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Chinese President Xi Jinping meets with Cambodia's Prime Minister Hun Manet (not pictured) at the Peace Palace in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, April 17, 2025.
China warns world against harmful US trade deals
Chinese President Xi Jinping launched a tour of Southeast Asia this month, visiting key trade partners and calling for an “open and cooperative international environment” that rejects “tariff abuse.” But given the reliance of countries like Vietnam and Cambodia on US markets, Beijing may need more than words.
What comes next: Major players are kicking off talks with the US, with Japan starting last week and South Korea meant to commence within days, and Vice President JD Vancemeeting with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in New Delhi on Monday.
Keep your eye on smaller players: Kenyan President William Ruto arrives in Beijing Tuesday, as his burgeoning economy faces strain from US aid clawbacks. For economies in the developing world like his, taking Beijing’s side might be the best hedge available.
Innovation: cause for optimism amid the global food crisis
How long will food prices keep rising? Will food itself become scarce? There's a lot of doom and gloom these days about the global food crisis, made even worse by Russia's war in Ukraine.
But there are some reasons to be hopeful, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation CEO Mark Suzman said during a livestream conversation about the global food crisis hosted by GZERO Media in partnership with the organization he leads.
The Gates Foundation, he explained, has long been investing in innovations that can massively increase productivity by smallholder farmers across the developing world. Think drought-tolerant seeds or flood-resistant rice.
What's more, new tools like apps to customize fertilizer use and digitally map soil are becoming available to smallholders in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. The goal is to double smallholder productivity.
Still, Suzman points out, none of that will matter without investing more in climate adaptation — especially better use of water.
How Russia's war is starving the world: food expert Ertharin Cousin
And it's not just that the prices of things like corn or wheat have doubled. Transport costs are up because gas is more expensive, while supplies of fertilizer are down for the same reason.
Who's most at risk? Developing countries that rely on those imports. The disruptions could double the number of people that went hungry due to the pandemic. Everyone will be affected because we're talking about global commodities, and the worst might be yet to come since agriculture is a seasonal business.
”This is a long, much longer-term potential food challenge,” Cousin says.
The conflict, she says, has put the international community in a tough spot. Sanctions will cause hunger, but otherwise, Russia will continue to profit from selling food to the world. And there's a growing divide between the West and non-aligned developing countries that can't afford to not import Russian food.
Conflict-affected nations are the most vulnerable, but many low-income nations will also struggle because they can't afford subsidies to feed their people.
"As a result," Cousin explains, "you'd have more people slipping into a position where food is maybe available, but inaccessible because they cannot afford it."
Cousin tells Bremmer the West should "move beyond platitudes" and offer developing countries financial support to deal with the food crisis because now with China, "we need to realize we're not the only game in town."
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- Russia and Ukraine are agricultural powerhouses. But the war and ... ›
- War in Ukraine: cascading impacts on global food supply - GZERO ... ›
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- What's causing the global food crisis? Live townhall today at 2 pm ET - GZERO Media ›
A perfect storm of food insecurity: a problem for all of us
Russia and Ukraine are agricultural powerhouses. But the war and sanctions have crippled their ability to feed the world.
Who's most at risk? Developing countries that rely on those imports. What will the impact be? The disruptions could double the number of people currently suffering from acute food insecurity (some 275 million) due to the pandemic.
On GZERO World, Ian Bremmer speaks to Ertharin Cousin, who knows a thing or two about food security as the former executive director of the UN World Food Programme
Cousin says the war has created a perfect storm that'll led to a global food price and supply crisis. Everyone will be affected because we're talking about global commodities, and the worst might be yet to come since agriculture is a seasonal business.The conflict, she says, has put the international community in a tough spot. Sanctions will cause hunger, but otherwise, Russia will continue to profit from selling food to the world.
And there's a growing divide between the West and non-aligned developing countries that can't afford to not import Russian food. Conflict-affected nations are the most vulnerable, but many low-income nations will also struggle because they can't afford subsidies to feed their people.
As a bonus, battle over borscht! What’s the back story, and why is the soup such an important part of Ukraine’s national identity? We spoke with a chef, a historian, and a Ukrainian emigré couple to learn more.
Nations don’t need carbon to grow their economies, says John Kerry
If John Kerry were only able to accomplish one thing as US climate change czar, he'd focus on changing the minds of the one-third of countries in the world that say they're "entitled" to pollute because they didn't before.
For Kerry, it's a fallacy that heavy carbon use is the only way to develop an economy because these nations can leapfrog from fossil fuels to renewable energy.
If we are able to cut by half the amount of carbon we're now releasing into the atmosphere by the end of the decade, he says, we may be able to meet the Paris Climate Agreement goal of keeping global temperature rise below 1.5 degrees Celsius.
"Currently, we're on a track to blow through 2 degrees, let alone 1.5. This is the urgency that people need to understand," he says. "Promises are fine, but they don't get the job done. It's the implementation that gets the job done. So, we're working on something called implementation plus."
Watch the GZERO World episode: Ukraine War: Has Putin overplayed his hand?
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The urgent need for doses—not dollars—in the global vaccination race
600 million people worldwide have already received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, but about 75% of those doses were given in only ten countries. Dr. Soumya Swaminathan, Chief Scientist at the World Health Organization, explains why the pandemic will not effectively end even in the world's richest nations until it is curtailed in its poorest. "A new variant that is less susceptible to the immunity that's brought about by vaccines or that's more transmissible or makes people more ill could easily then spread, in fact, to people in parts of the world where there have been large numbers of people vaccinated and where they think that they are then immune." Dr. Swaminathan discusses the urgent need to distribute vaccines worldwide in an interview with Ian Bremmer on GZERO World, airing on US public television stations starting April 9. Check local listings.
Watch the episode: Vaccine nationalism could prolong the pandemic
Japan’s role in the global response to COVID-19
As part of our special "In 60 Seconds" series on Japan's domestic and international response to the pandemic, GZERO Media spoke to Dr. Satoshi Ezoe, Director of the Global Health Policy Division in Japan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Dr. Ezoe breaks down his nation's contributions to multilateral efforts like the COVAX facility and the ACT Accelerator program and describes their impact on the developing world. He also details Japan's commitment to universal health care and how that policy and infrastructure have benefited the nation during the pandemic. "Japan in 60 Seconds" is produced in partnership with the Consulate General of Japan.
This video is sponsored by the Consulate General of Japan.
Stopping the debt spiral in the world's poorest nations
"There needs to be a dramatic and deep reduction in the amount of debt on the poorest countries. That's clear." As the world's poorest nations struggle to recover from a devastating pandemic, World Bank President David Malpass argues that freeing them of much of their debt will be key. His conversation with Ian Bremmer is part of the latest episode of GZERO World.