS Day, Washington, D.C., USA. 

NEW PROJECTS

WINNER of 2009 Independent Evaluation Group Award: Kyrgyz Republic Health Sector Reform Project I & II

More health, nutrition and population projects

Vietnam: First Development Policy Lending (DPL) of US$50 million towards higher education

Uruguay: US$ 29.9 million for the Third Basic Education Improvement Project (MECAEP)

More education projects

Chile: US$3 million for technical assistance to social protection