December 2025
GiveDirectly, CoGi & the End of Progress
This month I’m supporting a campaign with GiveDirectly and other Substackers. If it’s successful, 800 families across three villages in Northern Rwanda will each receive $1,100 in direct cash transfers.
I’ve been donating to GiveDirectly since 2014 when I had high uncertainty about how to do good. After working in evidence and impact for over a decade my uncertainty about how to improve the world is even higher, but GiveDirectly still seems like one of the surer bets to do meaningful good.
They were one of the few orgs that came up more than once when I asked economists and development people about donation opportunities for economic growth.
Cash also remains one of the more dignified poverty interventions, letting people spend on what matters most to them.
If you’re interested in supporting this campaign, you can donate via this link.
Top Posts
Max Roser - The end of progress against extreme poverty?
I have written a response here arguing that progress might actually be continuing if the World Bank data is inaccurate (which I suspect it is)
The Global Fund to fight AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria reached $11.3 billion of its $18 billion target
33% of the funding came from the U.S. (still a decrease from last time but some people expected 0%)
Open Philanthropy is now Coefficient Giving
(There is a debate on how to shorten this and I’m trying to make CoGi catch on)
Alexander Berger (CEO of CoGi) - Four lessons from $4 billion in impact-focused giving
The 2025 World Urbanization Prospects used a new standardised grid-based method (rather than relying on varying national definitions) revealing that the world is more urbanised than previously estimated
45% of the global population lives in cities
36% in towns and semi-dense areas
19% in rural areas
The combined 81% urban population is much higher than the previously claimed 58%
3,000 cities experienced population decline between 2015 and 2025, predominantly in China and India
Chris O. Ogunmodede - Some straight talk about Nigeria’s ‘Christian genocide’ controversy - A long post assessing popular arguments of a complicated debate
Asterisk - A conversation on AI and wealth distribution
A transcript from a panel discussion including GiveDirectly
Event - GiveWell virtual panel discussion - Growing needs, shrinking aid: cost-effective action in a year of funding cuts - 4th December
New AidData report tracks, for the first time, China’s loans and grants
Shifting from development aid towards strategic lending in HIC’s, focused on critical infrastructure, minerals and high-tech sectors
ODA commitments fell to $1.9b in 2023, their lowest in two decades
Jobs
Coefficient Giving
Senior Program Associates, Science and Global Health R&D
Program Officer, Science and Global Health R&D
Gates Foundation
Deputy Director, Giving Pledge
Senior Program Officer, Malaria Modelling & Quantitative Science
Senior Program Officer - Country Support (Polio)
CHAI
Program Manager, Internal AI
Senior Associate, AI Innovation
Manager, Maximum Impact Incubator
Renaissance Philanthropy
Quantitative Research Analyst, Global Health and Development
Director, Cardiovascular Nutrition Fund
Full Stack Software Engineer, Engineering Hub
Machine Learning Engineer, Engineering Hub
CGD - Assistant Director for Institutional Advancement
Evidence Action - AI for Good, Program Lead
Wellcome - Chief Strategy Officer
Thumo (tech startup) - CTO
Probably Good Job Board (now including ‘profit for good’ and ‘societal improvements’)
Aid
The Gates Foundation has pledged $1.4b to support farmers across Africa and Asia
The Chan Zuckerberg Initiative is shifting the bulk of philanthropy to science, focusing on AI and biology to curb disease, away from social advocacy, education and politics
CZI will spend at least $10b on basic scientific research over the next decade, more than twice the $4b it spent in its first decade
US Department of State to provide $150m to Zipline to expand access to medical supplies across Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria and Rwanda
MacArthur Foundation - The Sentinel project awarded $100m to prevent pandemics
Japan is shifting from traditional aid to strategic VC investment in Africa, pledging $5.5b in financial packages and $1.5b in impact investment
Denmark to cut IAVI funds, prioritising multilaterals over smaller grants
The cautionary tale of the Sahel’s Great Green Wall
Launched in 2007, aiming to plant 8,000km of trees across the Sahel by 2030
It has largely failed despite billions spent, with most projects abandoned, international donors bypassing African agencies
Senegal shows only 1 of 36 reforested plots with any re-greening
Growth
Growth Teams have launched Export Boom Atlas, which documents 80+ case studies of rapid export growth across 40+ developing countries and 9 sectors since 1995
Why West Africa imports rice while East Africa exports it
Morocco hits high-tech manufacturing target 11 years early
Technology industries now generate over 50% of the country’s industrial added value
Nigeria’s foreign reserves hit seven-year high, reach $46.7b
Sarah Logan - Emulating Indonesia: Export bans to spur local value addition?
WB - How price controls spread technology but stall innovation
Karthik Tadepalli - What happened to technology transfer? - The death of the 20th century’s greatest development policy
Côte d’Ivoire climbs into Africa’s top 10 investment hubs on industrial reforms
OWID - Growth of global GDP per capita has been remarkably steady over the past three decades
Health
Novartis’ new malaria treatment cured 97.4% of patients, more than the current best treatment
It kills resistant parasites too, and probably blocks transmission better than current drugs
Gavi and UNICEF will pay 25% less for a new malaria vaccine - reducing the cost of the R21 vaccine to $2.99 a dose from ~$4
CGD - Smarter vaccine doses: a high-impact fix for global immunisation
Replacing paper-based records with electronic medical records in Malawian HIV clinics reduced annual deaths by 28%
Maldives just made it illegal for some generations to smoke
Inside Nigeria’s 100 million child vaccine drive
Our World in Data
While vaping is not risk-free, it is less harmful than tobacco
Anxiety is one of the world’s most common health issues. How have treatments evolved over the last 70 years?
Seasonal flu kills about 700,000 people each year across the world
Almost one billion children have died globally since 1950
The Examination - Recycling lead for U.S. car batteries is poisoning people
UNAIDS reports disruption to HIV services across multiple countries, including treatment initiation declines and preventive medicine distribution dropping 20-60%+
Rwanda to set up $24m lab to detect and respond to zoonotic diseases
Annual investments of $50-100k could establish air quality monitoring in 83 countries, whilst air pollution causes 7 million deaths annually
Governance & Policy
VoxDev - What are academic incentives? How do they compare to incentives for policymakers and practitioners?
Statecraft podcast - How diplomacy works in Africa with Judd Devermont
16 years as an intelligence analyst, and most recently, Senior Director for African Affairs at the NSC
Rohit Shinde - India’s labour gets its 1991 moment - A tour of the labour economics behind these reforms
Trade
The U.S. lifts tariffs on 200 food products, easing pressure on suppliers
How African nations got stuck with China
Bright Simons - Africa produces under 5% of global critical minerals and 4% of rare earths (only Madagascar and Nigeria), not the oft-cited 30% of reserves
Morocco becomes world’s third-largest tomato exporter, overtaking Spain
CGD - The EU should ban exports of lead chromate
Kenya to ban electronics imports over 12 years old
China is targeting agricultural sectors to pressure governments into dropping 100% electric vehicle duties
Rwanda lifted its 8-year pause on agricultural and animal imports from South Africa
VoxDev - Why workers at exporting firms learn and earn more
Development Finance
CGD
The World Bank Group Reorganisation: A retreat from research quality?
Have climate finance targets changed what the World Bank actually finances
DevEx
The Millennium Challenge Corporation has made significant changes to its scorecard, paving the way for more countries to meet the requirements and qualify for funding
Backed by $10b in guarantees, a new initiative will help public development banks issue green bonds and access cheaper finance for climate-vulnerable countries
DFC’s authorisation has lapsed
The U.S. development finance institution will continue to honour contracts, but will not make new commitments
Green Climate Fund hits record $3.26b in project finance for 2025
Closing the Deal: Financing our security against pandemic threats
Report of the G20 high-level independent panel
UAE announces $1b initiative to expand AI in Africa
The Republic of the Congo entered the international bond market for the first time since 2007
The Asian Development Bank approved updates to its energy policy that allows investments and capacity building in nuclear power
All 50 Asian members of the AsDB voted in favour of the change. Of the 19 “non-regionals,” only Germany and Austria opposed
South Africa wins credit rating boost after two decades
S&P raises Nigeria’s outlook to ‘positive’ as reforms take hold
Sheriff Alimi - Structural issues mean capital moves extremely slowly through Africa’s fragmented 50+ legal systems
Currency restrictions require lengthy approval processes that trap funds locally - Nigeria has $7b worth of uncleared requests for foreign currency
Emerging Tech & Development
Anthropic partners with Rwandan government to bring AI education to hundreds of thousands of learners
Rest of World - ChatGPT is huge in India. These locally focused startups found a way to compete
Karthik Tadepalli - AI automation measures are not up to the task
Chris Paxton - Humanity as a Service - AI and robotic companions are increasingly a part of real life for a shocking number of people, and we should expect this portion to grow
NPR - AI steps in to detect the world’s deadliest infectious disease (TB)
World Bank - Harnessing AI for agricultural transformation
Includes 60 AI use cases across the agrifood value chain
The Windfall Trust - The AI bubble and new research on automation & inequality
The same technology can reduce inequality in some workforces while increasing it in others, explaining why recent experiments show contradictory results
Stanford develops real-world benchmarks for healthcare AI agents
Sonia Vallentin - How tech plans to outsmart the next pandemic
Labour & Employment
Household bargaining and the suppression of women’s work in India
Why would employees work harder when firms don’t pay their wages?
Startups & Business
Rest of World - Syria’s new tech minister wants to rebuild a nation left offline
World Bank - When risk aversion keeps firms small: evidence from Kenyan retailers
Dharmesh Ba - WhatsApp owns India!
WhatsApp has become India’s involuntary business infrastructure (500 million users with no strong competitor) but creates systemic problems because Meta optimises advertising opportunities rather than SME productivity needs
Semafor - African fintech players seek new growth paths
PalmPay is evolving from providing quick money transfers to offering a health insurance feature that has enrolled one million people in it’s first year
Wave arrived in Cameroon in June, expanding its African footprint to nine countries, and is looking to offer loans as well
Timothy Motte
Mirlo: disrupting telcos in Mexico
Inside Kazakhstan’s $1b fund of funds
Understanding Ethiopia’s startup scene
Infrastructure
World’s biggest mining project begins operations in Guinea
China backed $23b iron-ore mine could vastly reduce the energy needed to produce steel
At full capacity it would produce ~7% of the worlds iron ore
EIB Global and ADB invest $275m to modernise Mauritania’s main railway corridor
Works in Progress - Why the developing world needs wider streets
The world’s largest climate multilateral fund made its biggest financial commitment yet to build a $6b water desalination plant in Jordan
Delivering Connectivity: Ethiopia’s Modjo–Hawassa expressway nears completion - part of the Cairo–Cape Town Trans-African highway
Roads: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly of Development
2Africa is the first cable to connect East and West Africa in a continuous system and link Africa to the Middle East, South Asia and Europe. With a reach of 33 countries enabling connectivity for 3 billion people
Agriculture & Food
Donors at COP30 committed more than $142m to CGIAR to accelerate agricultural research and innovation for climate-resilient food systems
Senegal plans 38% budget increase for agriculture in 2026
Senegal secures over $300m to boost food sovereignty
Solar dryers are saving Africa’s tomato harvests
Some estimate that about 40% of the tomatoes Africa produces are lost before they reach consumers
Nigeria Secures $500m World Bank loan to boost agricultural value chains and rural industrialisation
Ghana’s vegetable industry expects farm-to-market costs to fall if the government delivers on extensive road upgrades outlined in the 2026 budget
For more African agriculture news check out Ag Safari by Hannatu Asheolge
Energy & Climate
Kenya eyes new energy deals as power cuts intensify
In 2020, nearly all new trucks in China ran on diesel. By the first half of 2025, battery-powered trucks accounted for 22% of new heavy truck sales, up from 9.2% in the same period in 2024
Nigeria’s Dangote plans $1b investments in Zimbabwe
World Bank
Economic development is the surest path to climate resilience
New $430m project to power Tunisia’s energy transformation
Hannah Ritchie - What happened to global carbon emissions this year?
Emissions from fossils are up, emissions from land use are down
Elections & Democracy
Guinea-Bissau installs a military ruler after a coup
Kenya sounds alarm as Tanzania unrest hits regional trade
Mali is grinding towards a halt - As the country’s fuel crisis continues, the military government is facing pressures of its own
Democracies tend to have lower levels of corruption
Migration
The Immigration Substack Universe - All migration newsletters and people you want to follow in one place
Global Migration in 2024: A Snapshot
Conflict, Corruption & Crime
MSF - Sudan: Desperate conditions and accounts of mass violence in North Darfur
India’s violent crime cases fall 29% in a decade, riots down 40%
Congo and Rwanda-backed rebels sign framework for peace deal in latest bid to end decades-long conflict
Youth crime rates in sharp decline - International study shows long-term downward trend in developed countries
Mapping the intersection of violence and food insecurity in West Africa
Innovation & Metascience
Podcast - Hard Drugs - The History of Vaccines
The White House - Launching the Genesis Mission
A federal initiative to build an integrated AI platform using DOE supercomputers and scientific datasets to accelerate research across domains like energy, manufacturing and biotech
Charities & Foundations
GWWC’s 2025 evaluations of evaluators
They continue to recommend GiveWell, and continue to not recommend HLI
Development Media International - Scaling priority child survival campaigns in 2026
Coefficient Giving - Guide to back-of-the-envelope calculations for global health and wellbeing
AMF’s immediate funding gaps
Two years of doing advocacy on antimicrobial resistance
ACTRA - A promising crime-prevention intervention at a crucial funding moment
Marginal funding to expand an innovative domestic violence prevention strategy to Burundi and Tanzania
Announcing ClusterFree: A cluster headache advocacy and research initiative (and how you can help)
Ending hunger for millions of African smallholder farmers
Piloting a digital treatment for COPD, the second biggest killer in India (seeking $84k to Sept 2026)
GiveDirectly - What giving people money doesn’t fix
Other Links
World Bank data shows 800m people lack official identity documents (down from 1 billion in 2017) and 2.9 billion lack digital ID access
Hurricane Melissa triggers 100% payout of $150m World Bank Catastrophe Bond for Jamaica
When every child is stunted, no child Is? How local norms distort perceptions of growth
Fostering trust to save lives: evidence from organ donation in Tunisia
Lev Heller - New Cause Area: Administrative Data Sets
OWID - There are huge differences in death rates from road injuries, even across high-income countries
Good News
Measles deaths down 88% since 2000
Uganda - 64% reduction in annual AIDS deaths from 56k in 2010 to 20k in 2024 and a fall in new HIV infections from 96k to 37k over the same period
Egypt eliminates trachoma as a public health problem
Seychelles, Mauritius, and Cabo Verde eliminate measles and rubella
Gavi’s HPV vaccination programme has reached 86 million girls in lower-income countries since 2023, tripling coverage to 25% and potentially preventing 1.4 million future cervical cancer deaths
Between 2023 and 2024, the global rate of people falling ill with TB declined by nearly 2%, while deaths fell by 3%
For more good news check out Fix The News & Human Progress