This week we welcome the release of a new CGD book: Relief Chief: A Manifesto for Saving Lives in Dire Times, by Mark Lowcock. A former UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator—and a current Distinguished Non-Resident Fellow at CDG—Mark gives us an inside ...

You’ve seen the headline; indeed, you’ve probably seen it from us. According to widely cited estimates, about one in three children around the world are lead-poisoned, or about 800 million total. This means that they have blood-lead levels exceeding 5 micrograms per deciliter, a common reference lev...

In a recent note, we asked whether IDA, the arm of the World Bank that provides concessional lending to the poorest countries, has the right approach for determining the balance between grants and loans which its recipients receive. We noted that IDA concessionality depends on the level of recipient...

Many cost-effective education programs suffer implementation failures and political resistance when scaled up in government systems. But not all.

Suppose you’re the minister of education in a lower-middle income country. It’s budget season. You have a meeting tomorrow with the finance minister to make your case for more education spending. You know she’s skeptical that money is really what’s holding your school system back. The World Bank say...

Has the Modi government accelerated or decelerated poverty reduction? It’s hard to know, as India has effectively stopped measuring poverty. A new World Bank paper using private-sector survey data finds the share of people living below $1.90 per day has been falling, but is higher than we thought, a...

Heightened food and energy prices are exacerbating humanitarian crises around the world. Resources and attention are being diverted to Ukraine, rather than expanded. Here, we identify existing and new countries at risk, and look at the major donors’ resources to respond to those needs. Policymakers...