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42. Strengthening European Leadership on Global Health Security
- Author:
- Amanda Glassman, Jeremy Konyndyk, and Liesl Schnabel
- Publication Date:
- 10-2019
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Center for Global Development
- Abstract:
- Impending leadership transitions in EU institutions provide a unique opportunity to bolster European action on global health security. This would be a double win for the EU: advancing its efforts to foster progress in developing countries while also protecting Europe itself against potential disease risks. To help strengthen the EU’s leadership on global health security, the new Commission should
- Topic:
- Security, Health, Regional Cooperation, European Union, and Leadership
- Political Geography:
- Europe
43. Redesigning the External Investment Plan to be a Game-Changer for Africa
- Author:
- Mikaela Gavas
- Publication Date:
- 10-2019
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Center for Global Development
- Abstract:
- Despite their potential to achieve high development impact, projects in the poorest and most fragile countries, most in sub-Saharan Africa, are chronically underfinanced by Euro- pean development finance institutions and private investors owing to real or perceived low risk-adjusted returns. The External Investment Plan and its risk-mitigation tools, if struc- tured right, have the potential to mobilise investment where the need is greatest. To make this happen, the new European Commission should n clarify the strategic objectives of external investment and steer it towards leveraging high-risk capital for underserved markets; n explicitly focus assistance on the poorest countries through clear project selection criteria; n provide demand-driven technical assistance and oper- ationalise policy dialogue to improve the business envi- ronment; and n federate the development finance institutions focusing on steering policy, encouraging best practice, and har- monising procedures and results amongst the develop- ment finance institutions and multilateral development banks.
- Topic:
- Diplomacy, International Cooperation, European Union, and Investment
- Political Geography:
- Africa, Europe, and Sub-Saharan Africa
44. Reforming EU Trade Policy to Accelerate Economic Transformation in Africa
- Author:
- Hannah Timmis and Ian Mitchell
- Publication Date:
- 10-2019
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Center for Global Development
- Abstract:
- As the rest of the developing world has reaped the benefits of rapid globalisation, Africa has remained marginalised in international trade. The new European Commission has an opportunity to accelerate export-led growth on the continent by introducing a bolder, more coherent policy on trade, agriculture, and aid.
- Topic:
- Development, Diplomacy, International Cooperation, European Union, Economic Development, and Economic Transformation
- Political Geography:
- Africa and Europe
45. Automation and AI: Implications for African Development Prospects?
- Author:
- Charles Kenny
- Publication Date:
- 10-2019
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Center for Global Development
- Abstract:
- Now that computers are capable of taking the jobs that require brain as well as brawn, it may appear there is little left for humans to do. There are many scary forecasts of the capacity of automation and AI to replace a lot of workers very fast. Self-driving vehicles may wipe out opportunities for taxi driv- ers and truckers, for example. Brynjolfsson, Rock, and Syverson note there are 3.5 million people em- ployed driving vehicles in the US. If automation reduced that to 1.5 million, that alone would increase total US labor productivity by 1.7 percent,1 but it would also leave two million drivers looking for work. In 2013, Oxford economists Carl Frey and Michael Osborne made waves by predicting that 47 percent of US employment was automatable over the next two decades, with a higher estimate for developing countries.2 Erin Winick of Technology Review subsequently produced a summary table of job losses and gains estimations on automation.3 Some of the worldwide figures are in Table 1. There are clearly two sides to the ledger, but some of the predicted job loss numbers at the global level are considerable. The forecasts suggest bad news for Africa in particular, given concentration in types of low-skill jobs that might be easy to automate, rising working age populations, and already far too few good jobs to occupy the existing population. Arntz et al. suggest the share of workers at high risk of automation is 40 percent amongst those with a lower secondary education and above 50 percent for those with primary or less education.4 Advanced manufacturing and AI applications including automated call centers might even reverse the trend towards manufacturing and low-skilled services moving to developing countries. That would imperil a recent run of global income convergence. And there have been cases of impact al- ready: Foxconn replacing 30 percent of its workforce when it introduced robots, and 1,000 lost jobs in Vietnam when Adidas shuttered a factory and moved production to “speed factories” in Germany and the US. If this is the beginning of a trend, it would be harmful to African development prospects.
- Topic:
- Development, Science and Technology, Artificial Intelligence, Automation, and Emerging Technology
- Political Geography:
- Africa
46. Promoting New Kinds of Legal Labour Migration Pathways Between Europe and Africa
- Author:
- Michael Clemens, Helen Dempster, and Kate Gough
- Publication Date:
- 10-2019
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Center for Global Development
- Abstract:
- As Europe’s working-age population continues to decline, sub-Saharan Africa’s is rapidly increasing. Many of these new labour market entrants will seek opportunities in Europe, plugging skill gaps and contributing to economies in their countries of destination. To make the most of these movements, the new European Commission should create and promote new kinds of legal labour migration pathways with more tangible benefits to countries of origin and destination; pilot and scale Global Skill Partnership projects between Europe and sub-Saharan Africa and within Africa; and be a positive voice for migration within Europe, promoting the benefits from migration and ensuring they are understood.
- Topic:
- Migration, Labor Issues, Legal Theory, Borders, and Labor Market
- Political Geography:
- Africa and Europe
47. A Smoother Trade Transition for Graduating LDCs
- Author:
- Kimberly Ann Elliott
- Publication Date:
- 11-2019
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Center for Global Development
- Abstract:
- For nearly 50 years, the world’s “least developed countries” have received extra financial support and preferential trade treatment to help them grow and develop. In the first three decades after the Unit- ed Nations (UN) created the LDC category in 1971, only one country—diamond-rich Botswana—out- grew that status. Since then, four more countries have graduated, and the pace is set to accelerate over the coming decade. Moreover, the countries approaching graduation in the next decade will pose different adjustment challenges than those that preceded them. When a country successfully graduates, it loses access to the special finance and trade programs that come with LDC status. In the case of trade, that can mean the graduating country’s exporters sudden- ly face the higher tariffs that their more advanced competitors face, so-called most-favored nation (MFN) tariffs. Even if these countries remain eligible for the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) that is available to developing countries, those programs are typically much less generous than the duty-free, quota-free market access that most advanced economies provide for LDCs.1 Moreover, out- side the European Union (EU), few countries provide transition measures for graduating LDCs (see Annex A). Nor does there appear to be much planning to prepare for the coming wave of graduations. The United Kingdom has already committed to provide barrier-free market access for LDCs, similar to the EU’s Everything But Arms (EBA) program.2 But British policymakers have a unique opportunity to improve on that model as part of post-Brexit trade and development planning, including to ad- dress the coming wave of graduations. And if the UK remains in the customs union, it can work with EU policymakers to improve the graduation process as part of the review of the GSP regulation that expires in 2023.
- Topic:
- Development, International Cooperation, European Union, Trade, and Transition
- Political Geography:
- Europe and Global Focus
48. Gender Equality in US Think Tank Leadership: Data from Tax Records
- Author:
- Charles Kenny and Julian Duggan
- Publication Date:
- 11-2019
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Center for Global Development
- Abstract:
- Existing analysis of US think tanks suggests that women are underrepresented among senior staff, lead- ership, and board members. Chantal de Jonge Oudraat and Soraya Kamali-Nafar at Women In Interna- tional Security examined 22 Washington, DC-based think tanks working on foreign policy and national and international security, and they found that 68 percent of the heads of the think tanks were men, along with 73 percent of the experts and 78 percent of those on governing boards. In 2018, a random sampling of 10 leading US think tanks working on development by Charles Kenny and Tanvi Jaluka sug- gested that women made up 30 percent of high-paid employees and 10 percent of highest-paid employ- ees, and that higher-paid women earned only 75 percent that of higher-paid men. This note updates the 2018 analysis with a larger sample of think tanks covering a longer period and includes measures of think tank reach to examine if more established think tanks perform better or worse on gender equality within their senior ranks. Across the 71 think tanks for which we have data, we find that the average share of trustees and directors that were women was 23 percent, the average share of highly compensated employees that were women was 30 percent, and highly compensat- ed women were paid 92 percent of what highly compensated men were paid. Conservative-leaning think tanks performed notably worse than the average on the share of high-paid employees who were women, as did think tanks that worked on global development. Older think tanks saw worse gender pay ratios. Having a woman as CEO was not associated with greater pay equality. Analysis of the gen- der pay ratio suggest that it may be driven in part by a few very highly compensated men in senior positions, but also that, conditional on job title and think tank of employment, highly paid women are paid $30,000 less per year than highly paid men.
- Topic:
- Gender Issues, Leadership, Feminism, and Equality
- Political Geography:
- North America and United States of America
49. Taxing “Bads”: An Overview of Research Initiatives
- Author:
- Ruth Lopert
- Publication Date:
- 11-2019
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Center for Global Development
- Abstract:
- Around the world, development economists and researchers are exploring proposals to tax excise goods, and several have produced models demonstrating that such taxes can generate substantial revenues. This note attempts to list the organizations and research initiatives currently addressing taxation of tobacco, alcohol, and sugar-sweetened beverages—the “bads”—to help navigate the landscape of existing research and identify gaps and opportunities for further work.
- Topic:
- Development, Economics, Tax Systems, and Revenue Management
- Political Geography:
- Global Focus
50. Commitment to Development Index 2014
- Author:
- Owen Barder and Petra Krylová
- Publication Date:
- 01-2015
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Center for Global Development
- Abstract:
- The Commitment to Development Index ranks 27 of the world's richest countries on their policies that affect more than five billion people living in poorer nations. Moving beyond comparing how much foreign aid each country gives, the CDI quantifies a range of rich country policies that affect poor people.
- Topic:
- Development, Poverty, Foreign Aid, and Foreign Direct Investment