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Most recent by Brookings Institute

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American leadership in advancing the sustainable development goals

The sustainable development goals (SDGs) reflect a commitment to equity, justice, and environmental resilience. Across the country, Americans share this commitment as they build a transformative economic recovery out of COVID-19 that addresses the historic legacy of racial inequities and takes ambitious action on climate change. On Monday, September 20, the Center for Sustainable Development and the United Nations Foundation...
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Can national statistical offices shape the data revolution?

In recent years, breakthrough technologies in artificial intelligence (AI) and the use of satellite imagery made it possible to disrupt the way we collect, process, and analyze data. Facilitated by the intersection of new statistical techniques and the availability of (big) data, it is now possible to create hypergranular estimates. National statistical offices (NSOs) could be at the forefront of...
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COVID-19 impacts on foreign direct investments in sub-Saharan Africa

In June of this year, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) released its 2021 World Investment Report, in which it focuses on investing in a sustainable recovery from the pandemic. The report itself looks at how the COVID-19 pandemic impacted foreign direct investment globally and investment priorities for the recovery phase. The complex health and economic...
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Accelerating COVID-19 vaccinations in Africa

The rapid spread of the delta variant of COVID-19 has made the successful rollout and uptake of vaccinations against the disease around the world more urgent than ever. Through regional cooperation and tough national actions, among other factors, the African continent has made impressive strides toward preventing the devastating impacts of the pandemic seen elsewhere. However, recent months have...
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Renewing US rural prosperity: Federal policy in the Biden administration  

Amid 21st-century shifts in the global and U.S. economy, demographics, and climate, federal leadership must modernize to improve its coherence, effectiveness, and ability to support rural communities. The Biden administration’s public commitment to “rebuild rural” represents a once-in-a-generation opportunity to reimagine policy to maximize rural prosperity. Critical to its success will be addressing several questions, including: How can federal...
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Which will be the top 30 consumer markets of this decade? 5 Asian markets below the radar

Despite COVID-19, the global consumer class—those who are middle class or rich—is rising fast. In an earlier post, we showed that we are experiencing a truly secular shift in the size of this global consumer class. COVID-19 is a transitory setback of one or two years in this long-term shift. Since 2000, the global consumer class grew by more...
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How Chile implemented its computer science program

Computer science (CS) education helps students acquire skills such as computational thinking, problem-solving, and collaboration. It has been linked with higher rates of college enrollment (Brown & Brown, 2020; Salehi, Wang, Toorawa, & Wieman, 2020), and a recent randomized control trial showed that lessons in computational thinking improved student response inhibition, planning, and coding skills (Arfé et al., 2020)....
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How Chile implemented its computer science education program

Computer science (CS) education helps students acquire skills such as computational thinking, problem-solving, and collaboration. It has been linked with higher rates of college enrollment (Brown & Brown, 2020; Salehi, Wang, Toorawa, & Wieman, 2020), and a recent randomized control trial showed that lessons in computational thinking improved student response inhibition, planning, and coding skills (Arfé et al., 2020)....
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The role of fiscal decentralization in promoting effective domestic resource mobilization in Africa

The lingering economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is disrupting sub-Saharan Africa’s traditional financial inflows, revealing the heightened need to strengthen domestic resource mobilization and improve tax administration in the region. This unprecedented shock to the world economy has revealed the volatility of financial inflows that African nations are dependent on: Indeed, foreign direct investment (FDI)—an increasingly important source...
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Why did state-building efforts in Afghanistan fail?

Afghanistan has received enormous amounts of foreign aid over the years, but despite the investment of funds and various efforts to build state capacity, the government quickly fell to the Taliban after the withdrawal of U.S. forces. To discuss what capacity-building efforts accomplished and why they ultimately fell short, David Dollar is joined by Jennifer Brick Murtazashvili, director of...
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Africa in the news: South African economy, energy production, and Nigerian foreign relations updates

New definition measures South Africa’s GDP 11% higher than previously thought This week, authorities in South Africa announced that the country’s economy is 11 percent larger than previous estimates after Statistics South Africa altered its method for calculating gross domestic product. The national statistical service’s new definition utilizes a refined, more modern classification of activities, new sources of information, and...
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Figure of the week: A case study comparison of industries without smokestacks in South Africa and Uganda

Unlike developing countries in Asia, African countries are not relying on export-led manufacturing to drive structural transformation but instead pivoting to service-oriented sectors. While many services are less productive and absorb less low-skilled labor than manufacturing, certain subsectors, according to recent Brookings Africa Growth Initiative research, can be the catalyst for economic growth and job creation in the changing...
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Building a more stable financial system: Unfinished business

Twice in this still-young century central banks have had to take steps, unprecedented in size and scope, to limit the economic fallout from financial instability. While we can’t expect a financial system to withstand an overnight shut down of the global economy like we experienced in March 2020 without support from central banks and fiscal authorities, the financial market...
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The future of money: The end of cash and the rise of digital currencies

Are we heading for a cashless future? Eswar Prasad, a senior fellow at Brookings and author of the forthcoming book, “The Future of Money: How the Digital Revolution Is Transforming Currencies and Finance,” thinks so. Credit card and cell phone payments have disrupted the physical cash market already, but Prasad says the real driving force will be central banks—as...
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The future of money: The end of cash and the rise of digital currencies

Are we heading for a cashless future? Eswar Prasad, a senior fellow at Brookings and author of the forthcoming book, “The Future of Money: How the Digital Revolution Is Transforming Currencies and Finance,” thinks so. Credit card and cell phone payments have disrupted the physical cash market already, but Prasad says the real driving force will be central banks—as...
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Ed tech and educational opportunity during the COVID-19 school closures

The purpose of this study is to identify gaps and challenges in the use of education technology (ed tech) in Chennai, Tamil Nadu during COVID-19. Specifically, we investigated how use of ed tech differed by type of school (government or private), household socioeconomic status, and student gender—and how it changed during the COVID-19 school closures. Ultimately, we wanted to...
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How has education technology impacted student learning in India during COVID-19?

India has been one of the hardest-hit countries by COVID-19. Beyond the staggering impact on human life, COVID-19 has greatly disrupted access to education in India, with 247 million primary and secondary school students out of school. While school systems in India and across the world have made efforts to reach students at home through various means, recent estimates...
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Africa in the news: Zambian election, impacts of the Taliban’s Afghanistan takeover, and health updates

Zambian opposition leader Hichilema wins presidential election On Monday, Zambia’s electoral commission declared opposition leader Hakainde Hichilema the winner of the southern African nation’s recent presidential election. Hichilema garnered 2.8 million votes, or 50.1 percent of the total, narrowly eclipsing the 50 percent mark needed to win without recourse to a second round. Addressing the nation on Monday, the current...