Toxic pollution affects the health of millions of people in developing countries. In 2009, the Asian Development Bank, through assistance from its partner Blacksmith Institute, joined the Global Inventory Project to build a database that catalogues, assesses, prioritizes, and estimates costs for remediation of critical toxic sites. The database now provides policymakers better information and possible cleanup solutions.

Viet Nam’s agriculture, science, and technology sector faces many challenges, but a recent project by the Asian Developmebnt Bank adopting a bottom-up approach made a dent. By linking training, research, and extension services, the country was able to foster natural resource management that the poor can participate in, with practical and sustainable results.

A new railway connecting Uzbekistan to Afghanistan, a project supported by the Asian Development Bank, has increased the reliability and efficiency of Afghanistan's trade routes, lowered cost of goods, and linked the country to new business opportunities in Asia and Europe. Effective project management ensured that railway construction took less than a year, and operations started soon after.

The communal land system in Bangladesh’s Chittagong Hill Tract makes land acquisition complex. Asian Development Bank (ADB) has supported a project that improved infrastructure and incomes and resolved the challenge through continuous consultation, resulting in the first successful application of consensus-based compensation under ADB’s Safeguard Policy Statement.

Access to energy can contribute significantly to the Asian Development Bank (ADB)’s overarching goal of reducing poverty. In 2008, the Energy for All initiative was created with the aim of adding value to ADB’s energy access projects by assisting project developers and the Bank’s operations staff conduct pre-investment activities.

This video showcases a project in Sri Lanka that uplifted the life status of villages through the development of rural roads. It shares the special features of the project that led to a successful implementation.

This video explains why the Charanka Solar Power Park in India’s Gujarat State is one of the successful public-private partnership models that has helped bridge grid parity. It also highlights how the project not only addressed the country’s energy security situation, but also connected poverty-stricken and energy poor local communities.

A pilot project has taught Timor-Leste and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) that climate change risks should logically be considered during rehabilitation when climatic changes impact roads to the point that their closure or threatened disappearance becomes commonplace.

The Asian Development Bank (ADB)’s Accountability Mechanism provides an independent forum through which people claiming to be affected by ADB projects can raise issues with the bank and request the review of a project’s compliance with ADB’s policies and procedures.

Indonesia is struggling with increased energy consumption primarily from its industry sector, along with a power supply mix that remains highly dependent on fossil fuels. In 2011, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) partnered with Indonesia Eximbank to pioneer energy efficiency financing, serving as the gateway for mainstreaming energy efficiency programs in the country.

Read about ADB's other energy projects in Knowledge and Power: Lessons from ADB Energy Projects.