The role of the World Bank in sustainable development

The World Bank or, in other words, World Bank Group is an international finance institution whose primary goal is to decrease poverty and promote sustainable development in third world countries. Other goals include granting loans to governments for financing development projects, reform of economic policy and technical support. World Bank involvement in terms of environment protection is expressed by linking main tasks pertaining to financing of economic development and reduction of poverty, taking into account environmental issues. The purpose of this article is to present the World Bank as a financial institution which actively supports and promotes various types of activities on behalf of sustainable development and environment protection. This article presents issues which pertain to the establishment and the idea of World Bank activity as well as characterizes functions of individual institutions which belong to the World Bank Group. Subsequently, this article also discusses the principles of financing of investments by the World Bank as well as presents financial instruments that are utilized in this process. In addition, this article depicts the conditions which must be fulfilled by the loaners. The author also presents a detailed characteristics of World Bank activity in terms of environment protection worldwide as well as in Poland. The author also performed in-depth analysis of granted credits in the years 2005-2010, based on the types of activities and destined targets