ABSTRACT
In channelling resources from the industrialized capitalist countries to Third World countries, the World Bank has an importance very similar to that of the International Monetary Fund (IMF). In 1979, it introduced a new form of lending, the Structural Adjustment Loan which has much more in common with IMF facilities than with conventional forms of Bank assistance. The conditionality of structural adjustment loans is premised on this diagnosis of the underlying causes of economic crisis in the underdeveloped world. The main thrust of trade policy adjustment has been to promote both agricultural and industrial exports through diversification and improved competitiveness, and to discourage uneconomic import substitution industries. The formulation of structural adjustment programs usually begins with the outlining of a framework of medium term objectives and, in broad terms of the measures to be taken to meet these objectives.
