In the report, a scheduled update to the bank’s overview of the global economy, the bank forecasts sluggish growth in

high-income countries, like Japan, Germany and the United States, in the coming years. It expects more modest growth

in the middle-income economies that have been the engine of the global recovery, like China and Brazil. And it sees developing

countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America experiencing slower growth than they have for most of the last decade.

From 2004 to 2007, before the financial crisis hit, the global economy grew at an annual rate of roughly 5 percent, according to

International Monetary Fund data.

In the case of China, for instance, growth “doesn’t depend on domestic demand in high-income countries, and ultimately it

doesn't depend on their export demand,''said Hans Timmer, the director of the World Bank’s development prospects

group. Future growth would instead come largely from within the country and other poorer but fast-growing economies, he said.