Development & EA - June 2024
Cause Prio, new charities, new philanthropy
Top Posts
Emily Oehlsen - Philanthropic Cause Prioritisation (In the Journal of Economic Perspectives, Emily looks at how Open Philanthropy assesses importance,
neglectedness and tractability in practice)
Tom Kalil is launching Renaissance Philanthropy to help philanthropists support science, technology and innovation
Presenting nine new charities - a record for the AIM (CE) Incubation Program
R&D for neglected diseases returns $405 for every dollar spent
80,000 Hours podcast - Rachel Glennerster on how “market shaping” could help solve climate change, pandemics, and other global problems
Center for Global Development appoints Rachel Glennerster as new president
China’s spending on global development projects has surpassed $1 trillion since the turn of the century - AidData research aims to shed light on China’s grant giving and lending activities
Melinda French Gates’s $12.5B separation agreement from Gates Foundation
Events
29th June - EA Brazil Summit
5th-7th July - EAGxUtrecht
16-18th August - EAGxToronto
6-7th September - EA Nigeria Summit
13-15th September - EAGxBerlin
1st-3rd November - EAG Boston
Jobs
Growth Teams - Junior Advisor - 30th June
Probably Good - CEO/Executive Director
Evidence Action - Head of Philanthropy - DC
GiveWell
Researcher
Comms Director
Development Finance
Devex Pro - How remittances are worth more than all development funding combined - $669 billion in 2023
World Bank - Private Sector Pumps $86 billion into Infrastructure in LMICs
Ghana law tests World Bank loyalty with $20 billion on the line
South Korea agrees to lend billions to Tanzania, Ethiopia
World Bank approves $1.2 billion budget support for Kenya
Accion launches $152 million fund investing in digital transformation of financial institutions serving small businesses
British International Investment and Citi launch $100m risk-sharing facility to support trade finance in frontier and emerging African economies
African leaders set out IDA funding priorities at World Bank summit
Grieve Chelwa - The IMF has hypnotized Africa's Policymakers
Devex Pro - UN forum helps set agenda for 2025 financing for development conference
IMF greenlights new financing mechanism for MDBs
UK and New York laws have to be part of global debt crisis fix
Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank wants to go beyond infrastructure (including digital infrastructure now)
Taxation
How Offshore Companies Can Level the Tax Playing Field for Developing Countries and are Finance Ministers' Secret Best Friend
How Zambia can leverage mobile money to increase tax revenue
Four ways in which technology and behavioural insights can improve tax collection in Pakistan
How can lower-income countries collect more taxes?
Economic Growth
Growth Teams - Development Bargains in Action: Kickstarting Good Job Creation in Rwanda’s Outsourcing Sector
Kyle Schutter (af/acc) - How far “behind” is Kenya?
Hauke Hillebrandt - GDP per capita in 2050
Tobi Lawson - Beyond GDP, conversation with Africa editor for the FT
Oliver Kim - Are African Prices Too High?
Charles Kenny - An End to Extreme Poverty? (Or at Least the Extreme Poverty Line)
Yaw - Steering Globalization: The Humans' Hand Behind the Trend
Steven Ayres - There are not enough large firms in developing countries – just 76 in Tanzania and 23 in Malawi. We need more large firms born large (attracted or built) or SMEs that grow large to meet the job-creation needs in Africa and India, where the workforce will increase by 1 billion people by 2050
World Bank - Poverty in Lebanon more than tripled in past decade
AI, Data & Development
Nature - Using machine learning to assess the livelihood impact of electricity access
Driving AI-Enabled Chat Solutions to Improve Lives - GenAI Accelerator Cohort Announced
Microsoft AI is first to predict air pollution for the whole world
AI In Precision Agriculture: Optimising Crop Yield Through Data-Driven Insights
Trust, human-centered AI and collaboration the focus of inaugural RAISE Health symposium
IrokoBench: A New Benchmark for African Languages in the Age of Large Language Models
Microsoft’s Kiswahili AI model to bridge tech inclusivity gap
The UNDP and the timbuktoo Africa Innovation Foundation have launched a Call for Applications for the first timbuktoo Fintech Hub in Africa. The Pan-African initiative is searching for people who can build or are already building fintech start-ups that leverage innovations in financial services
Apurba Kundu - The Missing Link: Need for Accessible Indian Health Datasets for Trustworthy AI Solutions
The Cybersecurity and AI Innovation Challenge Africa (CAICA) is looking for startups, researchers and founders
Sal Khan is pioneering innovation in education
Foreign Aid
Eirik Mofoss on Norwegian TV discussing how the aid budget can be more impactful
Devex Pro - How the Millennium Challenge Corporation, plans to spend almost $550m in the coming months
With $1 trillion US farm bill uncertain, aid groups try to protect Food for Peace
A €742 million cut to this year's aid budget is raising questions about France's commitment to aid
Japan doubles development aid in 10 years, vying with China
Netherlands plans €2.4 billion aid spending cut
South Korean president vows to expand mineral ties with Africa and send more development aid
Yaw - Book Review #1: Insights on Dambisa Moyo's Book: "Dead Aid"
Pro humanitarian aid, anti ODA
Angola alone is a quarter of all Chinese lending in Africa
In 2010, Rwanda was so aid dependent that aid was equivalent 17% of Rwanda’s GDP. In 2022, aid is closer to 8.3% of Rwanda’s GDP
EU breaches aid spending guideline in shift to ‘migration management’
Japan's foreign aid to focus more on tech, less on infrastructure
Unlock Aid - building an accountability platform for the aid industry
Where the US spends the most on foreign aid
$78.3B - Ukraine
$21.6B - Israel
$3.2B - Jordan
$2.9B - Egypt
$2B - Ethiopia
$1.5B - Nigeria
Replenishment
African Development Fund seeks $25B replenishment. Is it too ambitious?
WHO launches first investment round, asking for $11 billion
UN Hails $4.8 Bn In New Pledges To Boost Global Connectivity
Pandemic Fund eyes $2B funding target to kick-start new strategic plan
India
Forbes - India's Rise In The Global Supply Chain
India, Ghana agree to operationalise UPI link within 6 months, in order to enable instant fund transfers for users in both countries
Devex pro - How Indian development data is disappearing
India Link - Elections Breakdown: Reactions From Across India
India achieves 16% decline in new TB cases, 18% reduction in mortality since 2015
Economist - India has quietly transformed its ports
Vaccines & Pandemics
Saloni Dattani - New polio vaccines are key to preventing outbreaks and achieving eradication
Kelsey Piper - How the White House just made the world a little safer from biorisks
WHO - Dengue - Global situation
Gavi - Major infrastructure upgrade to Kenya’s vaccine cold chain rolls out
Is the fight against antimicrobial resistance finally gaining traction?
Major step in malaria prevention as three West African countries roll out vaccine
$14 trillion BOTEC cost to eradicate all infectious diseases
WHO releases progress report on neglected tropical diseases
In 2022, 1.62 billion people required interventions against NTDs. This reflects a 26% decrease from 2010
In 2023, five countries were acknowledged by WHO for eliminating one NTD, and one country for eliminating two NTDs
Saudi Arabia pledges $500m to protect children from polio
South Africa’s Afrigen targets local diseases with mRNA vaccines
The WHO’s failure to reach a pandemic agreement underscores a global health divide
Effective Giving
5 things you’ve got wrong about the Giving What We Can Pledge
GiveWell - Consider the eggplant
GiveWell’s Research Council
Humanitix has donated $4 million to The Life You Can Save
Corruption
Yaw - Thoughts about Corruption in Developing Countries
How Philip Morris International gained a foothold in Egypt’s tobacco market
SOAS has an ACE Anti-Corruption Course - “On this course, you’ll develop an understanding of corruption through theory and evidence. You’ll investigate the logic behind these strategies and assess the evidence of their limited success”
Agriculture
Agriculture exports drive Kenya’s economic growth to 5.6% in 2023 (up from 4.9%)
How farmers in India can be incentivised to save water
Innovation Commission partners with UAE and Gates Foundation to design a new mechanism to transition food systems innovations to scale
China approves genetically modified wheat crops
‘A catastrophe’: Greenpeace blocks planting of ‘lifesaving’ Golden Rice
African leaders pledge to triple fertilizer use to improve soil quality
Horn of Africa droughts: Research shows how a network of groundwater bores could help
In Ethiopia, New EU Regulations Require Ingenuity To Protect Coffee’s Future
Health
Novo Nordisk Foundation, Wellcome and the Gates Foundation join forces to accelerate global health equity and impact - committing $300 million
Dean Spears - Ask me questions about my 80,000 hours podcast on preventing neonatal deaths with Kangaroo Mother Care
Supriya - Introducing Ansh: A CE Incubated Charity
Chloe Lee - Improving Indoor Air Quality for Public Health in Malaysia
CGD - Redistributing Power in Global Health: A Survey of Options for Donors
Inside the U.S. and Panama’s long-running collaboration to rid an entire continent of a deadly disease
WHO - Stronger control efforts help to lower tobacco use in African region
The Global Observatory on Health R&D is a comprehensive source of information and analyses
GiveWell - A major initiative to scale up water chlorination in India
Environment
Todd Moss - How can new philanthropy help end energy poverty?
Landmark summit mobilises $2.2 billion to make 2024 a turning point for clean cooking access in Africa
Devex Pro - What's inside the $10B Bezos Earth Fund?
Hannah Ritchie - The world has (probably) passed peak pollution
Bezos Earth Fund Announces $100 Million for AI Solutions to Tackle Climate Change and Nature Loss
Giving Green’s climate regranting fund receives $10 million anonymous donation
Ember - Global Electricity Review 2024
Innovation & Metascience
80,000 Hours podcast - Matt Clancy on whether science is good
RoRI is partnering with the Center for Open Science to bring the Metascience 2025 conference to London
Japan’s push to make all research open access is taking shape
Accelerator For Innovation & Research Funding Experimentation has been launched
The Simon Abundance Index 2024 finds Earth’s resources 509% more plentiful than in 1980
Maxwell Tabarrok - Tax Cuts and Innovation - an underrated metascience policy
For academics interested in synthesising and communicating research for non-specialists - Open Philanthropy may be able to offer financial support (announcement point 3)
Jacob Trefethen - 10 U.S. policy ideas for 10 lifesaving technologies
Biotech
Decoding Bio Snapshot 2024 - looking at some of the most impactful papers in the tech/bio space
Science - AI & medical forecasting
An AI system that warned physicians to check on high-risk patients resulted in a 31% reduction in overall deaths among this group
Nature - Semaglutide compared with other anti-obesity medications is associated with a 50-56% lower risk for both the incidence and recurrence of alcohol use disorder for a 12-month follow-up period
Podcast on the AI revolution in biology with Amelie Schreiber
Ozempic is coming for the alcohol and tobacco industries next
AlphaFold 3 predicts the structure and interactions of all of life’s molecules
How successful are AI-discovered drugs in clinical trials? A first analysis and emerging lessons
“In Phase I we find AI-discovered molecules have an 80–90% success rate, substantially higher than historic industry averages”
Conflict
Conflicts drive new record of 75.9 million people living in internal displacement
‘Bleak milestone’: UN says 3 million forced to flee in Myanmar conflict
Sudan: Warnings of an invisible crisis on the brink of 'mass atrocity'
Foundations
The Chan Zuckerberg Initiative commits $3 billion over the next decade to curing disease in the next century
Ken Opalo - Two unsolicited ideas on how to invest some of Melinda French Gates’ $12.5 billion
Mental Health
Stan Pinsent - A Neglected Crisis: Perinatal Mental Illness in LMICs
NBER - The Effects of Mental Health Interventions on Labor Market Outcomes in LMICs
Against a Happiness Ceiling: Replicating Killingsworth & Kahneman
Grants
Open Philanthropy have made several grants recently
$12.7m - Global Health & Development
$5.7m - Hospital for Sick Children – Malaria Vaccine Research and Preclinical Development
$3.5m - KU Leuven — Influenza Antiviral Research
$1.3m - University of Oxford — Hepatitis C Challenge Model
$680k - Peterson Institute for International Economics — Indian Economic Policy Reform
$420k - Clinton Health Access Initiative — Aid Efficacy Support
$790k - Giving What We Can
$150k - Innovation Policy
Emergent Ventures Africa and Caribbean, fifth cohort
Other Links & Causes
Leah Pierson - Survey: bioethicists' views on bioethical issues
Lauren Gilbert - "Considering starting a group chat/meetup for GHD people who would like to write for a public audience. Anyone interested?"
CGD - Legislating to Prevent Violence against Children: Corporal Punishment Bans Are Necessary but Not Enough
How the World’s Deadliest Crises Go Unseen - In the Central African Republic, researchers found an astronomical death rate. Could a major emergency be invisible?
African Snakebite Alliance has been launched
CGD - Improving Outcomes for Economic Migrants and Refugees: A Role for MDBs?
5 things I learned working in an East African government
Aiding the search for good jobs: Evidence from Uganda
NBER - Overview of the literature on mobility in developing countries
Science - Induction of social contagion for diverse outcomes in structured experiments in isolated villages
Results-based funds aim to boost preschool access in Rwanda
24 global development organisations to watch in 2024
Nick Cowen - How the war on drunk driving was won
Is the number of natural disasters increasing?
Protopia Group (think tank) is formed of young professionals passionate about unlocking the world’s potential for growth
Effective Altruism
The Charity Commission has concluded its inquiry into EVF UK - “the inquiry found that the trustees took appropriate steps to protect the charity’s funds and complied with their legal duties acting diligently and quickly following the collapse of FTX.”
EA Survey: Cause Prioritisation
Ryan Briggs - “what EA can contribute to established areas like development studies”
Ryan Briggs - “When you strip out the branding of EA and just ask development studies professors if they agree with EA ideas, they overwhelmingly do.”
Good News
Belize, Jamaica, and St. Vincent and the Grenadines are the latest Caribbean countries to be certified for the elimination of mother-to-child transmission of HIV and syphilis
Maternal deaths have halved in the last 35 years
