GDP - The Global Development Primer

The war between Israel and Hamas is unfolding into a humanitarian catastrophe. Water is the most precious resource for Gaza, and it is in short supply. Ground water supplies are sparse, and Israel controls inflow into Gaza. To punish Hamas, Israel temporarily turned off the taps which led to further humanitarian emergencies.

Israel has mastered scarce water resource technology, including de-salinization. This technology could come to Gaza, but it is not. Why? Clive Lipchin joins us to share his expertise on how this technology could greatly help the people of Gaza, and he explains why it hasn't been brought in it yet.

Clive Lipchin is a renowned environmental scientist and water resource management expert. Clive has dedicated his career to addressing water-related challenges in arid regions, particularly in the Middle East. He founded and currently directs the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies' Center for Transboundary Water Management, an institution recognized for its innovative work in cross-border water management and cooperation between Israelis, Palestinians and Jordanians. Throughout his career, Lipchin has actively promoted regional collaboration on water-related issues, seeking to foster peace and sustainability through shared water resources. His work has earned him international acclaim and has made a significant impact on the field of environmental science and peacebuilding in the Middle East.

As smelly as they are, flatulent cattle really take their toll on the climate. Major producers of methane, cattle, and other industrialized animals in agriculture, produces detrimental levels of methane which warm the planet faster than carbon. Not only is there no end in sight to seeking alternatives to this industry, but the World Bank has approved Industrial Agriculture as being compliant to the Paris Climate Commitment. Kelly McNamara joins us this week to offer a stern warning as to why industrial agriculture for animals should be a thing of the past for a climate conscious future.

Kelly McNamara is a senior research and policy analyst in Friends of the Earth US’ Agriculture and Climate Finance Program. Her work involves collaborating with teams across FOE and broader coalitions of NGOs from the Global North and South to engage multilateral development banks (MDBs) and private sector financiers on their investments in industrial animal agriculture. Prior to joining Friends of the Earth, Kelly worked as a business researcher and writer at Harvard Business School and EY and as an advisor and research fellow at industrial animal agriculture-focused NGOs including The Humane League and Pivot Food Investment. Kelly holds a BA in philosophy from the University of Pennsylvania and an MPhil in philosophy from Cambridge University.

War is raging in The Gaza Strip. As Israel prepares for a ground invasion, Hamas holds dozens of prisoners, and now with knowledge that U.S. citizens are in the mix, it all spells disaster for Gaza. The Gaza Strip, home to 2.3 million people under a heavy blockade on movement and basic resources, are now facing an unprecedented humanitarian crisis in this conflict.

The simple question is: "Why"? Why blockade water, energy, bread, and ice, when the worry is military rockets? Why restrict movement so strictly, when trade routes for weapons are clearly succeeding in getting weaponry into Gaza to use against Israel. It makes no sense as to why humanitarian hurt is being used a military tactic. To help us unpack this, we have Rida Abu Rass joining use from Kingston, Ontario, Canada.

Rida Abu Rass is a PhD candidate at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario. He is a Palestinian citizen of Israel, born in Tayibe, in the ‘Triangle’ area near the West Bank, and raised in Jaffa and Tel Aviv. He is interested in the factors that facilitate and obstruct political mobilization among ethnopolitical movements, with an emphasis on the Palestinian community within Israel. Rida has also taught and written about the political history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, on Middle East politics, social movements, democratization and nationalism. Before coming to Queen’s, he worked as a data coordinator at B’Tselem, Israel’s leading human rights organization. In his spare time, he writes op-eds, and he blogs.

Almost 1/3 of the 8 billion people on this planet have never used the internet. Landlocked countries, conflict zones and remote islands have the highest rates of people who have never "logged on". This is a problem that goes beyond being a new face of inequality. As Anir Chowdhury says, the internet "is like oxygen"as those who have it, exist through it. But for those who do not have access or have low-literacy skills in technology the opportunities for exploitation, deception, and misinformation are enormous. Through "frugal innovation" Bangladesh's a2i programme plans to push back against the threats of the digital divide. Anir Chowdhury joins us from Dhaka.

Anir Chowdhury is the Policy Advisor of the a2i Programmme of the ICT Division and the Cabinet Division of the Government of Bangladesh supported by the UNDP. In this capacity, he leads the formation of a whole-of-society innovation ecosystem in Bangladesh through massive technology deployment, extensive capacity development, integrated policy formulation, whole-of-government institutional reform, and an Innovation Fund. His work on innovation in public service has developed interesting and replicable models of service delivery decentralization, public-private partnerships, and transformation of a traditional bureaucracy into a forward-looking, citizen-centric service provider.

He is a regular speaker in international conferences on public service innovation and reform, digital financial inclusion, data driven policy making, civil registration and digital identity management, SDGs, youth and community empowerment, educational transformation, public-private partnerships, and South-South Cooperation. He regularly writes in reputed national and international blogs, journals and publications. 

The Sustainable Development Goals were at the top of the agenda for the United Nations General Assembly in New York this year. How many donor countries get a failing grade when it comes to meeting the target of contributing 0.7% of their Gross National Income? A lot. But 3 countries in Europe are standing out as leaders in surpassing the 0.7% commitment. And this comes at a time when countries like the United States and the United Kingdom are focusing more development dollars back on to their own shores and borders.

In this episode of GDP, Ian Mitchell from London's Centre for Global Development joins us to talk about why some countries are giving more than ever to international development, and why others are losing interest.

Ian Mitchell is a senior fellow and the director of development cooperation in Europe at the Center for Global Development. He leads CGD’s work in Europe on how governments’ policies accelerate or inhibit development and poverty reduction—considering both the effectiveness of aid and policies beyond aid including trade, migration, environment, and security. He is also an associate fellow at Chatham House and at the Institute for Fiscal Studies.

It continues to baffle many as how hunger remains in a planet of 8 billion people when there is the ability and potential to feed everyone. In this conversation with Tim Prewitt, CEO of the Hunger Project, we explain why Las Vegas buffets probably won't save humanity from hunger. But local level community development projects in Uganda just might.

In Uganda, The Hunger Project is working in nine districts where agro-ecological zones - referred to as epicenters - have been set up. Across the epicenters in Africa, participants create community farms, where they learn regenerative agriculture practices such as composting, intercropping, and drip irrigation to promote biodiversity, improve crop yields, restore soil fertility, and make the best use of scarce resources. In addition, community partners receive training on food processing to reduce food waste. 

Tim Prewitt is an international executive, CEO and board member with more than 20 years of experience leading global teams to deliver impact at scale, through agricultural development, social enterprises, gender empowerment, impact investment, community-led development, and policy reform. He joined The Hunger Project as President and CEO on February 1, 2021. 

The spring meetings of the IMF and the World Bank are underway. Climate change adaptation is a top concern, and many wonder whether or not emerging economies can be part of the New Green Industrial Age. Technology, resources and political will exist. But do the finances? Will green technology remain a reserved commodity for affluent nations? Is it possible to change over millions of two-stroke Tuk-Tuks to emission free vehicles. None of it will happen without the right economic model behind. Oliver Schwank joins us this week to talk about how we can actually make that possible.

Globally, public health is pretty beat up after the pandemic. High and low income countries alike are struggling to get their own health systems back to capacity, let alone think about preparing for the next global pandemic. Yet, if pandemics teach us anything, being prepared for the next one is what really matters. As Spring meetings commence for the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, Amanda Glassman from the Center for Global Development joins us to talk about what world leaders should be thinking about when it comes to pandemic readiness, and the lessons learned coming out of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Amanda Glassman is executive vice president and senior fellow at the Center for Global Development and also serves as chief executive officer of CGD Europe. Her research focuses on priority-setting, resource allocation and value for money in global health, as well as data for development. Prior to her current position, she served as director for global health policy at the Center from 2010 to 2016, and has more than 25 years of experience working on health and social protection policy and programs in Latin America and elsewhere in the developing world.

During the COVID-19 pandemic women health care leaders stood out. Jurisdictions with women as elected leaders or top public health policy experts seemed to manage the challenges of the pandemic a bit better, and with a bit more public trust. Well before the pandemic, in parts of rural India communities that train Dalit women as community health workers often experienced dramatic improvements in health outcomes, all the while challenging rigid gender norms. We know that gender equity in health delivery, policy and management only brings better outcomes. Yet, the glass ceiling remains, and is seemingly reinforced. In countries where more than half the medical students are women, the majority of specialists remain men. In other countries women who enter the health professions as nurses stay planted as such while men ascend to leadership roles. For Ann Keeling this needs to change. Listen to this episode of GDP where she discusses why we'd all benefit from taking gender equity seriously in global health.

Ann Keeling is Women in Global Health’s Senior Fellow, is a British citizen whose 40-year career in global health and social development has included posts in Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Indonesia, the Caribbean, Belgium, the USA, and her home country, the UK. She held the post of Head of Gender Equality Policy with the UK Government and is currently the Chair of the NGO Age International and Senior Fellow of Women in Global Health. Ann Keeling has been CEO of two global health NGOs, was UNFPA Country Representative Pakistan, and Director Commonwealth Secretariat leading on Health, Education, and Gender. Between 2008 and 2012 she was Chief Executive Officer of the International Diabetes Federation, founded the NCD (Non-Communicable Diseases) Alliance, and as Chair, led the successful campaign for the 2011 UN High-Level Summit on NCDs. Ann Keeling spent 9 years in Pakistan with the British Council, DFID, and UNDP working on human development and women’s rights. She also held senior posts with the Governments of Papua New Guinea and Pakistan. She studied at Oxford University UK, Ann Arbor University USA, and in 1981, at the People’s University in Beijing, China.

Many countries around the world are growing deeply concerned about the health and well being of their democracies.  China's foreign interference in elections is is a major concern at the moment for Canada, as it has been to New Zealand.  But foreign governments are not necessarily the greatest to the health of democracies.  In fact, one of the greatest threats to democratic well being may be a lack of feminism.  On this international women's day, Dr. Gabrielle Bardall takes us through the concerns and threats that arise when democracies shrug feminism.  She also makes the case the democracies are best prepared for foreign threats and interference when they embrace feminist principles.  Check out this episode of GDP to learn more.  

An educator, advisor and activist, Dr. Bardall has worked to advance democracy and human rights in over 60 countries worldwide over the past two decades. She has advised and trained diplomats, legislators and civil servants from Parliament Hill to Capitol Hill. Recognizing that "democracy" as we know it and support it around the world often replicates structures of oppression, she started her own consulting firm in 2019, Herizon Democracy, to bring feminist vision to international democracy assistance. She has advised the US National Security Council, State Department and NATO on feminist approaches to democracy support and offered testimony to Canada's Parliament. Bardall has worked with leading organizations in realizing this vison, including numerous UN agencies and international non-profits. A prolific author and public speaker, she holds degrees from McGill University (BA), Sciences-Po Paris (MA) and l’Université de Montreal (PhD). She received the American Political Science Association’s Congressional Fellowship and the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Doctoral Scholarship for her work in comparative democratization. Dr. Bardall lives on the South Shore of Nova Scotia with her husband and toddler twins.

"Permacrisis" was declared word of the year by Collins English Dictionary.  The idea is that state of crisis lingers on despite society's best efforts to wish it weren't there.  War, climate change, economic crisis, and global inequality are with us.  How do we begin to understand what we're up against?  Do we pursue learning in order to find solutions?  Do we attempt to learn new skills to adapt?  Or do approach these heavy topics with the intent to take care of our selves, especially our own emotional needs?  In this episode of GDP Solla Zophoniasdottir joins us to talk about ways to lean into the permacrisis, so that we can adapt, we can improve, and we can face challenges with bravery and compassion.  Check out this episode where Dr. Bob shares some of his stories handling crisis as a firefighter - even when calls come in during a podcast recording.  

Solla Zophoniasdottir is the Learning Services Orchestrator at EIT Climate-KIC where she is responsible for the strategic development of learning and capability building activities across the organization.

Over the past 15 years, Solla has worked to expand and facilitate the learning processes of organisations, with a focus on skill building and shifting mindsets to see transformation in the climate space. She is an expert in organizational change management, working to create change both within and across different cultures. She is passionate about systems change and innovation and working with practitioners who have the power to make transformational change on some of our world’s biggest challenges.

Solla holds a MSc in Strategic Leadership towards sustainability and a BA in in Leadership and process management. In addition, she has accreditation in Organization & Relationship systems coaching.

We promise that this podcast write up is in fact written by a human being.  But we can't say the same about this episode of GDP itself.  In this episode we let ChatGpt do some of the work by scripting dialogue, and then we ask it to write an essay about climate change and climate justice.  With us this week is Dr. Becca Babcock and Dr. Anders Hayden both from Dalhousie University.  Dr. Babcock provides some reflection on the use of AI, and how she has managed to go as far as using it as a teaching tool in her classes.  Dr. Hayden evaluates a ChatGpt essay and even gives it a grade.  It's an episode for educators, students, and development practitioners who fear that AI may take their jobs.  Worry not, as our guests this week discuss, AI remains a tool rather than a certain path of cyborgs taking over the planet.

Dr. Becca Babcock is the Assistant Dean of Student Matters in the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences at Dalhousie University, where she also teaches writing. She has published two books: a novel, One Who Has Been Here Before (Vagrant Press/Nimbus Publishing, 2021) and a short story cycle, Every Second Weekend (Blaurock Press, 2011). Her forthcoming novel, Some There Are Fearless (Vagrant Press/Nimbus Publishing) is due this April.

Dr. Anders Hayden is Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science at Dalhousie University, with an emphasis on environmental politics. He is particularly interested in the concept of sufficiency and related post-growth ideas and initiatives. This interest has led him to examine issues such as sustainable consumption, work-time reduction, and the political and policy impacts of alternative measures of wellbeing and prosperity (“beyond GDP” measurement) in Canada, the United Kingdom, the United States, and Bhutan. He is the author of When Green Growth Is Not Enough: Climate Change, Ecological Modernization, and Sufficiency (McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2014) and Sharing the Work, Sparing the Planet: Work Time, Consumption & Ecology (Zed Books / Between the Lines, 1999). He is the co-editor of the Routledge Handbook of Global Sustainability Governance (Routledge, 2020) and Towards Sustainable Well-Being: Moving beyond GDP in Canada and the World (University of Toronto Press, 2022).

If you've studied global development, you probably didn't get too far into the curriculum before learning about how private partnerships in development have led to ruin more than once.  Oil companies, mining companies, water companies, chemical companies and others have all been called out on human rights abuses.  Yet, the private sector remains a major player in global development.  Gina Volynsky suggests that it is because the private sector has evolved into a broader ecosystem than in the past.  Now with more binding accountability for ecological and human impact, private sector partnerships continue to emerge in difficult circumstances, but with the ability to learn and improve?  Or is there a risk for repeated mistakes of the past? And what about the concept of the private sector in China's development model? Listen here, and you be the judge.

Gina Volynsky is a senior director of private sector practice with PACT.  She has over 25 years of experience in international development, including 14 years of living and working in emerging economies. She has dedicated much of her career to collaborating with the private sector to address development challenges, which included heading a team working for USAID on private-sector engagement, and designing and managing multi-country programs for the UNDP that created the infrastructure to partner with multinationals. While at the World Bank she served as country manager for MIGA, which provides political risk insurance to companies that invest in emerging economies. She set up and managed business development divisions for Crown Agents and CARANA. She has also worked directly in the private sector, running her own import-export company, and served as director of marketing for a U.S.-based financial services company.

Journalists, it’s often said, write the first drafts of history because they are the first recorders and commentators of current events and social realities.  And the last couple of years have been a meaty first draft.  A global pandemic, a rise in authoritarianism, economic chaos, war in Europe, and now Artificial Intelligence that will write essays for you, and probably one day curate podcasts.  Has the world gone upside?  Will it right itself?  Instead of searching fro the prolific crystal ball, Dr. Luis Martínez-Fernández suggests that we get the historians involved to understand how broader social processes connect these issues, and how crises have been handled in the past.  Can the perspective of history seriously work to guide societies out of crisis and chaos?  Tune in to find out.

In When the World Turned Upside Down: Politics, Culture and the Unimaginable Events of 2019-2022, award-winning historian and nationally syndicated columnist Luis Martínez-Fernández adeptly examines current U.S. and worldwide events from the intersection of opinion journalism, chronicling, and historical writing. This rare combination of methods and approaches offers readers unique insights on how history sheds light on contemporary matters and how our present preoccupations shape the way we look at and understand the past. The book, thus, invites readers into a dialogue between past and present, and at times, the near future.

Dr. Luis Martínez-Fernández is a historian, university professor, author, consultant, and public speaker, whose fields of expertise include Latin America, the Caribbean, education, and Latino/Hispanic politics, culture, and society.

Born in Havana, Cuba and raised in Lima, Peru and San Juan, Puerto Rico, he holds B.A. and M.A. degrees in History from the University of Puerto Rico and a Ph.D. in History from Duke University.

Dr. Martínez-Fernández has vast experience as consultant in the areas of education, diversity, transcultural communications, outreach, media, and publishing.

A Pegasus Professor of History at the University of Central Florida since 2004, he is recognized as one of the most prolific and influential scholars in the field of Caribbean history. His publications include articles in Cuban Studies, Slavery and Abolition, Latin American Research Review, The Americas, Caribbean Studies, and in numerous edited volumes.

The power of stories in global development cannot be under-estimated.  Chronicling experiences, encounters and adventures can inspire others to journey, engage and do the same.  Rich stories can build relations and understanding in rich and dynamic ways.  Telling stories comes with great power and responsibility.  Stereotypes can be forged, speaking on behalf of others leads to patriarchy, and sensationalism can create harmful representations of the land and life of peoples and cultures.  These issues matter to Nancy Edwards.  Having established an impressive career in global health and nursing, Dr. Edwards is now taking the time to explore the power and purpose of memoirs.  Check out this episode of GDP to hear her thoughts and the advice she offers others hoping to chronicle their journeys.

Nancy Edwards is a Distinguished Professor and Professor Emeritus, School of Nursing, University of Ottawa.  Dr. Edwards obtained her undergraduate nursing degree from the University of Windsor and completed graduate studies in epidemiology at McMaster University and McGill University. She is a fellow of the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences.

Dr. Edwards’ professional interests are in the fields of public and population health. She has worked in global health for most of her career focusing on capacity building, the delivery of maternal and child health programs, reducing health inequities, and implementation research.  She has mentored many colleagues, led global health program delivery and research initiatives on four continents, and shaped strategic directions for global health during her tenure as a Scientific Director with the Canadian Institutes of Health Research.

In both Canada and abroad, Nancy has drawn on her foundational global health learning roots in Sierra Leone, West Africa, where she worked as a community health nurse and program evaluator for five years.  Nancy captures these experiences in her book Not One, Not Even One: A Memoir of Life-altering Experiences in Sierra Leone, West Africa.  Her book was released by FriesenPress earlier this year (www.nancyedwards.ca).

When a World Bank Development project gets rolling, people's lives will be impacted. Sometimes for the better?  Sometimes for the worse.  If you are a person living in a project impacted community, and you feel that your life will worsen, what can you do?  Protest? Standby and watch?  Leave your home?  These are all options, but another key option is to take your concerns to the highest levels of the World Bank.  Sometimes forgotten in many international development studies courses, the World Bank's Inspection Panel is an arm's length body that will hear complaints, look over the details, and take it to the top brass in the World Bank.  How do negatively impacted peoples get a hold of the panel?  Is there accountability?  Can the panel put the brakes on a potentially harmful project?  Listen to this episode of GDP where Ramanie Kunanayagam, the Panel Chair of the World Bank Inspection Panel, takes us through the details.  

Ramanie Kunanayagam, is a Sri Lankan-born Australian citizen, was appointed to the Inspection Panel on December 16, 2018, and became Panel Chair on January 1, 2022. She brings to the Panel three decades of experience across diverse geopolitical and multicultural environments in the private and public sectors.

Ms. Kunanayagam spent more than 10 years doing fieldwork in a remote part of East Kalimantan, Indonesia. She has held leadership positions in sustainability in both the private sector (working for two FTSE 10 companies) and the nonprofit sector. Most recently before joining the Panel she was the Global Head for Social Performance and Human Rights for BG Group. She has been a member of the boards of two international non-profit development organizations—RESOLVE and the Institute of Human Rights and Business.

Health and human needs only intensify during a conflict.  Persons relying on disability-inclusive spaces and services face enormous challenges when attempting to flee their homes because of the threat of invasion or attack.  Moldova continues to receive refugees from Ukraine, many of whom are in great need of disability inclusive care.  But Who Cares?  Where does the responsibility to provide care and services lie in such crises?  One organization is stepping in to answer the call. Based on in its long-term work in Moldova, Keystone Human Services made a Commitment to Action at the Clinton Global Initiative to provide spaces of care for those fleeing the war in Ukraine.  Recorded live at the Clinton Global Initiative in Manhattan, we are joined with Charlie Hooker, Charles Sweeder, and Nicolae Ciocan to talk about the important work that they are doing in Moldova today.

Keystone Human Services (KHS) announced a new Commitment to Action at this year’s Clinton Global Initiative in New York. Through this Commitment, entitled “Inclusive Crisis Response and Recovery – Rebuilding Forward – Moldova/Ukraine,” KHS will coordinate a national-level disability-inclusive relief and response effort within Moldova to support refugees from Ukraine, as well as Moldovan communities providing support, addressing both immediate basic and longer-term targeted needs.

The Guatemalan genocide was the systematic murder of Maya civilians during the government rule in the 1970s and 1980s.  Some 200,000 lives were taken by military and paramilitary operations during this era, all the while the government denied it was occurring. Governments are notoriously lousy at hiding secrets forever, and the military dictatorship in Guatemala was no exception.  In 2005 an abandoned room was discovered by Guatemala's human rights office.  In it was a vast collection of police records, reports and other documents that revealed the systemic implementation of murder and violence against Maya people by the government. A "staggering discovery" of records that proudly documented abuse and murder, this collection of documents was one of the most revealing collections of documents from Guatemala's dirty war.  

The police archive revealed that not only was genocide carefully planned and systemically executed, but it was proudly recorded!  Dr. Catherine Nolin's research and teaching focuses on learning from the afterlife of those who were targeted during the genocide.  Her research digs into the deeper significance of the genocide and how it was recorded.  And, she even takes her students and colleagues on field trips to Guatemala to engage in this historic landscape of violence first hand.  In this conversation, she outlines her work.

Child exploitation.  Any is too much.  No government in the world would openly advocate for child exploitation.  Yet, it occurs with impunity.  The Out of the Shadows Index is a tool that can help get governments get on track to prevent vulnerabilities for child exploitation. Check out this episode with Rute Caldeira from Ignite Philanthropy, who is overseeing the strategic direction of the Out of the Shadows Index.

Rute Caldeira has almost two decades of experience in the development and the good governance sectors, where she has built considerable expertise in evaluating the impact of evidence-based advocacy initiatives that aim to enable policy changes, and in developing effective and sustainable strategies for these initiatives. Currently she works as Ignite Philanthropy’s senior strategy advisor responsible, among other things, for the strategic direction and impact of the Out of the Shadows index.

We want affordable housing!  And we want housing to be the greatest appreciating asset!  How can it be both?  

This antipodal relationship is not only impossible to fulfill, its consequences are falling on renters.  In the United States the average renter has a few thousand dollars of net wealth, while home owners boast hundreds of thousands.   

Michael Barnes sees this problem not as a wealth management problem, but as an issue of racial and gender discrimination.  The renter wealth equity gap is aimed at single mothers, African Americans, Hispanic Americans, and newcomers.  His firm, Viva Equity Fund, has a plan to get more wealth into the pockets of renters, while costing landlords nothing in the process.  How?  Tune in to this Episode of GDP, recorded live at the Clinton Global Initiative 2022, to find out. #CGI2022

A 17-year old student from Ukraine who may be able to put the land mine business out of business.  A video game that connects players to solving pressing climate change challenges.  And a robotic habitat for bees.  These are 3 stories of innovations that are unfolding not just so people can thrive, but so they can thrive.  In this episode of GDP, broadcast live from the CGI 2022 meeting in New York City alongside the UNGA, we meet 3 innovators who's ideas put into action may make a world of difference.  Praise aside, these innovators show how a commitment to be present to a problem can lead into an executable action.  It's a lesson for students, teachers, and policy makers alike on how to beat "development anxiety" and put it into commitments to action.

Igor Klymenko studies Physical and Mathematical sciences at the Kyiv Polytechnic Institute. Igor is passionate about raising awareness of, and solving, the global landmine problem.

Sankari Studies is  a team of game developers, ecopreneurs, creatives, dreamers, technologists, solutionists, visionaries, storytellers, rebels, disruptors, and environmentalists, who have rallied to take a stand to fight the demise of our planet and pull it back from the brink of destruction.

Saar Safra is a tech-geek, a serial entrepreneur, and CEO of Beewise

Not since 2016 has the Clinton Global Initiative met in person to make commitments for action against pressing global challenges.  Climate change, health care, inclusive economic growth, gender inequalities, even the health and well being of bees.  It's all on the table.  For this episode of GDP, Dr. Bob heads to New York to catch the conversations of world leaders in government, business, or the non-profit sector to better understand "The business of how".  How are these leaders approaching these problems, and what will they do about it?

In this episode we hear from Former U.S. President Bill Clinton, Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley, and José Andrés founder of world central kitchen about getting ideas "unstuck" and what needs to happen going forward when it comes to climate change and the emergencies that follow climate-related disasters.

Imagine this.  A Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) founded in a post-conflict country in Western Africa that offers assistance to the Global North.  And what if that same NGO refuses funds from those who disagree with its feminist mandate, and yet continues to thrive?  And what if this organization, Purposeful - based in Sierra Leone, is a leading example of how to turn the development industry right around.  In Sierra Leone Chernor Bah the Co-CEO of Purposeful joins GDP this week to explain exactly how a commitment to values, respect of morals, and belief in the goal of empowering girls is an approach to development that is so sorely needed.  For any development practitioner, student, or scholar, you will not want to miss this conversation.  

Chernor Bah is a feminist leader, activist, and champion who works in Sierra Leone and around the world to empower girls and young people. As the Co-founder and Co-CEO of Purposeful- the first Africa-rooted global feminist hub for girls activism - he dedicates his time to building power and amplifying  the voices of girls and young women while promoting distribution of  unrestricted funds to girls and feminist activists in Sierra Leone and over 150 countries around the world. He’s a leading voice of reform and decolonisation of the global development industry.  A lifelong champion for human rights, at age 15, Chernor founded and led the the Children’s Forum Network  -a mass movement of children who mobilized to demand their voices be included in peace and reconciliation efforts after Sierra Leone’s civil war. Globally recognized for his activism and expertise on girls, global education and youth rights, he has been appointed numerous times by the United Nations Secretary-General and is a frequent speaker and advisor at high-level platforms including the United Nations, The European Union, the World Bank, and at major universities around the world. His writings have appeared in the Lancet, the New York Times, the Guardian, Africa is a Country, DEVEX, and several other influential platforms.

Great ideas can be contagious.  But they need networks, validation, and times mentorship.  For the first time since 2016, the Clinton Global Initiative is coming back to New York alongside the United Nations General Assembly to bring together established and emerging leaders from government, business and philanthropy to tackle some of the world's most pressing challenges.  From war in Ukraine to the global climate crisis, to searching for inclusive economic development coming out of the pandemic.  It is a gathering, both in person and online, that will foster commitments to action to address these issues at local and global levels.  In the words of President Clinton, this event is about bringing diverse partners together to take action and to achieve real results to create a cultural of possibility in a world hungry for hope.  Kevin Thurm, the CEO of the Clinton Foundation joins us to discuss how this initiative works.

Kevin Thurm is the chief executive officer of the Clinton Foundation. He previously served as a senior counselor at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), where he worked with Secretary Sylvia Burwell and HHS senior leadership on a number of cross-cutting strategic initiatives, including continuing implementation of the Affordable Care Act. Prior to that role, Kevin held various leadership positions at Citigroup, including chief compliance officer and deputy general counsel. Before joining Citigroup, Thurm served as the deputy secretary and chief of staff for the Department of Health and Human Services under Secretary Donna E. Shalala. He received a bachelor’s from Tufts University in 1983; a bachelor’s/master’s from Oxford University in 1986, where he was a Rhodes Scholar; and a J.D. from Harvard Law School in 1989.

Finish your prescriptions even if you feel well.  Wash your hands.  And get ready for a tough new era of global health: Antimicrobial resistance.  Antibiotics were the greatest heroes of World War 2.  Thanks to this miracle medicine the 2nd world war was the first major conflict where people died of the actual wounds, not of infection.  Praise for antibiotics was so high following World War 2 that it put entire global health literatures of disease prevention and health promotion on the shelf - with the hope that pills would be enough.  And in 2022 we're still overprescribing antibiotic technology from the 1960s and 1970s to people and animals alike.  The consequence?  Bacterium is starting to adapt.  And when it does, as with diseases like tuberculosis, the consequences are horrendous.  Anthony McDonnell is sending a clear warning, that without proper change and action, antimicrobial resistance will impact global health so hard, it will make COVID-19 look like an annoyance.  

Anthony McDonnell is a senior policy analyst at the Center for Global Development (CGD), working to support national decision making and prioritisation of healthcare in Ethiopia through iDSI and as the technical lead for CGD’s working group on Antimicrobial Procurement. Previously, McDonnell led CGD’s work to analyse the COVID-19 vaccine portfolio and a project examining policy interventions to protect the supply chains for pharmaceuticals from COVID-19 induced shocks.

Before joining CGD, McDonnell worked as the Head of Economic Research for the UK’s independent review into antimicrobial resistance (O’Neill Review). Following this, he co-wrote a book with Harvard University Press called Superbugs: An Arms Race against Bacteria. He has also worked as a Senior Health Economist at the University of Oxford studying malaria interventions, and as a research associate at ODI where he led work examining why countries established universal health coverage and how best to get health care to left behind groups.

In Uganda 1 in 5 high-school aged children attend classes.  In rural areas the number plummets to only 5% for young girls.  This is in a country where 55% of the population is under 18.  Ronald Kibirige works with InteRoots, an organization that sees how serious this education crisis is in Uganda.  Beyond getting students into classrooms, there is real concern that traditions, oral histories, and knowledges are at risk of vanishing.  It is why his work is about keeping traditional knowledge alive and well for all generations in Uganda.  It is a project with a solid and sound reminder that it is community strength and resilience that is at the heart of development.  

Ronald Kibirige is a Music and Dance Practitioner, Instrumentalist, Educationist and Researcher of African Music and Dance traditions. He pursued his undergraduate education in Music and Dance at Makerere University – Kampala. He completed graduate studies in Dance Knowledge, Practice and Heritage in a consortium of four Universities; University of Blaise Pascal-France, University of Szeged – Hungary, University of Roehampton – London, and the Norwegian University of Science and Technology – Norway, where he recently completed his doctoral studies in Humanities and the Arts.

Beyond Academia and the Arts, Ronald has significant experience with nonprofit collaborations and management in Africa.

People are paying more for food in 2022 - a lot more!  And in countries where food security is frail, access to the basics is going to get harder.  Price spikes are being felt around the world.  In some cases leading to violence, in other cases, triggering famine warnings.  Russia's war in Ukraine is fuelling the crisis first by targeting Ukraine's wheat and sunflower oil producers, and second by disrupting global trade networks.  What should G7 and G20 nations be doing about this?  According to Ian Mitchell, it may be time to go beyond traditional notions of food aid, and to look at a bigger determinant:  Finance.

Ian Mitchell is a senior fellow and the director of development cooperation in Europe at the Center for Global Development. He leads CGD’s work in Europe on how governments’ policies accelerate or inhibit development and poverty reduction—considering both the effectiveness of aid and policies beyond aid including trade, migration, environment, and security. He is also an associate fellow at Chatham House and at the Institute for Fiscal Studies.

Mitchell has expertise in the economics and developmental impact of including on trade, agriculture, and policy development in the EU and G20. He leads the annual Commitment to Development Index (CDI) and the Quality of Official Development Assistance (QuODA). Recently, he has developed new measures of how agriculture and trade policies affect lower income countries; identified new metrics of aid effectiveness; and developed new approaches to the UK’s development policy post-Brexit.

In this season finale of GDP, James Grall joins the conversation about how development practitioners can do what they do best in a challenging post-pandemic world.  Will remote working be part of the equation?  Are there risks of relying remote technology in countries with heavy handed internet surveillance?  Are there opportunities for development scholars and practitioners to get "back in the field".  Now with the war in Ukraine grinding on, what other challenges will continue to unfold for global development going forward?  Don't miss this conversation with James Grall. 

James Grall has 25 years of experience in international development. He has designed and implemented complex activities in economic growth, democracy and governance, energy, environment and natural resources, health and education. James currently leads the Pact regional portfolios for Asia, Europe, Latin America and global programs. James has lived and worked in Southeast Asia since 2005 and is presently based in Bangkok, Thailand. James holds a master's degree in international affairs and U.S. foreign policy from The American University. When not at work, James is usually found with his husband and four dogs on a beach somewhere in Asia or at the piano.

Deep poverty is increasing.  Since the COVID-19 pandemic is making more people poorer - especially those who are already experiencing poverty.  Some estimates suggest that COVID-19 wiped out the global gains on poverty alleviation in the three to four years before the pandemic.  Knowing this?  Now what?  How can development practitioners begin to address this challenge?  According to Kate Schecter, one of the key components may be more obvious than we think:  "saving money".  Check out this episode of GDP to learn more about her ideas and approach.  

Kate Schecter, Ph.D., joined World Neighbors as the President and CEO in June of 2014.  World Neighbors is a 71 year old international development organization that works with rural isolated communities to help find solutions to permanently lift these communities out of poverty.  Dr. Schecter is responsible for managing World Neighbors’ programs and operations in 14 countries in Asia, Africa, Latin America, and the Caribbean.  In her previous position, she worked for the American International Health Alliance (AIHA) for 14 years.  As a Senior Program Officer at AIHA, she had responsibility for managing health partnerships throughout Eurasia and Central and Eastern Europe.  She worked with over 35 partnerships addressing primary healthcare, chronic disease management, hospital management, maternal/child health, Tuberculosis, blood safety and HIV/AIDS.

Dr. Schecter holds a Ph.D. in political science from Columbia University and an M.A. in Soviet Studies from Harvard University. She is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and served on the Board of Children’s National Medical Center in Washington, D.C. from 2010 to 2018.

If you thought that the COVID-19 pandemic knocked put the threat of terrorism to rest?  Think again.  Sondre Lindahl sees the threat of terrorism happening anywhere that there is political instability.  The form it takes?  Who perpetuates it, and how they carry out actions can vary widely, but rest assured, the threat of terror activities remains high.  So how should the world prepare and respond?  Sondre Lindahl suggests that the Global War on Terror was the wrong approach, and instead of using resources and political imaginations that way, can there be better global cooperation to work further upstream to prevent extremism?  Tune in to find out.

Sondre Lindahl is Associate Professor in Political Science at Østfold University College, Norway. He holds a PhD from the National Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies, University of Otago, New Zealand. His main research interest is counterterrorism, and he is the author of a A Critical Theory of Counterterrorism: Ontology, Epistemology and Normativity. He is a regular commentator on issues of security and terrorism in Norway.

Humanitarian organizations do their jobs well in times of crisis.  Be it crisis born from conflict, famine, climate change, or natural disasters, the humanitarian sector knows how to respond to people's needs when they are in need.  Mark Lowcock suggests that despite this great work on the ground, it almost always takes shape as reactions to crisis, rather than prevention of crisis.  With 35 years of humanitarian experience, Mark Lowcock's forthcoming book "Relief Chief" makes the case that global humanitarian efforts need to work on preventing crisis.  It requires accepting the challenges of a new paradigm of humanitarian emergencies and by ensuring that the needs of those in crisis are heard and responded to with appropriate care and compassion.

Mark's new book is titled "Relief Chief: A Manifesto for Saving Lives in Dire Times.

Mark Lowcock was appointed United Nations Under‑Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator in May 2017 and served in that role until June 2021. He was previously Permanent Secretary of the United Kingdom’s Department for International Development. As one of the most distinguished international public servants, Lowcock has spent more than 35 years leading and managing responses to humanitarian crises across the globe. He has authored opinion articles for The Washington Post, Financial Times, The Guardian, The Times, Le Monde, CNN, and others. He was twice awarded medals by Queen Elizabeth II for services to international development and public service, including Knighthood in 2017. He is a Visiting Professor of Practice in the Department of International Development at the London School of Economics and a Distinguished Non-Resident Fellow at the Center for Global Development.

When it comes to addressing global health challenges, handling stigma is essential.  In Eswatini 27% of the population lives with HIV.  Organizations like pact have worked within communities to help achieve the 95 - 95 - 95 goal in Eswatini.  This is to say that 95% of persons with HIV are aware of it, and 95% of them have regular access to medication, and 95% of them are experiencing viral suppression.  Getting to this state requires openness, communication, and trust between public health officials and their communities.  Nosipho Gwebu Storer's work in this building that trust is impressive and a lesson for the world to listen to...especially now with vaccine hesitancy against COVID-19.  The story of public health in Eswatini is one the world needs to hear.

Nosipho Gwebu Storer is Pact's Eswatini Country Director. Nosipho Gwebu Storer has more than 17 years of experience in public health and community development, including in HIV care and treatment programs, psychosocial programming and policy and planning. In addition to serving as Pact's Country Director in Eswatini, Nosipho is also the Chief of Party for the Insika ya Kusasahas project and supporting the Eswatini Ministry of Health with technical assistance, messaging dissemination and deployment of the Covid-19 vaccine in the country. Prior to Pact, Nosipho served as a social worker, leading social work support interventions for community prevention of mother to child transmission of HIV programs. She also worked for the Eswatini Baylor Children’s Clinical Centre of Excellence and ICAP with Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health. She began her development career working in food security and response programs for areas experiencing severe drought in Eswatini.

A long time ago, in a galaxy far far away Atul Tandon was making it on Wall Street.  At 39, Tandon was running one of the world’s largest international banking efforts on Wall Street when he was faced with a serious health crisis. Questioning his purpose, Tandon walked away from a life of wealth and turned to the very poorest in the world, vowing to serve those he left behind.

Access to higher education remains a challenge in sub-Saharan Africa.  Select scholarships and bursaries are available to some, but getting access to knowledge to many remains a challenge.  Germaine Tuyisenge, an Assistant Professor at London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine is working to change that.  By expanding online learning to students in sub-Saharan Africa, and to highlight African scholar research on her new podcast "The African Scholar Podcast", Germaine is working to break barriers of knowledge access and knowledge translation in global development.  Check out how she's doing it.

Germaine Tuyisenge is an assistant professor of sexual and reproductive health at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine in London, UK, where she is also a program director for the online masters, Sexual and Reproductive Health Policy and Programming in Low and Middle Income Countries that the school is developing with the University of Ghana and that will start this September.

Germaine’s research focuses on equitable access to sexual and reproductive health services among resource-limited settings

Her PhD research looked at the role of community health workers in promoting access to maternal health services in Rwanda. For her post-doctoral research, Germaine worked with the Centre for Gender and Sexual Health Equity from the University of British Columbia and Simon Fraser University to explore the dynamics of access to sexual and reproductive health services among immigrant women in Vancouver, Canada.

Germaine has worked with government and non-government institutions in Rwanda, Kenya, the Netherlands and Canada on community-based programs to improve SRH.

North Korea is used to sanctions by now.  When Pyongyang demonstrates its might with missile tests, or when reports surface of the bone crushing repression within prison camps, the West often responds with financial measures and sanctions.  But now, North Korea has a new plan to move money across borders despite sanctions - cryptocurrencies.  And from what we can tell, it looks like they are using digital coins to evade sanctions to great effect.  On this episode of GDP Ethan Jewell joins us to talk about North Korea's cryptocurrency plans.

Ethan Jewell is a Seoul-based correspondent for NK News and NK Pro focused on sanctions, trade and maritime issues. He previously worked as an investigations and intelligence contractor for Facebook and as a research intern for the Brookings Institution’s Center for East Asia Policy Studies. He also worked as a personal research assistant for Evan Osnos of the New Yorker Magazine, where he researched a range of topics from Chinese economics to American domestic politics. Ethan graduated from The University of Texas at Austin in 2019 with a bachelors in International Security with a focus on China and the Korean Peninsula.

What do Truckers in Canada, Islamophobes in the U.S., Hindu supremacists and incels the world over have in common?  Distorted visions of a golden age when they ruled as they liked.  Selective histories of nationalist glories are on the front steps of Capitols and Parliaments around the world.  Fuelled by half-baked histories and disinformation online, the rise of anti-establishment movements, white supremacy and nationalisms tend to follow a similar script.  Joining us today to unpack that script, and to understand why people fall for it, are Zenaib Farokhi and David R. Anderson.

Zeinab Farokhi is a doctoral candidate at the Women and Gender Studies Institute and Diaspora and Transnational Studies Centre, University of Toronto. She received her M.A in Women and Gender Studies, University of Toronto, and an M.A in Sociology from Osmania University, India, and her B.A in History from Isfahan University, Iran. Her research interests include cyber feminism, transnational feminisms and diasporic studies.Farokhi's mixed-methods dissertation focuses on right-wing extremism, gender, and online radicalization. Her current doctoral work compares the usage of Twitter by Islamophobic right-wing extremists in India, Canada, and the US, focusing on anti-Muslim rhetoric in Hindu and white nationalist discourse.

David R. Anderson is a PhD candidate in the Faculty of Environmental and Urban Change at York University. David was born legally blind and grew up in the West Kootenays, a region of the southern interior of British Columbia and the traditional territory of the Ktunaxa and Sinixt First Nations. His dissertation, Seeing Otherwise: Nature, Blindness, Memoir, examines blind, minority, and nature memoirs via close reading practices to evidence how blind and other overlooked ecological sensibilities can promote more just political and environmental collectivities. With an interdisciplinary background in literature, education, and the environmental humanities, his intersectional research promotes the value of and strategies for creating practices of mutual vulnerability, care, and resilience in the face of multiple climate, social, and political crises.

Russia has just declared Dontesk & Luhansk in the Donbas region of Ukraine to be sovereign states.  Peacekeepers are on the ground.  NATO nations are applying sanctions.  The government in Kyiv has said for months that Russia is attempting to usurp democracy in the country.  Yet Moscow says that it is merely peacekeeping.  Is it peacekeeping?  Is it warmongering?  Is it something else?

As we see the beginnings of a hybrid war emerging in Ukraine, Thomas Hughes joins GDP to help explain some of the factors that have led up to this escalation.  Will there be a full scale invasion?  What will become of the Donbas region?  Are cyberattacks on their way?  What could and should NATO nations do at a time like this?

Thomas Hughes is a Post-Doctoral Fellow at the Centre for International and Defence Policy, Queen’s University. His primary areas of research are on confidence-building, arms control regimes, deterrence, and strategic culture. Thomas defended his dissertation, The Art of War Games: The Political Effects of Military Exercises in Europe, 1975-2018 in August 2021. He co-edited the 2018 volume North American Strategic Defense in the 21st Century, and has also published work on the use of Remotely Piloted Aircraft. Thomas gained his MA from the Josef Korbel School of International Studies, Denver, and has also worked for the UN Inter-regional Crime and Justice Research Institute.

On October 25, 2021 military officers in Sudan staged a coup and took the capital.  Sudan's coup follows coups in Chad, Guinea, and two in Mali.  Madagascar and the Central African Republic experienced a failed attempt each.  For the past twenty years coups were becoming rare in the African continent, and they were never condoned or encouraged by members of the African Union, or the international community.  But now, there is an uptick in strongmen in uniform toppling democratic processes.  Why, and why now?  A long-standing expert on democratic institutions in Northern African and the Middle East, Milica Panic shares her thoughts about what is going on in Sudan, and the growing threats to democracies in the region.

Milica Panic is an accomplished program leader with more than 20 years of experience designing and managing complex governance programs, including deep experience working across both sub-Saharan Africa and the MENA region (Middle East and North Africa). Beginning her career as a peace activist in her native Serbia, Milica went on to design and implement programs focused on women’s political inclusion in South-East Europe, Russia and Palestine for Norwegian People’s Aid. Later she led governance and civil society programs for the International Republican Institute in Iraq, Sudan and South Sudan, before serving as IRI’s deputy regional director for Africa. Before joining Pact, Milica worked with DAI, where she served as a director on the project delivery team. Between 2016 and 2021, Milica was COP for the USAID Liberia Accountability and Voice Initiative, a project renowned for its innovative approaches to network building, adaptive management and politically smart programming.

"You can shove your climate crisis up your arse", said Greta Thunberg.  "How many more signs do we need?", asked Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.  "“And this is a chance, in my view, to make a generational investment in our economic resilience and in our workers and our communities throughout the world," said Joe Biden.  Another climate conference, and another year of incredible disasters linked to climate change.  Intensive hurricanes and cyclones.  Burning temperatures, and an entire town burned to the ground in minutes amid wild fires in British Columbia.  Are politicians finally taking definitive action on the climate crisis?  If they are?  What does it look like?  Can we pump the breaks on carbon intensive industries?  Do we have enough available alternatives at the ready to get the global economy off of carbon?  Here to answer these questions and to weigh in on the Glasgow COP26 conference, it's none other that our regular guest on GDP: Dr. Anders Hayden.

Anders Hayden is Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia.  He is particularly interested in the evolving balance between efforts to promote ecological modernization (“green growth”) and sufficiency-based challenges to the endless growth of production and consumption. He has written on efforts to promote "green growth" in Canada, Britain, and the European Union. His interest in the sufficiency approach has included examination of policies and initiatives to reduce hours of work as well as research on Bhutan, a country that has established Gross National Happiness, rather than Gross National Product, as its overriding goal. He is currently involved in research on the political and policy impacts of alternative measures of wellbeing and prosperity (“beyond GDP” measurement). He is the author of two books: When Green Growth Is Not Enough: Climate Change, Ecological Modernization, and Sufficiency (McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2014) and Sharing the Work, Sparing the Planet: Work Time, Consumption & Ecology (Zed Books / Between the Lines, 1999), and co-editor of the Routledge Handbook of Global Sustainability Governance (Routledge, 2020).

Governments can be slow to help those in need, yet they often act fast against real threats.  Social media platforms, like Facebook (Meta) have been long critiqued for being bigger than governments, both in terms of subscribers and revenue. But is Facebook a threat to governments, democracies and to populations themselves?  Despite the birthday reminders, cute cat photos, and ability to sell goods locally, Facebook has enabled the spread of disinformation, intimidation, hatred and fear to the point where lives have been threatened.  In particular the patterns of disinformation show that women in politics are particularly targeted, and strategically so.  If social media is a potential threat to democracies, what can be done? Kristina Wilfore spells it all out in this 30 minute podcast. 

Kristina Wilfore is a seasoned international development professional having worked against authoritarian regimes around the world for the National Democratic Institute, International Foundation for Electoral Systems, and USAID-funded grantees - designing and implementing large-scale election integrity, political party, civil society and disinformation defense programs in post conflict and pre-revolutionary environments.

Through the 2020 general election in the US, Kristina managed the largest effort in US history to help civil society organizations and election stakeholders detect, respond to, and preempt orchestrated disinformation campaigns.

She has helped campaign professionals in Western Europe throughout Sweden, Spain, Finland and the Netherlands work against growing far-right populist movements, by improving message strategies and grassroots engagement with voters. In the 2019 EU election, she worked to expose online influence operations and pushback on disinformation, organizing digital forensic evidence for regulators on activities of malign actors. She has piloted public engagement campaigns to tackle disinformation head on in Kosovo, Serbia and Ukraine.

Kristina is originally from Montana where she began her journey in changemaking when at the age of 14 she organized a letter to the editor campaign to support Planned Parenthood after an abortion clinic in the state was bombed by anti-choice extremists.

The Pandora Papers is the International Consortium of Investigative Journalist's largest investigation into off-shore finance to date.  Almost 3 terabytes of data piece together a shadow world of offshore financial.  World leaders  and at least 130 billionaires rely on an offshore financial system that keeps taxes low, money opaque and above all guards the privacy of its clients.  Beyond the shocking inequalities from the world's billionaires harbouring their wealth in tax-havens, what role does the offshore finance system have in facilitating shady business?  From real estate, to art trading all the way to illicit trade at sea, the world of off shore finance is mysterious to many, but day to day business for a global super elite.  In this episode of GDP, we chat with Delphine Reuter from the ICIJ, to help piece together the bigger meaning of the Pandora Papers.  

Delphine Reuter, Belgium, is ICIJ’s data journalist and researcher.

She started collaborating with ICIJ on the LuxLeaks project in 2014.

Prior to joining ICIJ's Data & Research Unit full time, she described her position as "brain for hire." She's no data witch, but somehow working for ICIJ has sparked a love for spreadsheets, everything that requires research, and cross-border investigations.

Previously she was a freelancer working on investigative cross-border projects. She has also been a researcher for environmental organizations. More recently, she was a coordinator of journalism training for professionals and a teacher at IHECS, a journalism school in Brussels.

She holds a degree from Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism (NY) and IHECS.

COVID-19 is a global experience that conjoins us all.  But we live in very different realities of it.  Everyone on earth has been impacted by the virus and the public health measures that have responded to it.  Now with vaccines rolling out is the world coming together to move towards the post-pandemic era, or are we entrenching divisions in dangerous and untested ways?  

It's not just the vaccinated who will enjoy more liberties going forward, but rather those who receive a certain type of vaccine.  Double vaccinations of Pfizer, Moderna, AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson, allow for free entry into North America, Europe and beyond.  For those vaccinated in Russia, China, Cuba and India, the borders may stay shut.  And for the 87.7% of people in low income countries who are awaiting a first dose?  Borders and opportunities will remain closed.  All the while some places like the U.S. and Quebec are preparing to give out 3rd doses.   

Dr. Bob is joined by his old friend and brother in arms in global health, Dr. Ryan Hoskins, to talk about why the preference of types of vaccine are among the reasons why the world is setting itself up to divide in dangerous ways.  

Dr Hoskins works as an emergency room physician, health policy researcher, and teacher, based at the University of British Columbia. He has worked, and continues to work, in a number of rural and remote communities across Canada, and has worked in parts of Latin America and Africa. He is interested in the cost-effectiveness of health in low-income settings, building a case for non-communicable disease treatment. He has a special interest in strep throat and rheumatic heart disease, a condition that is vastly overtreated in high income countries and under treated in low-income countries. He wishes our healthcare resource decisions were made with more transparency and more evidence.