World Bank

The World Bank in the conventional sense is not a bank, but works as a platform for providing financial and technical assistance to developing countries on various themes such as education, health, public administration, infrastructure, financial and private sector development, agriculture, and environmental and natural resource management. The World Bank is made up of two multilateral bodies, namely, International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) and International Development Agency (IDA), which comprise of 185 member countries.

The World Bank’s primary goal is to reduce world poverty. In order to achieve this goal, it works towards achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) which provide a yardstick to measure progress and results achieved. The World Bank is focuses on middle income and poorest countries and provides low-interest loans and grants to government and civil society to implement programs to achieve the objectives of the Bank.

The World Bank traditionally believes in supporting government actors involved in the sustainable development of the country. However, it also realizes the need for involving NGOs in the development processes for achieving coordinated and swift results. The World does provide direct funding to NGOs. The funding is allocated with the support of other multilateral agencies such as the UN or bilateral partners such as the DFID. At times, it also works closely with governments of different countries to ensure that NGOs are involved at elementary state for implementing development programs. More direct funds for NGOs are managed through the country offices of the World Bank.

The contact information of World Bank’s head office is:

The World Bank
1818 H Street, NW
Washington, DC 20433 USA
URL: http://www.worldbank.org