G and I went to Shashemane and Awassa this weekend. I wanted to see how things are looking in the (usually quite fertile) south towards the end of the growing season. As you can see from this photo (right) taken on our morning run, things seemed pretty green. The anecdotal Read more…
I have been contacted through my website by somebody saying: we are working to save lives orphans in south Ethiopia, Wolaita. but still we don’t have our own website to spread our works and sounds of orphans. please try your best to help us. I don’t know anything about this Read more…
Martin Wolf in the Financial Times says he is calling for “a debate” about immigration but his article is, in truth, a thinly-veiled diatribe against immigration on the grounds that it harms the economy, the environment and society. The most important step in his argument is the first one. Wolf Read more…
Daniel Kaufmann and Mushtaq Khan talk about corruption in the latest edition of Development Drums.
The sweetness of the apricots offsets the spiciness of the curry in this dish which I am sure has no connection with India at all. It is a very quick and easy vegan dish. I usually serve it with brown rice mixed with fried onions and green peas. I saw Read more…
On the first World Pneumonia Day, spare a thought for the mothers and fathers of the five thousand children who will be killed today by pneumonia. Pause for a moment in silent thanks to the staff of the GAVI Alliance which works to get immunisation to children in developing countries. Read more…
I love this black humour about useless NGOs: It reminds me of a joke that we had in Malawi about the proliferation of useless (and often fraudulent) NGOs – we talked about the NGO TWACIB, which stood for “Two wankers and a computer in Blantyre. On a recent trip to Read more…
Here is a new paper by Channing Arndt, Sam Jones, and Finn Tarp on whether aid leads to economic growth. The econometrics are done carefully, and it finds that aid inflows of about 10 per cent of GDP lead to an increase in economic growth of about 1 percentage point. Read more…
Alison Evans, the new Director of ODI, stepped in to my seat to present the latest edition of the Development Drums podcast. She interviewed me and Roger Riddell about my paper, Beyond Planning. Thanks to all the folks at ODI for collaborating with me on this. The next two episodes Read more…
Not according to Michael Clemens at the Center for Global Development. Read his “Think Again” piece in Foreign Policy. Here’s a sample: This common idea that skilled emigration amounts to “stealing” requires a cartoonish set of assumptions about developing countries. First, it requires us to assume that developing countries possess Read more…