Showing 1 - 10 of 85
2026 outlook calls for recalibration
News, Mohamed A El-Erian, Published on 17/01/2026
» For global markets, 2025 was defined as much by what did not happen as by what did. The year offered a masterclass in the power of a single narrative, with massive, concentrated bets on AI masking various other unanswered questions. Yet as we move further into 2026, the AI narrative is unlikely to prove strong enough to continue overshadowing other lingering uncertainties, many of which reflect deeper structural shifts. For investors, central banks, and governments alike, the situation demands adaptation.
FAO at 80: feeding the future
News, Qu Dongyu, Published on 16/10/2025
» This year's World Food Day marks 80 years since the founding of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), whose mandate from the outset has been to ensure humanity's freedom from want.
Time for mission-oriented approach to school meals
News, Mariana Mazzucato, Published on 13/10/2025
» The global food system is failing on multiple fronts. With more than 2.6 billion people unable to afford a healthy diet, over 500 million are expected to be chronically undernourished by 2030. Worse, at a time when meeting future demand requires a 50% increase in food production, food-system productivity is actually declining, owing partly to rising climate risks. Agrifood industries are not only driving biodiversity loss, land degradation, and a global water crisis, but also generating almost one-third of global greenhouse-gas emissions.
Agenda for tackling debt crisis
News, Martín Guzmán & Mahmoud Mohieldin & Vera Songwe, Published on 23/08/2025
» Following the Fourth International Conference on Financing for Development in June, we reached a breakthrough moment. Governments, international financial institutions, and civil-society organisations, recognising the need to tackle today's debt and development crises, are ready for action ahead of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in September.
Global coral collapse a neglected crisis
News, Imran Khalid, Published on 16/08/2025
» Before the crack of dawn on Koh Tao in the Gulf of Thailand, Somsak Chaisri paddles his wooden boat over waters that used to shimmer with life. A once-vibrant coral garden below the water surface now consists of dead skeleton-like structures. According to this fisherman, the bleached coral skeletons are the only things he pulls from the water after his father showed him how to fish in living coral reefs. "Now, I drag up ghosts," he murmured. His lament echoes across the tropics. From the Maldives to Mozambique, the once-thriving reefs of the Pacific, Atlantic, and Indian Oceans are being scoured of life.
Global banking rules need review
News, Vera Songwe & Jendayi Frazer & Peter Blair Henry, Published on 29/07/2025
» In an era of shrinking resources for development finance, global policymakers must shift their focus to making better use of existing funds. Identifying and removing regulatory barriers that hinder the efficient deployment of capital to emerging markets and developing economies (EMDEs) is a good place to start.
This UN debt initiative is different
News, Mahmoud Mohieldin, Paolo Gentiloni, Trevor Manuel and Yan Wang, Published on 07/04/2025
» Economic development requires financing that is affordable, accessible and has maturities matched to development outcomes. Yet for most developing countries, none of the above apply. Instead, an escalating "debt disaster" is unfolding across much of the developing world, exacerbated by a series of cascading global crises.
Can COP30 close the funding gap?
News, Montek Singh Ahluwalia, Published on 31/03/2025
» Last year's United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP29) in Baku ended with developed countries agreeing to mobilise $300 billion (about 10.2 trillion baht) annually for climate finance in developing countries. But while this figure is three times higher than the previous $100 billion target, it falls far short of what's needed to close the climate funding gap.
Finance for a sustainable future
News, Jordan Schwartz, Published on 07/11/2024
» Whenever the world's financial and political leaders convene -- whether at the G20 summit, the United Nations General Assembly, or the International Monetary Fund and World Bank annual meetings -- the most urgent development challenges are nearly always on the agenda. Increasingly, the solution these leaders propose to such problems, from poverty alleviation and public-health crises to climate change and the energy transition, is more financing.
Recommitting to pandemic preparedness
News, Gro Harlem Brundtland, Published on 26/08/2024
» Four years ago, at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, governments were scrambling to protect their populations and prevent an economic meltdown. No one would dispute that addressing this existential threat was the top political priority back then.