World Bank – History, Facts, Functions, and Objectives of the World Bank
World Bank history facts functions objectives – The World Bank is an international financial institution. It provides loans and grants to the government of poor countries for the purpose of pursuing capital projects and is a component of the World Bank Group.
The World Bank comprises of two institutions, namely:
– The International Bank for Reconstruction and Development
– The International Development Association
World Bank history facts functions objectives
History of World Bank
The World Bank, along with the International Monetary Fund was created at the 1944 Bretton Woods Conference. The intention behind founding the institution was to provide temporary loans to low-income countries that were unable to obtain loans commercially.
In its early years between 1944 to 1974, the World Bank made a slow start due to leadership struggles and underfunding. However, starting from France, the world bank lent out its first amount of US$250 million. Then came the era when the World Bank started concentrating on the basic needs of people in the developing world. The size and the number of loans began to increase between 1974 to 1980. This was when the World Bank’s loan targets expanded from infrastructure to social services and other sectors. This was also when the World Bank’s debt rose to an average annual rate of nearly 20%.
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It was in 1980 that the World Bank Administrative Tribunal was established to decide on disputes between the World Bank Group and its staff. From here on the bank emphasized lending to service the Third-World debt and structural adjustment policies which were all designed to streamline economies of developing nations. Being criticized by the UNICEF in 1989, the World Bank began including environmental groups and NGOs to mitigate the past effects of its development policies.
World Bank history facts functions objectives
Over time, the World Bank participated in the following causes:
– Eradicating extreme poverty and hunger
– Achieving universal primary education
– Promoting gender equality
– Reducing child mortality
– Improving maternal health
– Combating HIV/AIDS, Malaria, and other diseases
– Ensuring environmental sustainability
– Developing a global partnership for development
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World Bank history facts functions objectives
Facts about World Bank
- The current president of the World Bank is David Malpass from the US.
- Membership of the world bank has been given to 189 countries under IBRD and 173 countries under IDA.
- The World Bank’s headquarters is situated in Washington DC while it has a staff of over 10000 worldwide.
Functions and Objectives of World Bank (world bank functions, world bank objectives)
- It helps underdeveloped and war-devasted countries by granting them loans for development and reconstruction.
- It provides extensive experience and financial resources to help poor countries in increasing economic growth, reducing poverty, and therefore improve the standard of living.
- The World Bank provides loans to governments for irrigation, agriculture, water supply, health, education, and more.
- It promotes foreign investment by guaranteeing loans.
- It provides economic, monetary, and technical advice to member countries for their projects.
- The World Bank encourages development of industries in underdeveloped countries by introducing various economic reforms.
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Some more World Bank history facts functions objectives
- Providing long term capital to its member nations for economic development and reconstruction.
- Inducing long term capital for improving the balance of payments and balancing international trade.
- Providing guarantees against loans granted to large and small units and other projects for the member nations.
- Ensuring that the development projects are implemented.
- Promoting capital investment for member nations by providing a guarantee for capital investment and loans.
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