This is the sixth post in our series ahead of the UN Summit for Refugees and Migrants, 19 September 2016. The full series covers several key aspects of migration: from governance and health, to environment and culture, to development and forced migration. A round-up post will follow shortly after the summit. Read the first six posts here on the UNU Migration Network. ••• It’s time that we get serious about development — and really ‘put our money where our mouth is’. For far too long ...
Alumnus and affiliated researcher Dr. Richard Bluhm has won this year’s Prize for Excellence in Applied Development Research from the German Economic Association (VfS). He was awarded first prize in the Young Researcher category for his doctoral thesis on ‘Growth Dynamics and Development. Essays in Applied Econometrics and Political Economy’. “Understanding why some countries are poor and others are rich, and how this gap can be closed, remains the most fundamental problem in development e...
Technology can serve all three dimensions of sustainability – economic, social and environmental – at the same time. This is the main finding of UNIDO’s Industrial Development Report (IDR) 2016, to be presented at a special seminar at UNU HQ in Tokyo on 18 December 2015. Entitled “The Role of Technology and Innovation in Inclusive and Sustainable Industrial Development”, this flagship report was based around a series of UNU-MERIT Working Papers, co-authored by among others Dire...
The 2015 Global Innovation Index (GII) shows new ways for policymakers to boost innovation and spur growth, building on local strengths while developing sound national innovation environments. The report, now in its 8th edition, is co-published by Cornell University, INSEAD and the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). Each year the GII surveys 141 economies around the world, using 79 indicators to gauge both innovative capabilities and measurable results. This year’s report inc...
GLOBALLY each day almost 1000 children under 5 die from diarrhoea caused by contaminated water. More than 2.4 billion people – a third of all humanity – have no access to sanitation. And as populations grow, water is set to become a new source of danger, of conflict, given the rapid urban expansion of Latin America, Sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia. Meanwhile, as climate change accelerates, we are likely to see more extreme and frequent droughts, floods and typhoons. Again, people in emergi...
In 40 years of independence, Mozambique has made real progress: it is one of the fastest growing economies in the world, democratic institutions have been deepened, public services have been reformed, and human development indicators have significantly improved. Yet despite these achievements, great challenges remain. Ayokunu Adedokun, PhD fellow, writes from Maputo. Today, 25 June 2015, the Republic of Mozambique celebrates 40 years of independence from Portugal. The mood of the country is euph...
Why are poor countries poor and rich countries rich? How are wealth and poverty related to changes in health, life expectancy, education, population growth and politics? This book on development by Prof. Adam Szirmai, published 15 June 2015 by Cambridge University Press, explores the dynamics of socio-economic development and stagnation in developing countries. Here the author sets out the essential context. Throughout the book there’s one key concept: productive capacity. I see this as the core...
For a long time, the divide between ‘developed’ and ‘developing’ economies has been wide and persistent, giving rise to development economics as a specialised field. Yet with economic interactions between nations rising strongly over the past decades, economics in a broad sense needs to be able to deal with the global environment in which all economic agents operate. Evolutionary economics seems well suited to deal both with the salient long-run macro aspects of the globa...
Innovations from ICT — and the roll out of these technologies — touch every aspect of our lives. They are shaping political agendas and can help us achieve our development goals. Ahead of this Sunday’s ‘World Telecommunication & Information Society Day‘, PhD fellow Shuan SadreGhazi explains more on the links between ICT and innovation. Innovations from ICT and the implementation of these technologies have pervaded different aspects of our lives. Look everywhere...
The essay competition ‘Inside the Black Box‘ asked students to join the debate on Official Development Assistance (ODA) and to come up with ideas on how to improve it. Pushing further, it was a campaign to reach policymakers who may be able to restructure ODA. We spoke with Education Director Dr. Lutz Krebs in the soundcloud above and team member Tamara Kool in the blog post below. The winning essays, in the form of a working paper, are embedded below. Beginning 2014, students from t...