Global Fund for Education Gathers Momentum

If the international community can successfully raise billions of dollars to fight deadly diseases, why not a similar fund to promote education, asks Gordon Brown, former British prime minister.

SOUTH AFRICA: No Political Will to Support Generic Medication

South African health experts are calling on governments to use legally available mechanisms to promote the production or import of generic drugs in their countries.

Can BRICS Make a Difference at Busan? – Part 2

While experts are hopeful that blocs of emerging market economies like BRICS – Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa – will play a major role in the upcoming aid effectiveness conference in Busan, South Korea, others fear that the new players do not yet have the fiscal power to make a serious intervention in fora generally dominated by rich donor states.

Can the BRICS Make a Difference At Busan? – Part 1

As shock waves from Greece's economic crisis emanate across the Eurozone and the Occupy protests in the U.S. grow bolder in their critique of the dominant neoliberal system, it seems clear to many observers that the old hegemonic economic order is fading fast.

IBSA: In Conflict with the EU

When the G20 leaders meet for their fifth summit in Cannes, France, on Thursday, they will be confronted with several worsening global economic and trade issues. Among them is how to strengthen the international trading system and how to overcome the developmental deficit that continues to create an uneven playing field for poor countries.

EUROPE: ‘Agenda for Change’ Leaves Middle-Income Countries Out in the Cold

Last week the European Commission unveiled its ‘Agenda for Change’, a new policy framework outlining priorities for the European Union’s development aid and detailing the Commission’s renewed focus on economic growth as a means of poverty reduction, particularly in the world’s poorest countries.

TRADE: Developing Countries Out in the Cold at WTO

Developing countries, particularly from Africa, are concerned about attempts by industrialised nations to change the negotiating dynamic of the World Trade Organization.

Africa Ravaged by Continued Denial of Market Access

The poorest countries in Africa are not merely the victims of natural calamities. They are also ravaged by the continued denial of market access as promised in the Doha trade negotiations, say African trade diplomats.

Grassroots Women Urge Rights-Based Development Path

The streets around the headquarters of the world's leading financial institutions – the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund – have been transformed into a canvas over the last three days.

Moving Aid from Fire-Fighting to Long-Term Results

Civil society organisations weighed in Friday on the risks and necessities associated with results-driven aid, asking the key question when it comes to a development project: Results for whom? Donors, or the people on the ground?

Bill Gates to Support “Robin Hood” Tax

Microsoft co-founder and billionaire philanthropist Bill Gates appears poised to endorse the adoption of a controversial financial transactions tax (FTT) to be used as a new source of development aid for poor countries.

Uneven Results in Bid to Halt Needless Mother and Child Deaths

Political, private sector and civil society leaders from around the world gathered here on Tuesday to recommit to a year-old initiative, Every Woman Every Child, which aims to prevent 16 million maternal and child deaths by 2015.

Women Hung Out to Dry in Global Labour Market

Amid policy battles over food production, energy resources and economic decline, one untapped natural resource that is guaranteed to boost production on a global scale has been stubbornly overlooked – the power of women in the labour force.

World Bank, IMF Face Shifting Development Paradigm

Amid a global financial crisis that has shown little signs of reversing, next week's fall meetings of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank are crucial in setting the tone for rebounding world markets, to which leaders of the Bretton Woods institutions offered optimistic, yet ultimately vague, solutions in speeches this week.

U.S.: Republicans Call for Major Cuts to U.N.

As leaders from around the globe begin gathering in New York City for the annual opening of the U.N. General Assembly (UNGA), Republican lawmakers in Washington are calling for a major overhaul of the world body that would almost certainly result in huge cuts to its budget and operations.

TRADE: Southern Africa Has its Work Cut Out

Southern Africa has moved forward with regional economic integration, but challenges remain, say trade experts.

Eurozone Crisis Could Spill Over into Developing World

When the global economy was hit by a severe recession in 2008- 2009, the negative fallout impacted heavily on the world's developing nations, hindering the U.N.'s key development goals, including plans for the elimination of extreme poverty and hunger worldwide by 2015.

Development NGOs Face “Existential Challenge”

Buy now, pay later. That's the power Muhammad Yunus gave to the world's poor.

South Summit of World Leaders in Search of a Venue

The ongoing political turmoil in Libya has derailed plans for a major summit meeting of developing nations scheduled to take place in Tripoli in October.

Water as Basic Human Right Has a Market Price, Says U.N. Chief

As the 193-member General Assembly commemorates the first anniversary of its landmark resolution pronouncing water and sanitation to be a basic human right, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon triggered a political controversy last week when he implicitly declared that even human rights have a market price.

U.S.: Key Committee Slashes Foreign Aid, Warns Palestinians

Amidst growing fears of a new fiscal crisis sparked by a possible U.S. debt default next week, a key Republican-led Congressional committee Wednesday approved deep cuts in foreign aid and contributions to the United Nations and other multilateral institutions next year.