The papers consist of a body of materials related to Zambia and a set of general policy and issues papers. King undertook a mission to Zambia for the Bank and wrote a report on it, and he collected information about and remained interested in Zambia thereafter. The materials related to Zambia include four documents prepared and distributed for the December 1986 meeting of the Consultative Group on Zambia, which had had its first meeting in June 1978. Most of the other documents related to Zambia are internal World Bank documents, with a few Bank publications and some publications from other sources. The materials are arranged in four sections: Consultative Group documents; unpublished Bank materials; Bank publications; and other publications. This is a useful body of materials for an overview of Zambian economic issues in the 1980s.

The policy and research papers cover a wide variety of subjects including structural adjustment lending and sector adjustment lending, agriculture, Japan and Ghana, and Bank history. All the policy and research papers are Bank papers except six items, which are identified by source on the item list. They are arranged by date of preparation or publication.