World Bank Financing and Sustainable Development in Uzbekistan: A Time-Series Analysis

The study investigates the impact of World Bank investments on sustainable development of Uzbekistan in 1993-2025. In the paper, a compound SD Index is constructed, encompassing economic, social, and environmental dimensions. Using World Bank data, the analysis employs Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) with Newey–West standard errors and an autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) framework to capture both static and dynamic relationships. The results indicate that World Bank financing has a statistically significant U-shaped effect on sustainable development, leading to improved outcomes beyond $6 mln threshold. However, the magnitude of this effect is relatively small, suggesting incremental rather than transformative impacts. Moreover, no evidence of a long-run equilibrium relationship between World Bank investments and sustainable development is found, implying that the effects of external financing are not sustained over time. The findings also reveal strong persistence in development dynamics, with past levels of development being a key determinant of current outcomes.

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