By Victor Osei Kwadwo (researcher and lecturer, UNU-MERIT) and Rose Camille Vincent (Assistant Professor, Utrecht University) Education drives economic growth and individual well-being. Secondary education, in particular, plays a crucial role. In recent decades, this recognition has encouraged several African countries to make secondary education free. One example is Ghana’s Free Public Senior High School (FreeSHS) policy, initiated in 2017. The policy aimed to remove cost barriers to secondary ...
By Victor Osei Kwadwo, researcher and lecturer at UNU-MERIT In March 2023, three friends and I – all of us graduates of UNU-MERIT’s PhD programme – were thrilled when we stumbled upon a research fellowship opportunity in Africa, our home continent. Unfortunately, it turned out that the call was for individual three-month research stays. Our lives (some of us being parents) and newly launched careers simply wouldn’t bend that far. But, as any good scholar knows, constraints breed creativity...
NEMO Kennislink – the Dutch science journalism platform of NEMO, the largest science museum in the Netherlands – has recently published two news pieces, one discussing how African remote employees could help solve the Netherlands’ major shortage of IT professionals, and the other focusing on Africa’s lack of internet access compared to Europe. Both articles (written in Dutch) feature parts of an interview with UNU-MERIT researcher Bernardo Caldarola, an applied economist ...
By Tatenda Zinyemba (postdoctoral researcher, UNU-MERIT) Over the past three decades researchers have explored various aspects of the impact of the HIV pandemic. One focus area has been children who have lost their parents to AIDS. Less attention has been given to children who are raised by parents living with HIV. This group has become much bigger as more people have access to antiretroviral therapy and are therefore expected to raise their children. Our research in Zimbabwe looked at the effec...
Below is an excerpt from the article ‘Libya flood reveals disaster prevention deficit in fragile states’, published on 13 October 2023 in Context [a media platform of the Thomson Reuters Foundation] and written by United Nations University (UNU) researchers Michael Hagenlocher, Sanae Okamoto (UNU-MERIT) and Nidhi Nagabhatla, who together coordinate the UNU Climate Resilience Initiative. Research and planning can help minimise threats to infrastructure and people from extreme weather ...
Article co-authored by Mariajose Silva Vargas, full-time PhD fellow at UNU-MERIT [Reprinted by permission from VoxDev; Francesco Loiacono] Working together with one refugee worker for one week increases firms’ likelihood to hire more refugees by adjusting business owners’ beliefs about refugees’ skills. Addressing the pressing global challenge of integrating migrants, especially in the context of forced displacement, is crucial given that migrations are considered “one of the most important geop...
A post by Cristina Mancigotti, Capacity Development Coordinator at UNU-MERIT’s Capacity Development Office Students consider dropping out of courses for a number of reasons, but our research shows that peer discussions and local context examples during class sessions can increase engagement and completion rates in online courses. Challenges for online students and educators During the course of an interview, we were not surprised to hear a student telling us that they considered droppin...
Article co-authored by Yannick Markhof, PhD fellow at UNU-MERIT [Reprinted by permission from VoxDev; Philip Wollburg and Alberto Zezza] Insights from high-frequency phone survey data collection reveal that access, rather than hesitancy, prevents vaccine uptake in Sub-Saharan Africa. COVID-19 vaccination rates in Sub-Saharan Africa remain low as a lack of easy access to vaccines keeps high vaccine acceptance from translating to widespread coverage. March 11, 2023, marked the three-year anniversa...
A joint post by PhD alumni Racky Balde and Elvis Avenyo. … The COVID-19 pandemic and its associated counter-measures continue to shed light on the social and economic challenges facing African countries. Economic growth in sub-Saharan Africa countries is expected to decline, putting pressure on already limited fiscal space and resources in the region. The worst affected will be people working in the informal economy, which in most African countries represents the biggest part of the econom...
Her Majesty Queen Mathilde of the Belgians paid an in-person visit to UN House in Brussels, the headquarters of several agencies, funds, and programmes of the United Nations in the Belgian capital, as well as a virtual visit to the UN in Liberia, on 23 September 2021. During her meeting with representatives from UN organisations in Brussels, Her Majesty discussed the main priorities of the UN, and in particular the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). It was Her Majesty’s ...