The World Meteorological Organization’s State of the Climate in Asia 2024 report warns that the region is warming nearly twice as fast as the global average, driving more extreme weather and posing serious threats to lives, ecosystems, and economies. In 2024, Asia experienced its warmest or second warmest year on …
This paper aims to raise awareness and capacity among member organizations of the Network of Asian River Basin Organizations (NARBO) and their interested groups on the issues surrounding water rights and allocation. This paper examines in more detail the definitions, principles, and characteristics of water rights and water allocation; two …
This report presents a summary of what has been learnt through the third round of consultations, interviews and questionnaire surveys with policymakers and climate policy researchers across the Asia-Pacific region. It considers how sectoral approaches can be integrated in the future climate regime by looking at institutional and operational issues …
This paper provides an overview of selected trends and conditions of ecosystem services, in particular, food production and impacts on the environment based on the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment. It then describes outcomes for future ecosystem services under alternative development pathways, with a focus on tradeoffs between food security and the …
This article outlines some key elements of a human-rights based approach to the compulsory acquisition of land. It shows that the compulsory acquisition of land often proceeds rapidly where the political, economic and legal power of those affected directly is weakest. While expropriation should be a powerful and beneficial tool …
In October 2007, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the Director General of the WHO joined together to declare that the eradication of malaria was the only acceptable longterm goal for a disease that takes so many lives. Since the collapse of the global eradication campaign in 1969, there …
This report analyzes the corporate governance and strategic approaches of 40 of the world’s largest banks to the challenges and opportunities posed by climate change. This report is designed as a benchmarking tool that highlights climate change best practices within the financial sector. It employs a “Climate Change Governance Checklist” …
The challenge of saving wild tigers has become a global one and calls for a global solution and commitment. The successful conservation of wild tigers and the natural capital that sustains them are among the key indicators of sustainable development and require greater global resources and attention.
The decentralization of control over the vast forests of the world is moving at a rapid pace with both positive and negative ramifications for people and forests themselves. Fresh research from a host of Asia-Pacific countries presents rich and varied experience with decentralization and provides important lessons for other regions. …
This report provides an overview of information on the world fertilizer situation in 2007/08 and a forecast till 2011/12. The fertilizer situation is examined in relation to crop production and factors likely to affect the latter. High commodity prices experienced over recent years led to increased production and correspondingly greater …
This global screening study makes a first estimate of the exposure of the world's large port cities to coastal flooding due to storm surge and damage due to high winds. This study also investigates how climate change is likely to impact each port city's exposure to coastal flooding by the …
This paper, together with five other background studies, is a part of a broader research programme addressing trade and structural adjustment issues in non-member economies which was conducted as a follow-up to Trade and Structural Adjustment: Embracing Globalisation (OECD, 2005)which identified policies for successful trade-related structural adjustment. This paper revisits …
The Encyclopedia of Global Warming and Climate Change includes more than 750 articles that explore major topics related to global warming and climate change-ranging geographically from the North Pole to the South Pole, and thematically from social effects to scientific causes. It contains a 4-color, 16-page insert that is a …
The Encyclopedia of Global Warming and Climate Change includes more than 750 articles that explore major topics related to global warming and climate change-ranging geographically from the North Pole to the South Pole, and thematically from social effects to scientific causes. It contains a 4-color, 16-page insert that is a …
The historic development pathway of Europe and the US is clearly not sustainable in developing Asia, with its larger population, constrained by resource limitations, and now facing the global challenges of climate change. So far, however, Asia has not framed an alternative future that simultaneously provides for an escape from …
The World Trade Indicators (WTI) database and ranking tool cover country level indicators of trade performance and policies and institutions that affect trade. This publication summarizes patterns in world trade policy and trade outcomes revealed by the WTI database, focusing mainly on regional and income level variations and providing the …
This handbook is based on the results an EU Asia Pro Eco co-funded project "CURB-AIR: CDM and urban air pollution: partnerships enhancing synergies in urban air and health in Kyoto mechanisms'. The CURB-AIR project intends to pave the way for projects that both improve air quality and reduce greenhouse gases …
This Report comes on the heels of the landmark Second Session of the Conference of State Parties to the United Nations Convention against Corruption in Bali, Indonesia, which is aiding countries in the implementation of their anti-corruption efforts. The United Nations Convention Against Corruption (UNCAC) is the first legally binding, …
This report compiles in one volume a snapshot of ADB's strategies, assistance, and lending activities to address the environment-development nexus in Asia and the Pacific. It describes development trends in the region, characterized by rapid economic growth in certain countries and a slower pace in other countries, the continued widespread …
This report examines the region's key short and medium-term prospects and challenges in macroeconomic and selected social areas, especially from the point of view of minimizing human suffering; be it from economic hardships or social instability. The Survey also explores critical long-term development issues relevant to all developing countries in …