Independent research for global prosperity
Lawrence MacDonald, CGD vice president for communications and policy outreach, interviews a CGD expert in this weekly Podcast. The blog offers a short text summary.
My guest on this Wonkcast is Alan Kyerematen, Ghana's former Minister of Trade, Industry and President’s Special Initiatives and one of nine candidates to be the next head of the World Trade Organization (WTO). In our interview, Minister Kyerematen tells me he possesses the skills and vision needed to lead the WTO.
Ten years after the conflict in Darfur began, Sudan and the newly-sovereign South Sudan are still experiencing terrible violence and efforts to ensure lasting peace in the region are falling short. What can the United States do differently to help foster governance that works for both countries?
My guest on this week’s Wonkcast is Justin Sandefur, a research fellow at CGD whose recent work has focused on education in Kenya. One study examines the returns of private schooling, while another looks at the effects of contract teachers on student test scores. The results of these studies highlight shortcomings in public education, including failures of accountability and a dense bureaucracy.
Ghana’s recent recalculation of its GDP led to an overnight $500 per capita jump, putting in motion unexpectedly rapid graduation from the International Development Association (IDA) and ultimately a new relationship with the World Bank. In this week’s Wonkcast, I speak with Todd Moss, vice president for programs and senior fellow at CGD, about his recent trip to the newly categorized lower-middle income country, the implications of IDA graduation, and a sudden influx of oil wealth.
My guest this week is Todd Moss, senior fellow and vice president for programs here at the Center for Global Development. Our topic is the newly updated edition of his popular primer: African Development: Making Sense of the Issues and Actors.
What does extreme hyperinflation look like? Consider a pile of currency tall enough to encircle our entire galaxy. That’s how many Zimbabwean dollars you would have needed by the end of the country’s extraordinary inflationary crisis to equal one pre-crisis Zim dollar, according to CGD senior fellow Alan Gelb.
It’s not often that the United Nations sees fit to officially declare a food crisis a famine. That’s a testament to the severity of the ongoing suffering in Somalia, a disaster of biblical proportions that has already claimed the lives of tens of thousands. But evidence abounds that famines are not only the result of natural occurrences. On the contrary, most are the shocking result of human error or, in the worst case, deliberate neglect.
The Wonkcast is taking a brief summer vacation. We’ve selected this show from our archives- it was originally posted on June 1, 2010.
After the ouster of President Hosni Mubarak last Friday, I invited Arvind Subramanian, a former IMF resident representative in Cairo and a regular columnist for the Business Standard, the leading business daily in his native India, to share his views on Egypt’s economic prospects.
A 2011 referendum in Southern Sudan will determine the sub-nation’s independence – and it’s just one month away. Ahead of the South’s possible secession, Sudanese leaders are scrambling to find solutions to a host of questions, a critical one being: What should be done with Sudan’s crushing $35 billion external debt burden?