Nine months after celebrating independence from Georgia, Abkhazia stands with its ravishing, unspoiled coastline and a sprawling, if run-down, tourism infrastructure.
The oil-for-food programme, whereby Iraq is allowed to sell some oil to pay for humanitarian imports, has been hit by low oil prices and run-down Iraqi infrastructure; in the past six months, it raised $3 billion, $2.2 billion less than projected.
America may boast highly efficient labour and capital markets, but these advantages are partly offset by poor primary and secondary education, run-down public infrastructure, and inadequate saving that makes the country dependent on foreign capital.
After decades of neglect, the nation's freight-rail infrastructure was run-down: Half the bridges needed repair; a fifth were on the verge of collapse.
But Iraq's debilitated oil industry could not produce enough oil to cover the cost of even basic food and medicine, while its infrastructure is too run-down to allow proper distribution and storage of what little could be bought.
But there are two particular reasons why Europe's stability pact could prove especially problematic for Britain.The first is that Britain's public infrastructure is exceptionally run-down compared with the rest of Europe.
German reunification in 1990 was followed by huge investments into the totally run down transport infrastructure in East Germany as well as a resurrection of links between the eastern and the western part of the country.
For investors, Mozambique has all the problems of a seriously run-down economy: a small domestic market, high costs, bureaucratic tangle and weak infrastructure.
From the creation of the Olympic Park in a run-down part of east London, to the torch relay and the smooth running of the creaking Victorian transport infrastructure, the Games have been delivered with precision and impressive purpose.
