World Bank -- Free Online Databases

The World Bank has made 15 key databases available free online. These include the World Development Indicators (WDI) and the Global Development Finance (GDF) databases. The Bank has also revised the interfaces of a number of previously free data sets to simplify access.  Many of the databases can be accessed in more than one way, either through the common search facility or as Excel or CSV files which have been made up of selected indicators (Note that the preselected downloads often do not include all of the indicators in the database.)  A main data page which gives access to the databases as well as a host of other information from the Bank is at http://go.worldbank.org/45B5H20NV0. However some users may find this page confusing.  There are two main approaches to getting data, searching and downloading from the database or downloading the already prepared selection of data. The following databases have a common interface for searching-- World Development Indicators (WDI) and Global Development Finance (GDF) (which have been combined for searching); Gender Statistics; Education Statistics; Health and Population Statistics; African Development Indicators; Global Economic Monitor (GEM) and Millennium Development Goals. The search engine can be accessed directly at http://databank.worldbank.org/ddp/home.do . Alternatively the same search possibilities as well as the prepared downloads are also available at http://data.worldbank.org/data-catalog which also provides access to the following databases -- Gender Statistics; Doing Business Database; Actionable Governance Indicators; International Comparison Program; Joint External Data Hub (JEDH)Logistics Performance Index (LPI); and, Quarterly External Debt Statistics (QEDS/GDDS).

You can see a list of the countries categorized by region and income level at http://data.worldbank.org/about/country-classifications/country-and-lending-groups   . This is a useful link because you can down load the list in Excel format. The list includes a three character country code, the region, the income group and the level of indebtedness for each country.  This table can be linked to the data from the data base, however be careful, some of the country names in the list have accents, while the names in the data base do not. You will have to remove the accents if you want to link automatically. (Note the link to download the spreadsheet is right at the bottom of the page.)

You can see the list of some of the WDI indicators at http://publications.worldbank.org/WDI/indicators . At present this table cannot be downloaded, but a download similar to the countries list would be useful, particularly one with a code for each indicator and the indication of the data group etc.