International Bank for Reconstruction and Development or World Bank, specialized United

Nations agency established at the Bretton Woods Conference in 1944. A related institution, the International
Monetary Fund (IMF), was created at the same time. The chief objectives of the bank, as stated in the
articles of agreement, are “to assist in the reconstruction and development of territories of members by
facilitating the investment of capital for productive purposes [and] to promote private foreign investment by
means of guarantees or participation in loans [and] to supplement private investment by providing, on
suitable conditions, finance for productive purposes out of its own capital…”

The bank grants loans only to member nations, for the purpose of financing specific projects. Before a nation
can secure a loan, advisers and experts representing the bank must determine that the prospective borrower
can meet conditions stipulated by the bank. Most of these conditions are designed to ensure that loans will be
used productively and that they will be repaid. The bank requires that the borrower be unable to secure a
loan for the particular project from any other source on reasonable terms and that the prospective project be
technically feasible and economically sound. To ensure repayment, member governments must guarantee
loans made to private concerns within their territories. After the loan has been made, the bank requires
periodic reports both from the borrower and from its own observers on the use of the loan and on the
progress of the project.

In the early period of the World Bank's existence, loans were granted chiefly to European countries and were
used for the reconstruction of industries damaged or destroyed during World War II. Since the late 1960s,
however, most loans have been granted to economically developing countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin
America. In the 1980s the bank gave particular attention to projects that could directly benefit the poorest
people in developing nations by helping them to raise their productivity and to gain access to such
necessities as safe water and waste-disposal facilities, health care, family-planning assistance, nutrition,
education, and housing. Direct involvement of the poorest people in economic activity was being promoted
by providing loans for agriculture and rural development, small-scale enterprises, and urban development.
The bank also was expanding its assistance to energy development and ecological concerns.

SOURCES OF FUNDS :
Subscriptions to, or purchase of, capital shares are worth SDR 100,000 (about $120,000) each. The
minimum number of shares that a member nation must purchase varies according to the relative strength of
its national economy. Not all the funds subscribed are immediately available to the bank; only about 8.5
percent of the capital subscription of each member nation actually is paid into the bank (a total of $7.3
billion in mid-1987). The remainder is to be deposited only if, and to the extent that, the bank calls for the
money in order to pay its own obligations to creditors. There has never been a need to call in capital. The
bank's working funds are derived from sales of its interest-bearing bonds and notes in capital markets of the
world, from repayment of earlier loans, and from profits on its own operations. It has earned profits every
year since 1947.

All powers of the bank are vested in a board of governors, comprising one governor appointed by each
member nation. The board meets at least once annually. The governors delegate most of their powers to 21
executive directors, who meet regularly at the central headquarters of the bank in Washington, D.C. Five of
the executive directors are appointed by the five member states that hold the largest number of capital shares
in the bank. The remaining 16 directors are elected by the governors from the other member nations and
serve 2-year terms. The executive directors are headed by the president of the World Bank, whom they elect
for a 5-year term, and who must be neither a governor nor a director. The bank currently has 152 members.

AFFILIATES:
The bank has two affiliates:
1. The International Finance Corporation (IFC), established in 1956; and
2. The International Development Association (IDA), established in 1960. Membership in the bank is a
prerequisite for membership in either the IFC or the IDA. All three institutions share the same president and
boards of governors and executive directors.
IDA is the bank's concessionary lending affiliate, designed to provide development finance for those
countries that do not qualify for loans at market-based interest rates. IDA soft loans, or “credits,” are longer
term than those of the bank and bear no interest; only an annual service charge of 0.75 percent is made. The
IDA depends for its funds on subscriptions from its most prosperous members and on transfers of income
from the bank. The IDA had 137 members in the late 1980s.
All three institutions are legally and financially separate, but the bank and IDA share the same staff; IFC,
with 133 members, has its own operating and legal staff, but uses administrative and other services of the
bank. Membership in the International Monetary Fund is a prerequisite for membership in the World Bank
and its affiliates.