INTERNATIONAL BANK FOR RECONSTRUCTION AND DEVELOPMENT

Abstract

This chapter discusses origin and functions of International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD). IBRD was established, together with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), at the Bretton Woods Conference in July 1944. The IBRD, together with the International Development Association (IDA) and the International Finance Corporation (IFC), is a part of the so-called World Bank Group. Affiliated with the World Bank Group is the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes. The IBRD lends only for specific projects to member governments or to any business, industrial, and agricultural enterprise with a government guarantee at appropriate rates of interest, while the IFC provides venture capital without government guarantees for productive private enterprises, and the IDA is a source of concessionary financing for specific projects to member governments and also to private enterprises with suitable government guarantees. In the IBRD's earlier years, its major calling was to assist member countries in the reconstruction of their economies after World War II.