The rapid spread of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic globally is partly a symptom of a highly integrated and interconnected world in an era of globalisation. Sri Lanka too is highly connected to various channels of international mobility such as movements across borders of tourists and migrant workers. As such, it is rational to argue that the contagion of the Sri Lankan population to COVID-19 ...

On 25 October 2020, Malaysian King Sultan Abdullah Sultan Ahmad Shah declined to declare a National Emergency, despite Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin’s urging that such an emergency was necessary in the face of an intensifying “Third Wave” of COVID-19 transmission. In a media statement relaying the decision, His Majesty reminded Malaysia’s politicians to “stop all politicking that might disrupt the ...

This handbook is a ready reference guide for those actively involved with management of natural disasters before, during, and after disaster situations in developing member countries. It draws upon disaster management practices in Asia and the Pacific and endeavors to relate realistically to the needs of national disaster managers.

This publication summarizes the proceedings of the 44th Annual Meeting of the ADB Board of Governors,held in Ha Noi, Viet Nam from 5 to 6 May 2011.

Indonesia has made impressive improvements in education over the last decade and is on track to meeting Millennium Development Goals 2 and 3 (universal primary education and gender parity). The country has a national net primary (years 1 to 6) enrolment rate of 94.7 percent with equal enrolment for girls and boys.1 GOI recognises that it has not yet achieved its national ‘Education for All’ ...

Conflict of interest (COI) is recognized as a key factor contributing to corruption in its myriad forms. However, policies and regulatory frameworks to detect and manage COIs are weak in many countries. Conscious of the urgent need to strengthen these frameworks, the Indonesian Corruption Eradication Commission and the ADB/OECD Anti-Corruption Initiative for Asia and the Pacific called for a technical ...

This publication displays the menu for choice of available methods to evaluate the impact of Free Trade Agreements (FTAs). It caters mainly to policy makers from developing countries and aims to equip them with some economic knowledge and techniques that will enable them to conduct their own economic evaluation studies on existing or future FTAs, or to critically re-examine the results of impact ...

Growing attention has been directed in recent years to the role of government. Governance in general and corruption in particular have been much discussed because of the way they affect, and are affected by, the role of government. Dictionaries generally define “governance” as government. Thus, good governance is good government. In recent writing, however, governance has taken on a more substantive, ...

The climate change challenge. The countries of Asia and the Pacific are highly vulnerable to the adverse impacts of climate change, with more people at risk than any other region of the world. This places the need to address climate change firmly on the region's economic development agenda. Continued poverty reduction in Asia and the Pacific will not be possible without proactive efforts to mitigate ...

The Cook Islands’ real gross domestic product (GDP) grew by 4.5 percent per annum during 1982-1994, while the real GDP per capita growth rate was 3.6 percent. During 1995- 1998, as the population declined from 19,500 to 17,400 with the migration of Cook Islanders to New Zealand, real GDP declined at an average annual rate of 2.8 percent, and real GDP per capita stagnated. The recession largely ...