Aid & Development

The report of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) explained why the world has just over a decade to get global warming under control. Chris Mooney and Brady Dennis discuss the implications of the research. The full impact of the tsunami in Central Sulawesi is still unknown,

In New York, Turkey’s First Lady Emine Erdoğan says humanitarian aid policies should not increase the dependency of the recipients, but should focus on development. Lisa Cornish from Devex analyses the impact of the new government on Australia's aid and development program. This month

The Australian aid program has always laboured under multiple and competing objectives, both implicit and explicit. This was identified in the 1997 Simons Report on foreign aid, commissioned by the Howard Government, into what was then a separate agency, AusAID: The managers of the aid

Following Julie Bishop’s resignation as Australian foreign minister after five years in the job, Stephen Howes reflects on her aid and development legacy, which is only saved by the growth of the Seasonal Workers Program. Ashlee Betteridge and Lisa Cornish separately

Samuel Oakford comments on the new rule applied by the Trump administration on money spent by USAid through the UN and other multinational agencies. The measure could negatively impact a quarter of all US foreign assistance. The Australian picked up Jonathan Pryke’s recent submission to the

This article is based on episode 9 of the Good Will Hunters podcast with Giles Gunesekera, CEO of the Global Impact Initiative. In March 2015, the Coalition committed $140 million over four years to an innovation hub within the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. The hub, known as

“Being in the Pacific, of the Pacific” was an aspiration announced by New Zealand’s Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs Fletcher Tabuteau at a recent conference in Wellington. New Zealand’s Pacific identity has been a continuing theme of the Pacific reset policy&

This article is based on episodes 7 and 8 of the Good Will Hunters Podcast with Georgina Camp, CEO of Huber Social, and Andrea De Almeida, CEO of B Lab Australia.  B Corp certification is to businesses what Fair Trade certification is to coffee. In Australia, there are just

This article is based on episodes 5 and 6 of the Good Will Hunters podcast. Most would agree that “entrepreneurship” has been a business buzzword for quite some time. Less apparent is how entrepreneurship is redefining the informal economy, especially in developing countries. Last week

This article is based on episode 4 of the Good Will Hunters podcast, featuring former deputy director of AusAID Richard Moore.   One draft title for this article was “Why I won’t campaign for Australian aid”. While in some ways this statement is true, it has many, many caveats. A

RMIT ABC fact-checkers confirmed the accuracy of a tweet from World Vision’s policy and advocacy director, Susan Anderson, that stated: “This year’s budget is the fifth year in a row that the Australian Government has cut Australian aid”. Matt Lowe ran an interesting

The Australian budget was handed down last week, with the aid budget receiving a slight increase, though only by definition. Stephen Howes analysed trends in the aid budget in great detail at the Devpolicy post-budget breakfast. In this great blog post, Kuntala Lahiri-Dutt

The Australian aid program will be in the spotlight this week as the Australia Federal budget is handed down on Tuesday. To see where Australian aid goes, take a look at the just released statistics for 2016/17. According to a recent poll, the majority of Australians believe that

Penny Goldberg, the new World Bank Chief Economist, and Nina Pavcnik discuss the threats and benefits of trade liberalisation on developing economies. David Evans comments on new research underlining how microcredits in Africa not only help farmers who borrow

To the surprise of many aid watchers, the Trump administration is supporting a capital increase for the World Bank. Annual (non-aid) lending is expected to leap from US$60 billion to $80 billion in 2019, and to $100 billion on average by 2030. The announcement still has to pass

Mahmoud Mohieldin explains how PPPs (public-private partnerships) can work together with the Sustainable Development Goals to eradicate global poverty around the world. In his latest blog post, Roy Trivedy explains how the Timor-Leste National Human Development Report 2018&

Fairfax news reported last week that the Coalition is considering another 10% cut to the Australian aid budget. The Government has alrady cut the aid budget by close to 33% since 2014. Minister for Foreign Affairs Julie Bishop has since dismissed the reports. This news

“Just the tip of the iceberg.” This is a phrase used repeatedly to describe the headline-grabbing sexual misconduct allegations against senior Oxfam staff in Haiti in 2011. Sure enough, many more reports have followed. Some 26 (as yet unnamed) organisations have so far reported 80

Last week, the Chinese Government announced its decision to establish China’s international development cooperation agency. As described by Beijing, the main purpose of the new agency is to give full attention to foreign aid, as a key means of major-country diplomacy. The goal is to

Bill and Melinda Gates have followed up their annual letter of a few weeks ago, in which they answer 10 tough questions from readers, by answering another set of readers’ questions. Bill Gates also participated in a Reddit “Ask Me Anything” event. In an address to the Lowy Institute

The Oxfam scandal continues to receive airtime. The Independent discusses how the NGO’s failings are part of a deeper malaise in the industry; the BBC charts what UK charities actually do; and Mark Hurst discusses what Oxfam can learn from other charities that have weathered

The Rohingya crisis is terrible in itself; however, many refugees are giving untrue (and more horrific) stories when asked their testimony. Hannah Beech, a reporter for The New York Times, uncovers these lies and explains their origins. President Donald Trump questions the future and

Stephen Howes provides suggests how to reform the DFAT bureaucracy to improve the profile and performance of Australian aid.  The paradox of connectivity, jobs destruction caused by technology, and insufficient education are World Bank President Jim Yong Kim’s three main

The Davos summit is taking place this week. At the Center for Global Development, Michael Clemens and Kate Gough argue that human mobility and migration solutions should be a central topic of discussion. Egypt and Ethiopia are fighting over the Nile. Damming the Blue Nile tributary