The 2022 update to the China’s Global Energy Finance Database, managed by the Boston University Global Development Policy Center, recorded no new energy development finance commitments in 2021 from China to foreign governments through its two most active policy banks, the China Development Bank (CDB) and the Export-Import Bank of China (CHEXIM). This is the […]
Each year, 14 million unplanned pregnancies occur in Sub-Saharan Africa. Given the costs involved in raising a child, the high rate of unplanned pregnancy may influence how limited household resources are allocated among children, with potentially detrimental effects on children’s growth and development. While family planning and reproductive health services allow couples to plan births, […]
By Samantha Igo After two years of severe economic stress from the COVID-19 pandemic, economies are just beginning to recover as international leaders make use of a variety of policy tools. However, capital flow management measures (CFMs), a key tool that could support economic recovery, remain out of reach for many. In 2012, the International […]
March 11, 2022 marks two years since the World Health Organization officially declared COVID-19 a global pandemic. While the past two years have seen remarkable innovations in response to the pandemic’s disruptions, including new technologies and novel vaccines, the virus has also presented challenges for human capital development. In early 2021, Human Capital Initiative (HCI) […]
By Özlem Ömer On Tuesday, March 1, the Boston University Global Development Policy (GDP) Center hosted a webinar to discuss its new report analyzing the policy responses to the COVID-19 pandemic and lessons for the global trade and investment regime, focusing on six countries— USA, Germany, France, China, India and South Africa. The discussion centered […]
The current narrative on debt sustainability often ignores the issue of what a government owns (assets) versus what a government owes (liabilities). While conventional approaches largely focus on the liability side, the kinds of assets a country is trying to build are vital to development and debt sustainability. A new working paper by Yan Wang and […]
The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in the most serious global health crisis of the past century. For many African countries in particular, the pandemic has also had severe social and economic impacts. Already fragile welfare systems have been threatened or overwhelmed. In addition, the pandemic has adversely affected African intraregional and international trade, investment flows […]
In just over a decade, China’s two major policy banks provided more financing for overseas coal-fired power plant expansion than any other public financier in the world economy. In a new journal article published in the Journal of East Asian Studies, Bo Kong and Kevin P. Gallagher examine the political economy of Chinese overseas development finance […]
By Rebecca Ray As part of the Spring 2022 Global China Research Colloquium, Carlos Larrea, Professor of Social Science at the Universidad Andina Simón Bolivar in Ecuador, shared his vision for a debt-for-nature swap between Ecuador and China, wherein portions of debt would be cancelled on the condition of allocating saved funds for conservation investments. […]
By Samantha Igo Amid the social and economic stress of the COVID-19 pandemic, emerging market and developing countries have faced severe liquidity bottlenecks while working to implement responsive public health and economic policies. Compounded by an already-looming debt crisis, the economic distress led experts and civil society organizations to advocate for the International Monetary Fund […]