I had the pleasure of sitting down with C. Peter Timmer and Michael Lipton in early April for short interviews based on their provocative and well-received lectures at Tufts University, where my institute awarded them the 2012 Leontief Prizes for Advancing the Frontiers of Economic Thought. Timmer offers an interesting defense of food reserves as necessary to the functioning of international markets. Lipton’s talk on “Income from Work” through smallholder development in Africa provided the backdrop to an interview on the centrality of smallholders to early development even in the age of global markets. See the short interviews below, and for more: read a summary of the event; read the lectures by Timmer and Lipton; read more about the Global Development and Environment Institute’s Leontief Prize, including past winners.
UNCTAD gets fresh mandate
A fresh mandate has been given to the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) to continue the scope of its present activities as well as to take on some new issues in the next four years.
This was the main result of UNCTAD’s ministerial conference (known as UNCTAD XIII) that ended in Doha, Qatar, on Thursday.
It came after a huge battle between developing and developed countries that went on for several months, first in Geneva (where the UN organisation is located) and then in Doha.
Bankers' Assault on Financial Reform
Triple Crisis blogger Gerald Epstein was recently interviewed by the Real News Network on how new financial regulations in the Dodd-Frank law are being gutted or delayed by regulators and Congress. His interview is based on his latest Triple Crisis piece, “Economists, Liquidity Mongers and the Banker Assault on Financial Reform.”
Bankers’ Assault on Financial Reform
Triple Crisis blogger Gerald Epstein was recently interviewed by the Real News Network on how new financial regulations in the Dodd-Frank law are being gutted or delayed by regulators and Congress. His interview is based on his latest Triple Crisis piece, “Economists, Liquidity Mongers and the Banker Assault on Financial Reform.”
Principles for Prevention of Sovereign Debt Crises – A historical opportunity
At the recently concluded UNCTAD XIII Conference in Doha, Qatar, a High-Level Roundtable on Debt Prevention and Management was held to discuss new Principles on Responsible Lending and Borrowing, which have been under discussion since 2009. The Principles are forward-looking and symmetrically cover issues on the lender and borrower sides; and they are comprehensive, in contrast to other existing ad hoc single-issue-focused initiatives; they take a soft-law approach with a view to build consensus. Most importantly, these Principles emphasize full information disclosure by lenders and borrowers as a means of enforcing accountability and discipline in lending and borrowing.
Spotlight G20: The Food Security Agenda – Making positive change or passing the buck?
When it comes to food security and agriculture, the G20 seems to be all too willing to take the credit while passing the buck. It wants to set the agenda on world food security. But it has been reluctant to require the G20 governments themselves to coordinate regulatory changes to address high and rising food prices or put the kind of money needed into agricultural investment in the world’s poorest countries. Rather, it seems to be passing on responsibility for establishing rules and governance mechanisms to address food security onto others, while at the same time blocking others from discussing measures that might request changes to the G20’s policies.