The Gov¿t. of Afghanistan is committed to reducing poverty and increasing economic growth in the private sector. Two primary constraints impede the Government¿s efforts: (1) limited or ambiguous rights to land; and (2) state ownership of under-utilized or unutilized enterprises. USAID/Afghanistan designed the Land Titling and Economic Restructuring in Afghanistan Project. The project has two components. The first focuses on land titling and registration to help the Gov¿t. of Afghanistan improve land tenure security in urban areas. The second focuses on privatizing state-owned enterprises. This audit determines whether the project had achieved planned results and to assess what impact the project has made. A print on demand report.

Although today's richest countries tend to have long histories of secure private property rights, legal-titling projects do little to improve the economic and political well-being of those in the developing world. This book employs a historical narrative based on secondary literature, fieldwork across thirty villages, and a nationally representative survey to explore how private property institutions develop, how they are maintained, and their relationship to the state and state-building within the context of Afghanistan. In this predominantly rural society, citizens cannot rely on the state to enforce their claims to ownership. Instead, they rely on community-based land registration, which has a long and stable history and is often more effective at protecting private property rights than state registration. In addition to contributing significantly to the literature on Afghanistan, this book makes a valuable contribution to the literature on property rights and state governance from the new institutional economics perspective.

"The 2012 report recognized that expanding women's agency - their ability to make decisions and take advantage of opportunities is key to improving their lives as well as the world. This report represents a major advance in global knowledge on this critical front. The vast data and thousands of surveys distilled in this report cast important light on the nature of constraints women and girls continue to face globally. This report identifies promising opportunities and entry points for lasting transformation, such as interventions that reach across sectors and include life-skills training, sexual and reproductive health education, conditional cash transfers, and mentoring. It finds that addressing what the World Health Organization has identified as an epidemic of violence against women means sharply scaling up engagement with men and boys. The report also underlines the vital role information and communication technologies can play in amplifying women's voices, expanding their economic and learning opportunities, and broadening their views and aspirations. The World Bank Group's twin goals of ending extreme poverty and boosting shared prosperity demand no less than the full and equal participation of women and men, girls and boys, around the world." -- Publisher's description.

In the context of a review of U.S. strategy in Afghanistan during September-November 2009, the performance and legitimacy of the Afghan government figured prominently. In his December 1, 2009, speech announcing a way forward in Afghanistan, President Obama stated that the Afghan government would be judged on performance, and "The days of providing a blank check are over." The policy statement was based, in part, on an assessment of the security situation furnished by the top commander in Afghanistan, General Stanley McChrystal, which warned of potential mission failure unless a fully resourced classic counterinsurgency strategy is employed. That counterinsurgency effort is deemed to require a legitimate Afghan partner. The Afghan government's limited writ and widespread official corruption are believed by U.S. officials to be helping sustain a Taliban insurgency and complicating international efforts to stabilize Afghanistan. At the same time, President Hamid Karzai has, through compromise with faction leaders, been able to confine ethnic disputes to political competition, enabling his government to focus on trying to win over those members of the ethnic Pashtun community that support Taliban and other insurgents.

The Transport Sector Master Plan Update is a guide for government and donors in allocating and programming future funds to raise efficiency of Afghanistan’s transport system. It takes stock of achievements of the previous Road Master Plan and important sector developments that have emerged during intervening period. The Master Plan Update will cover roads, railways, civil aviation, urban transport, and trade logistics, and administrative responsibilities concerned with transport infrastructure and operations. It provides a program of prioritized investments, and recommends urgent capacity-building measures. As transportation in Afghanistan is central to social stability and peacebuilding efforts, the development results generated by the master plan will go beyond the boundaries of the transport sector.

The importance of good land governance to strengthen women s land rights, facilitate land-related investment, transfer land to better uses, use it as collateral, and allow effective decentralization through collection of property taxes has long been recognized. The challenges posed by recent global developments, especially urbanization, increased and more volatile food prices, and climate change have raised the profile of land and the need for countries to have appropriate land policies. However, efforts to improve country-level land governance are often frustrated by technical complexities, institutional fragmentation, vested interests, and lack of a shared vision on how to move towards good land governance and measure progress in concrete settings. Recent initiatives have recognized the important challenges this raises and the need for partners to act in a collaborative and coordinated fashion to address them. The breadth and depth of the papers included in this volume, all of which were presented at the World Bank s Annual Conference on Land Policy and Administration, illustrate the benefits from such collaboration. They are indicative not only of the diversity of issues related to land governance but, more importantly, highlight that, even though the topic is complex and politically challenging, there is a wealth of promising new approaches to improving land governance through innovative technologies, country-wide policy dialogue, and legal and administrative reforms. The publication is based on an on-going partnership between the World Bank, the International Federation of Surveyors, the Global Land Tool Network and the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization provide tools that can help to address land governance in practice and at scale. It is our hope that this volume will be of use to increase awareness of and support to the successful implementation of innovative approaches that can help to not only improve land governance, but also thereby contribute to the well-being of the poorest and the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals.