Lance Nobel's great Davos Newbies web log has an article "Good news from the World Bank" about the latest World Development Report from the World Bank.

Lance's says it's great to finally see some good news and I agree. Of course as he says the reports says that we can't sit on our hands for this positive out come to happen.

I've been having a quick read through the accompanying press release, but haven't yet read the full report. Generally I agree with most of the conclusions, but my libertarian side has some issues with a few things.

For example rather than concentrate on goverment action, we must realise that most of the problems in the developing world has been because of government action. Most of the development that is happening is happening despite the goverments not because the goverments. Hernando de Soto of Peru's Institute for Liberty & Democracy discusses it thoroughly in his book The Mystery of Capital.

I agree that an important part of solving the problems facing agriculture in the developing world, the developed world (Read US and Europe) MUST stop their foolish agricultural subsidies. I disagree with the report in that it says that more aid is necessary. People in the developing world are born survivors and will work things out themselves without any further layers of corruption introduced.

When it comes to the environmental problems, I believe it's quite simply an issue of survival. When people reach the stage where they're not wondering where the next meal is coming from, they will generally start protecting their environment them selves. I hear many better knowing arguments about conservation etc from Northern lefties all the time, but that really just proves how much they like to take the paternalistic Plato like approach to the poor "subhumans" south of Europe.

Besides that argument, governmental and trans national environmental policies usually just end up as magnets for corruption in both developing countries and in (particular) developed countries. Please lets not encourage more.

I think we can easily reach the goals of the report, if we learn from the past and focus on whats important.