Despite contributing the least to the climate crisis, Sub-Saharan Africa, home to over 1 billion 
people, continues to suffer some of the worst consequences of a changing climate. In 2019, we saw the catastrophic impacts of Cyclone Idai on millions of people in Mozambique, Zimbabwe, and Malawi, and in 2020, locusts caused widespread food insecurity in the amidst of a global pandemic.
Pakistan’s schools are reopening again today after a nearly uninterrupted 11-month hiatus. In March 2020, the Government of Pakistan closed all schools as part of a nationwide lockdown, prompting the Ministry of Federal Education and Professional Training (MoFE&PT) to seek education alternatives to ensure learning continuity.
The world is now a full year into the COVID-19 pandemic—both the health emergency and the global economic crisis it has generated. Its impacts have touched every person in every country, causing illness and death, disrupting livelihoods, and potentially pushing an estimated 150 million more people into extreme poverty around the globe by the end of 2021. And
One morning in February, in Kaffrine Region, Senegal, Kaffia Diallo emerged from her tent. She 
is happy; her new grandson was born just two days earlier. “A beautiful baby,” she said, “although I wish he weighed a little more.”
Deadline: 06-May-2020 at 11:59:59 PM (Eastern Time – Washington D.C.) 
This consultancy assignment will support preparation of technical resilience building guidelines and standards for a proposed Indonesia Mass Transit Program; build staff capacity in the Ministry of Transportation and the Ministry of Public Works and Housing; and support sub-national governments in Bandung and Medan as two selected pilot cities of the IMTP. There are two key components: (i) technical report for national-level resilient urban mobility infrastructure planning, design, and operations; (ii) resilient urban mobility diagnostics and investment options for Bandung and Medan to help inform IMTP investments to better withstand hydro-meteorological and geophysical hazards, as well as better prepare local transport administrators and operators for disaster shocks.
Director of Operations
I have read the many reports that summarize the dire state of the climate and our planet’s worsening prospects. I know the hard statistics docum
enting rising temperatures, the increasing intensity of natural disasters and warmer seas. I have been meeting with representatives from developing countries who have one request:
It is undeniable that progress has been made in reducing extreme poverty over the last 
quarter century—from 36 percent of the world population in 1990 to an estimated 8.6 percent in 2018—and that living standards for hundreds of millions of people have improved over that time.
Yet, poverty reduction has not been consistent across countries and today it is slowing.
Next week, I’ll attend the climate summit hosted by the United Nations as part of the 74th session of the General Assembly. A range of environmental challenges—including pollution, the degradation of forests and biodiversity, marine plastics, and extreme weather events—are putting sustainable economic growth and inclusive development at risk. While international discussions have a place in looking for results, one of the great strengths of the World Bank Group is in partnering with countries to find local solutions and deliver good outcomes.
I started reading about the Aral Sea disaster in 1989 ahead of my first visit, as a student 
and tourist, to Uzbekistan, then still a Soviet republic. In Karakalpakstan, the autonomous republic in current-day Uzbekistan, the Aral Sea has all but disappeared. Where fishing communities once thrived, all that remains is a scarred, desert landscape. Rusted ships are perched precariously on piles of sand and salt, along with a potent, unhealthy mix of toxic pollutants from industrial agriculture.
