The contribution of work to growth and household well-being is a growing concern in East Asia Pacific. The labor share of gross domestic product (GDP) in several countries in the region has been declining.
... Voir la suite Specific problems include high youth inactivity and unemployment, rising inequality, and binding skills shortages. A key underlying issue is widespread economic informality, which increases household vulnerability to shocks, limits the tax base, and constrains innovation and the productivity of firms and the economy as a whole. Informality is both a consequence of relatively stringent labor regulations and a reason for their widespread evasion. Key components of the appropriate policy response include macroeconomic stability and a regulatory framework that encourages, in particular, the growth of small and medium enterprises where most people in East Asia Pacific work. It is also critical to 'formalize' more work, in order to increase the coverage of essential work-risk and social protection and to sustain growth. To this end, policies should encourage mobility of labor and human capital and not favor some forms of employment (for instance, full-time wage employment in manufacturing) over others. East Asia Pacific is one of the most diverse regions in the world. The challenges to sustaining well-being from work are just as diverse. Countries that are still mainly agrarian should focus on raising agricultural productivity. Rapidly urbanizing countries should address the critical need for good urban planning. The Pacific island countries should provide young people with the human capital they need to succeed abroad as migrant workers.
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Since the early 1990s, the East Asia and Pacific (EAP) region has seen remarkable economic growth and a significant reduction in the number of people living on less than 1.25 United States dollar (USD) a day (more than 50 percent decrease since 1990).
... Voir la suite However the growth witnessed has not benefited men and women equally. Rural women in particular are still facing barriers in accessing productive assets, such as land, financial capital, and agricultural extension services. The projects highlighted in this note have used different ways to identify rural women's needs and introduced various ways to address them. This note discusses how World Bank projects have identified and addressed gender inequality in rural development in the EAP region. It presents planned actions and steps made toward women's empowerment; and highlights lessons learned that can inform future development interventions.
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Growth in developing countries is expected to pick up from 4.8 percent in 2013 to 5.0 percent in 2014, 5.4 percent in 2015, and 5.6 percent in 2016.
... Voir la suite Stronger global growth will help most developing East Asia Pacific (EAP) countries grow at a steady pace while they adjust to tighter global financial conditions. The structure of domestic demand is undergoing adjustment as countries are trying to unwind internal imbalances and respond to external vulnerabilities. External positions have steadily improved in EAP countries, making them better prepared to manage further normalization of monetary policy in advanced economies. Foreign direct investment flows into developing EAP countries have remained robust. These developments have helped the EAP countries offset the portfolio outflows associated with the scaling back of the quantitative easing program by the United States. The authorities in some of the large economies have employed macro-prudential measures to contain the risks arising from asset price boom including in the real estate market. China's priority is to further reduce total credit growth in the economy, which is still well above nominal gross domestic product (GDP) growth. There are modest fiscal consolidation efforts underway in several countries, with an emphasis on rationalizing fuel and rice subsides, although more needs to be done to rebuild policy buffers and create space for priority spending. The downside risks to the economic prospects of developing EAP are evenly balanced with opportunities for more rapid growth, including through deeper structural reforms. The report is organized in following three parts: part one presents recent developments and outlook; part two focuses on elected emerging issues; and part three presents country pages and key indicators.
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This note describes a number of innovations taken by some Chinese cities, in particular Jinzhou, Liaoning province, to ensure that urban transport systems are more accessible for the mobility-challenged.
... Voir la suite Public participation by disabled residents in Liaoning province in northeast China has increased awareness and consideration for special needs in the design and implementation of road infrastructure. Jinzhou has convened a series of meetings inviting public participation on the issue of improving traffic infrastructure for use by disabled people. With the introduction of some low or no-cost features, the principle of "people first" for urban transport has been put into practice.
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The World Bank, with support from the Australian Government, conducted in-depth sector studies in three countries of East Asia Pacific - Indonesia, the Philippines, and Vietnam and synthesized the analyses and findings in a single report.
... Voir la suite This report recommends ways these countries and others in the region can expand and improve urban sanitation services in an inclusive and sustainable way.
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This report consists of seven chapters and is divided into three parts. Part one focuses on the minimum wage policy, its historical evolution, and the current institutional context across ASEAN countries.
... Voir la suite Part two delves into the socio?economic impacts of the minimum wage policy on workers, households, firms, the economy, and the ASEAN region. Part III links the findings from each country to the ASEAN regional context and brings all the analysis together into a policy and operational discussion. Specifically, part one of the report includes this chapter (chapter one) and chapter two. The rest of chapter one summarizes the findings from all chapters in the report and presents an overview of lessons detailed in the final chapter. To provide some background and context for the remainder of the report, chapter two briefly describes the history of minimum wage policy around the world and the theoretical principles behind wage setting and its effects. Part two consists of four chapters. Chapter three, which describes how the minimum wage policy is structured and managed in each ASEAN country, includes details on the objectives that countries have set out for the policy and how the policy is enforced in each country. Chapter four summarizes results from primary and secondary empirical research on the impacts of minimum wage changes on employment, wages, and informal work in the four focus ASEAN countries. The discussion in this chapter takes into account the existence of complementary worker protection programs in each country. Chapter five discusses empirical results on whether changes in the minimum wage policy affect poverty and inequality. Since each country has distinct poverty programs, the discussion takes into account the presence of various social programs that potentially complement income earned from wage labor. Chapter six focuses on how wage and labor costs affect firms, especially in terms of investment decisions and productivity. Due to the limited availability of evidence on the impact of minimum wages on firm performance and private sector activity in ASEAN countries, a large part of the discussion in this chapter includes evidence from non-ASEAN countries. Lastly, this chapter reviews the status of the main labor market institutions legislated in the region and provides some evidence on how other labor institutions might interact with the minimum wage policy to shape its effect. Part three comprises chapter seven, which reflects on the material presented in previous chapters and provides policy?oriented insights. It discusses the political economy of the minimum wage policy and draws out the implications of having such diverse wage policies and institutional arrangements for wage management in an increasingly interlinked regional bloc such as ASEAN. The chapter also synthesizes the lessons learned throughout the report and frames the main labor policy issues to provide guidance for, and elicit action from, policymakers going forward.
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In the Pacific island countries, which are small and far from world markets, labor mobility represents the most significant and substantial opportunity for overcoming geographic constraints on employment.
... Voir la suite This report presents a brief overview of employment challenges in small Pacific island countries and recommendations for addressing them. The report contributes to an ongoing World Bank analytical program examining the linkages between employment and well-being around the world, begun with the World Development Report 2013: jobs. Discussion in this report relates to Pacific island states, with populations of significantly less than one million, including Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, Samoa, Tonga, Tuvalu, Kiribati, Republic of Marshall Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, and Palau. Economic growth and diversification has been very limited in these countries because of the barriers imposed by smallness and distance, and these barriers will not be quickly overcome. This report provides five priorities that are likely to be broadly applicable to the unique group of countries. First, stakeholders' expectations about the trajectory of development will need to be realistic. Second, the volume of international labor mobility should be increased through the erosion of regulatory barriers and investment in transferable human capital. Third, governments can work to harness the positive potential of urbanization through investment in improved rural services, connective infrastructure, and improved urban administration. Fourth, productive public spending can be used as a mechanism for creating new employment opportunities. Finally, policies can ensure that natural resource industries provide a sustainable source of employment creation.
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Talent, skills, and the ability to work are people's most important assets. The majority of people realize the value of these assets in the labor market, whether they sell their time to others or pursue their own enterprise.
... Voir la suite Work is often the channel through which the benefits of economic growth spread and living standards improve. This has been especially evident since 1990, as the share of the world's population living in poverty has declined by half. The prospects of working people in East Asia Pacific are better than those of many living elsewhere. The flow of goods and services within the region, integration with the global economy, price stability, rule of law, and relatively unfettered markets all foster opportunities for advancement through work that people in other regions regard with envy. In East Asia Pacific, work has brought more people out of poverty and closer to middleclass prosperity faster during the past three decades than in any other place and at any other time. The first (chapters 1, 2, and 3) describes the context: what is unique about East Asia Pacific, how diverse are the profiles of households and firms within the region, and how is the contribution of work to well-being changing. The second part (chapters 4, 5, and 6) reviews policy and takes stock of the prevailing models in East Asia Pacific and how they affect the prospects of and outcomes for working people. The third part (chapters 7, 8, and 9) looks at the policies that governments in East Asia Pacific economies may wish to consider sustaining the transformative impact of work, even as growth in the region begins to moderate.
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The contribution of work to growth and household well-being is a growing concern in East Asia Pacific. The labor share of gross domestic product (GDP) in several countries in the region has been declining.
... Voir la suite Specific problems include high youth inactivity and unemployment, rising inequality, and binding skills shortages. A key underlying issue is widespread economic informality, which increases household vulnerability to shocks, limits the tax base, and constrains innovation and the productivity of firms and the economy as a whole. Informality is both a consequence of relatively stringent labor regulations and a reason for their widespread evasion. Key components of the appropriate policy response include macroeconomic stability and a regulatory framework that encourages, in particular, the growth of small and medium enterprises where most people in East Asia Pacific work. It is also critical to 'formalize' more work, in order to increase the coverage of essential work-risk and social protection and to sustain growth. To this end, policies should encourage mobility of labor and human capital and not favor some forms of employment (for instance, full-time wage employment in manufacturing) over others. East Asia Pacific is one of the most diverse regions in the world. The challenges to sustaining well-being from work are just as diverse. Countries that are still mainly agrarian should focus on raising agricultural productivity. Rapidly urbanizing countries should address the critical need for good urban planning. The Pacific island countries should provide young people with the human capital they need to succeed abroad as migrant workers.
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This Philippines country study forms part of the East Asia and the Pacific region urban sanitation review that focuses on three of the emerging middle income countries of East Asia: Indonesia, Philippines, and Vietnam.
... Voir la suite The regional review aims to develop a strategic framework to help guide national urban sanitation programs and their implementation in these emerging middle income countries. This country study contributed to the regional review by providing important information on sector operations in the Philippines. The development of urban sanitation in the Philippines needs to be considered in the context of the different situations in Metro Manila and the other parts of the country. The case studies for some urban areas were prepared to see how sanitation operations are carried out in the Philippines and a consultative workshop was held on February 19, 2013 in Manila. The findings of the Philippines country study are briefly presented which complements the findings of the regional report.
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Document de travail 84290 DEC 01, 2013
Kearton, Ross; Ner, Salvador; Ancheta, Christopher; Alvarez, Victor Vazquez; Ignacio, Demilour Reyes; Weitz, Almud; Galing, Ed Karl; de la Torre, Shiela; Trillana, Mari Anne
The workshop on City-scale Climate Action Planning in East and Southeast Asia was held in Singapore from April 10-12, 2013. The main objective of the workshop was to share the experiences and lessons learned from best practices on how to implement climate action plans in C40 cities, both from developed (henceforth called "resource cities") and from developing cities (henceforth called "focus cities"), and to apply the knowledge towards supporting East Asian C40 cities in their quests for low-carbon development.
... Voir la suite The workshop was designed with a focus on six key topics: (a) integrated land use and transport planning; (b) sustainable transport; (c) green buildings; (d) city-scale carbon cap-and-trade; (e) institutional arrangement for multi-sector interventions; and (f) measurement, reporting, and verification (MRV) of community greenhouse gas emissions. The workshop represented only one step of what could potentially be a longer-term effort on capacity building and policy development amongst the participating cities. Amongst the subjects discussed were: integrated land use and transport planning, sustainable transport, green buildings, and emissions trading systems, Building on the momentum of the workshop, the World Bank is exploring tailored technical assistance and targeted capacity building for East Asia C40 cities who have expressed interest in receiving such assistance.
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