The World Bank’s Subnational Business Ready (Subnational B-READY) project, the successor to the Subnational Doing Business reports, offers a comprehensive framework for evaluating local business environments...
Access to finance and equal economic opportunities are crucial for female entrepreneurs, fostering business growth and economic participation. Drawing on interviews with key stakeholders involved in the...
The brief is the first in a two-part series that provides an overview of the electricity sector's demand and supply side environmental regulations. This brief focuses on supply-side regulations and investigates...
Women are a powerful engine for international trade and economic growth. As workers, small-scale traders, entrepreneurs, and producers, their engagement in export activities has the potential not only...
The eagerness with which governments across the world rushed to digitize their court systems during the COVID-19 pandemic might create an impression that new technologies alone can solve the multitude...
This Brief presents data collected by the World Bank’s Women, Business and the Law (WBL) project on legal and supportive frameworks to curb domestic violence and sexual harassment in 55 countries, including...
This Brief examines the challenges in implementing laws protecting women’s land rights in Sub-Saharan Africa. While some progress has been made in enacting legal protections, remaining discriminatory legislation...
Robust regulatory frameworks are important for developing healthy capital markets. Most current research ends that sustainable finance regulation serves as a backbone for the development of sustainable...
This brief presents new data collected by the World Bank’s Women, Business and the Law project on childcare legislation in 95 economies around the world. It focuses on government measures aimed at making...
This two-part policy brief series traces the development and reform of law in India related to three critical areas that affect women’s rights and economic opportunities: women’s property rights, domestic...
This two-part policy brief series traces the development and reform of law in India related to three critical areas that affect women’s rights and economic opportunities: women’s property rights, domestic...
Cyber violence against women has been rising at alarming rates in recent decades. Such acts not only harm women as individuals but have severe detrimental effects on society and the economy at large. This...
This brief provides insight into how Ethiopia increased the duration of paid maternity leave from 90 to 120 days and introduced three days of paid paternity leave in 2019. While ensuring job-protected...
Starting a business is a way for women to generate income and become more resilient when dealing with shocks. However, large gender gaps in formal entrepreneurship impede women’s livelihoods and global...
This brief discusses critical considerations for engaging the private sector in the process of reforming and implementing business regulations, along with channels and mechanisms that have been successfully...
Women with disabilities face additional barriers to their socioeconomic participation compared to men, with and without disabilities as well as to women without disabilities, resulting in significant employment...
This brief examines the introduction of landmark reforms in São Tomé and Príncipe to counter domestic and family violence and to protect women, both at home and at work. The enactment of laws on domestic...
This brief examines two reforms, enacted between 2012 and 2014, that lifted previous restrictions to women’s rights in Togo. Specifically, these limitations prevented women from choosing where to live...
Women with disabilities face additional barriers to their participation in the economy and society compared to men, with and without disabilities, and relative to nondisabled women, resulting in unequal...
This brief, the first in a two-part series, provides an overview of the evidence on key features of women’s travel behavior and the barriers they face in accessing public transport in developing countries...