Office of the Chief Economist, Africa Region

The 31st edition of Africa’s Pulse will provide an overview of economic trends in the region and focus on improvements in governance to better serve people at a time of mounting distrust. Share your questions in advance in the chat and join us on May 7 for a quick-paced conversation on this burning topic.

This event highlights how improving grid reliability in Senegal cut outages by 40%, boosted electricity use by 8%, and increased willingness to pay by 10%. Households gained more time for wage labor, and disconnection rates fell. With a return exceeding 30%, findings show reliability upgrades can significantly enhance the value of electricity in low-income settings.

The World Bank, in collaboration with George Washington University (GWU) and the University of Virginia (UVA), hosted the 2nd World Bank-GWU-UVA Conference on “The Economics of Sustainable Development.”

This event brought together academics and development economics practitioners to present and discuss pressing questions relating to sustainable development, a theme central to the World Bank’s mission of tackling poverty on a livable planet.