By Kaihui Song The year 2025 recorded the largest net addition to global coal capacity in over a decade, driven largely by China amid the country’s heightened energy security concerns. Recent geopolitical tensions, particularly the conflict in the Middle East, have disrupted liquefied natural gas (LNG) supply and prompted several countries to turn back to […]
By Richard Kozul-Wright Last month, the World Bank announced the return of Industrial Policy for Development in a report described as “the first comprehensive guide to industrial policy for development in the 21st century.” Running well over 250 pages and covering 15 policy tools, the latest edition concludes that industrial policy should be given its […]
This week, global economic leaders, policymakers and civil society representatives gathered in Washington, DC for the 2026 Spring Meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank Group, marking a key moment to assess the state of the global economy and discuss a path forward in an increasingly uncertain world. The Spring Meetings […]
The mission of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) is to promote international financial stability through liquidity support, surveillance and capacity building. Emerging market and developing countries frequently turn to the IMF during balance-of-payments distress. IMF liquidity support comes with conditionalities that require borrowing countries to commit to a series of policy reforms. These conditionalities have […]
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) conducts periodic Reviews of Program Design and Conditionality (RoC), and it is currently undergoing the first review since 2018. These reviews analyze the performance of IMF programs in recent years and establish changes to the framework guiding future programs. IMF programs are designed to address balance-of-payments challenges, and countries must […]
International financial institutions (IFIs) are increasingly expected to support environmental and climate goals. Among them, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) plays a central role in shaping economic policy across much of the Global South through its lending programs. However, little systematic evidence exists of the environmental consequences of these programs, including their potential effects on […]
By Rebecca Ray, Kevin P. Gallagher and Marina Zucker-Marques Once again, developing countries are experiencing shockwaves from a crisis they did not create. Since the US-Israel strikes on Iran began on February 28, global oil prices have skyrocketed, with consequences rippling far beyond the Middle East, impacting sovereign bond spreads across developing and emerging markets […]
“Dear President Gustavo Petro Urrego, We write to you as economists and legal scholars deeply concerned that investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) poses a serious obstacle to building prosperous, equitable, and sustainable societies. As Colombia prepares to co-host the First International Conference on Transitioning Away from Fossil Fuels in Santa Marta from April 24-29, where discussions […]
The Global Financial Safety Net (GFSN) is a set of institutions and mechanisms that provide insurance against crises and financing to mitigate their impacts. It has four main elements: countries’ own international reserves; bilateral swap arrangements whereby central banks exchange currencies to provide liquidity to banking systems; regional financial arrangements (RFAs) by which countries pool […]
The current trade war and tensions with the US pose many challenges for Mexico, but at the same time they provide both an impetus and a strategic opportunity to make progress on the longstanding and interwoven problems of low wages, poverty and slow economic growth. The impetus comes from the clear need to reduce the […]