The outcome of last week’s L’Aquila meeting confirms a common (and worrying) aspect of G8 summits: an abundance of promises and commitments, without sufficient details and clear mechanisms that would ensure effective implementation. Perhaps it is finally time to relegate the G8 to the history books and leave it to the G20, or another more inclusive forum for dialogue and coordination, to take the reins of global economic policy.
-
17 Jul 2009 / Paolo De Renzio
-
06 May 2009 / Jeni Whalan
A ‘surge’ in Afghan aid won’t solve the big problems facing international reconstruction efforts. More aid is needed, but so are fundamental reforms to its delivery. Opportunities are being squandered by wasteful donor practices and a military strategy that overlooks humanitarian needs.
The announcement of a new Afghanistan strategy by President Obama and his NATO allies brings with it the promise of more resources for reconstruction. Encouraging news, given that the financing shortfall stands at around 48% of estimated needs. Efforts to date have been ‘laughably insufficient’, wrote Paddy Ashdown and Joseph Ingram last week: while reconstruction efforts in Bosnia and East Timor received $580 and $400 per capita respectively, Afghanistan today receives about $57 (though the lack of census data makes this figure hazy).
So, will renewed international commitment to Afghanistan help?
-
29 Apr 2009 / Ana Arroio
With a budget of US$3.8 billion for 2009 the Gates Foundation has great ambitions and a big war chest. But will their technology-based approach deliver health solutions? Ana Arroio argues that the Foundation needs to ensure that technology promotes development.
-
02 Apr 2009 / Paolo De Renzio
Despite all the statements and rhetoric to the contrary, there is little doubt that foreign aid from rich countries will contract as a consequence of the global financial crisis. Averting such further impact of the global crisis calls for urgent and innovative solutions to both the quantity and quality of foreign aid. Proposals to increase aid in times of crisis require important institutional reforms aimed at addressing the shortcomings of the existing aid system. While political appetite for such reforms may not be high at the moment, extraordinary times require extraordinary solutions. The G20 and other development actors need to step up to the plate.
-
02 Apr 2009 / Rajaie Batniji
The G20 meeting in London will bring together leaders focusing on the global economic crisis. The financial crisis could contribute to a health crisis poor countries. The G20 can take actions to avert a health crisis. We spell these actions out in a policy brief available here.
-
17 Mar 2009 / Kevin Watkins
In good times or bad, there is one commodity which Africa always enjoys in abundance: namely, advice on fiscal responsibility. The real scarcity today is the flow of finance needed to prevent the economic downturn from turning into a human development reversal.
-
11 Mar 2009 / GEG
In the FT today, Harvey Morris quotes GEG Senior Visiting Fellow Kevin Watkins on the grave humanitarian crisis facing the world’s most vulnerable people, resulting from the global economic downturn. As Kevin has written previously, the global financial crisis is already draining development aid. The effect on the world’s poor is emphasised again in Morris’s article.
-
06 Feb 2009 / Kevin Watkins
As governments prepare for the G20 meeting in April, there is one thing you can be sure of: the agenda will be dominated by the global financial crisis. If you’ll forgive the expression, it’s an absolute banker.
So here’s the question. As the financial meltdown continues its journey from the US housing market, through the banking systems and real economies of rich countries and into the lives of the world’s poorest people, when are we going to see a financial rescue package for the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs)?
-
13 Jan 2009 / Christina Ward
Targeting the right audience, with the right incentives, may be the key to progress on the Millennium Cities Initiative, writes GEG guest blogger, Christina Ward.
On Wednesday, 10 December 2008 the Earth Institute of Columbia University hosted its second Millennium Cities Investment Day in London. The Millennium Cities Initiative (MCI), founded in 2005, aims to assist nine selected mid-sized cities across sub-Saharan Africa, located near the Millennium Villages, to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Perhaps the two of the most striking features of the conference were the different audiences being addressed and the differences in delivery across the country panels. -
07 Dec 2008 / Paolo De Renzio
Just think about it. The $700 billion rescue package that the US Congress approved for the financial crisis is equal to seven times current yearly aid levels, or the equivalent of global aid flows between now and 2015, the year that marks the target for the Millennium Development Goals. It will be spent within a [...]
