From Awareness to Action: An Evaluation of the Bank's Policy on Information Age Technologies and Development (OP-711)

Date
Nov 2003
The purpose of this report (RE-289) is to present to the Executive Directors an evaluation of the Bank's Operational Policy on Information Age Technologies (OP-711) that was approved in December 1998. The report establishes, first, that information age technologies are vital as enablers of progress in each of the pillars of the Bank's 1999 Institutional Strategy and, second, that the technologies present important policy challenges that appear to call for public action, including, in principle, a considerate and dynamic response by the Bank, assuming that problems of information failure can be solved. The report covers the period 1999-2002 and answers four key questions pertaining to relevance, institutional arrangements, operational response, and results.