By Jaya Ramachandran GENEVA | 5 December 2024 (IDN) — Global trade is poised to hit an all-time high of nearly $33 trillion in 2024. This marks a growth of 3.3% or $1 trillion increase driven by a 7% rise in trade in services, according to the latest Global Trade Update by UN Trade and […]
Sri Lanka: The IMF’s Remarkable Timing and a President’s Mandate for Debt Justice
By Darini Rajasingham-Senanayake* COLOMBO | 30 November 2024 (IDN) — At Annual Meetings in Washington in October, International Monetary Fund head Kristalina Georgieva claimed Sri Lanka as a debt restructuring ‘success’ story.[i] Left unsaid was that Sri Lanka’s external debt had ballooned from $26 billion to a purported whopping $100 billion during two years of […]
Behind a Surge in India-Russia Economic Relations
By Rajoli Siddharth Jayaprakash* NEW DELHI | 16 November 2024 (IDN) — In the past decade, the core drivers of India-Russia relations have begun shifting. The traditionally dominant military-technical partnership has declined, with India buying less Russian weapons, technology and military platforms. The economic pillar stagnated as military dealings slowed, with bilateral trade hovering around […]
Evolving Into an “Opportunity Economy” with Participatory Development
By Yossef Ben-Meir* MARRAKECH | 21 October 2024 (IDN) — The commitment of Kamala Harris’ U.S. Presidential campaign to create an opportunity economy—one that lowers costs and strengthens opportunities for working families and small businesses—has established goals that are consistent with observed outcomes of participatory approaches to community development around the world. The participatory approach […]
Cuts in Education, Health and Social Protection Trigger Rise in Economic Inequalities
By Rodney Reynolds NEW YORK | 21 October 2024 (IDN) — A new global index reveals that nine out of ten countries worldwide are pursuing policies that are likely to increase levels of economic inequality. Education and health cuts by nearly every country under World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) programs are being described as “dispiriting, dangerous, […]
Up to 41 billion USD in World Bank Climate Finance Unaccounted for, Oxfam Finds
By Rodney Reynolds NEW YORK | 17 October 2024 (IDN) — Up to $41 billion in World Bank climate finance—nearly 40 percent of all climate funds disbursed by the Bank over the past seven years— is unaccounted for due to poor record-keeping practices, reveals a new Oxfam report published ahead of the World Bank and […]
Will the G20 Decide Minimum Tax on the Wealthiest of Our World?
By Sam Pizzigati* This article was originally published on Inequality.org , a project of the Institute for Policy Studies under a Creative Commons 3.0 License. NEW YORK | 4 August 2024 (IDN) — For the richest among us, life on Earth can sometimes get rather boring. But worry not for our world’s deepest pockets. At […]
Multilateral Development Banks Play Crucial Role in Financing Global Public Goods
By José Antonio Ocampo and Karla Daniela González, Columbia University This article was first published in the 2023/2024 UNDP Human Development Report – Breaking the Gridlock: Reimagining cooperation in a polarized world –on 13 March 2024. NEW YORK | 14 March 2024 (IDN) — There is broad-based agreement among the United Nations and the Group […]
The Anatomy of Default and the IMF in Sri Lanka: Of Elections, Bond Scams, and Money Politics
By Darini Rajasingham-Senanayake COLOMBO, Sri Lanka | 7 February 2024 (IDN) — With the wisdom of hindsight, the Root Causes of Sri Lanka’s first-ever Sovereign Default, staged three years ago on the eve of 75 years of ‘Independence’ from the British Raj are clear. When the Default happened in March 2021, there was too much […]
Thailand’s ‘Sufficiency Economy’ Philosophy Bears Fruits in Laos
By Pattama Vilailert VIENTIANE, Laos. 28 June 2023 (IDN) — It was at the height of the Thai Economic Crisis in 1997 that the term “sufficiency economics” came into prominence when the late King of Thailand Bhumibol Adulyadej told his people that rather than building factories to become another Asian Tiger, the important thing for […]