Morning Briefing

The World Bank on Wednesday announced it "has committed a record $100 billion in financial support over the past 18 months to help developing countries recover from the global economic crisis," Reuters reports. "The bulk of the lending since the onset of the crisis in 2008, about $60.3 billion, was to middle-income countries, which struggled to borrow on global financial markets. Typical lending for these countries had averaged about $15 billion a year before the crisis," the news service writes. "Meanwhile, loans and grants through the Bank's fund for the world's poorest countries reached $21.2 billion during the crisis