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How to tackle global challenges: The IMF & World Bank blueprint
How to tackle global challenges: The IMF & World Bank blueprint | Global Stage

How to tackle global challenges: The IMF & World Bank blueprint

The International Monetary Fund and World Bank’s Spring Meetings in Washington have told a tale of two economies: In the developed world, inflation is falling, and recession looks unlikely. But many of the world’s poorest countries are struggling under tremendous debt burdens inflated by rising interest rates that threaten to undo decades of development progress. That means these key lenders of last resort have their work cut out for them.

The good news? There’s a proven model, as GZERO Senior Writer Matthew Kendrick discussed with Tony Maciulis at a Global Stage event while reporting on the meetings. Somalia, once the byword for a failed state, managed to implement massive reforms to its financial system to meet the guidelines of the IMF’s Highly Indebted Poor Countries Initiative.

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World Bank announces plan to bring power to 300 million in Africa
World Bank announces plan to bring power to 300 million in Africa | Global Stage

World Bank announces plan to bring power to 300 million in Africa

World Bank Group is bringing power to the people. Literally.

This week, during the bank’s annual Spring Meetings, the group announced a major new initiative to provide electricity to 300 million Africans by 2030. It is estimated that nearly 800 million people globally lack access to power, and the vast majority of them, 600 million, live on the African continent.

GZERO’s Tony Maciulis met with the World Bank’s Director of Infrastructure for West Africa Franz Drees-Gross, to discuss the project's details.

Over the next six years, the World Bank aims to connect 250 million people using $30 billion of public sector funding largely drawn from its International Development Association. The development finance institution provides low-interest loans and grants to the poorest countries. The group has also partnered with the African Development Bank, which has committed to supporting an additional 50 million people.

The connectivity will come from a combination of sources, some existing and some to be created by the project.

“It turns out that the most cost-effective way to connect those 250 million people is to connect about half of them using off-grid solutions,” Drees-Gross said. “So that means solar home systems, it means mini-grids that aren't connected to the larger national grid, and the other half of that goal will have to be connected by grid extensions and grid densifications.”

The ambitious plan comes with challenges including fortifying and modernizing existing utility companies to be able to consistently provide power and collect customer payments.

“The problem in many Sub-Saharan African countries is that utilities aren't recovering their costs,” Drees-Gross said. “They lose 30, 40, sometimes 50% of electricity due to commercial and technical losses. Since they only invoice a fraction of what they buy from the generators and then fail to collect that entire amount, that leads to a deficit.”

That inconsistent business has made the utilities less attractive to private-sector investors. World Bank hopes its support in stabilizing the power industry in the region will be an opportunity that will bring in private investment, ultimately powering the growth of more economies in Africa.

For more of our 2024 IMF/World Bank Spring Meetings coverage, visit Glogal Stage.

Half the world can’t access healthcare. How can the World Bank help?
Half the world can’t access healthcare. How can the World Bank help? | Global Stage

Half the world can’t access healthcare. How can the World Bank help?

Globally, a shocking 4.5 billion people — more than half the world’s population — lack access to essential healthcare and another 2 billion have to make tough financial choices to find care. That means for the majority of people on earth when a child is sick, families can’t get medicine; when a mother gives birth, the delivery is unsafe; when people develop chronic conditions, they go untreated.

Billions of individual tragedies come together to hold back development in some of the world's most fragile countries, and that’s where the World Bank has a role to play. Monique Vledder runs the Global Health Practice at the World Bank, and she sat down with GZERO’s Tony Maciulis at a Global Stage event for the institution’s annual Spring Meetings.GZERO’s Tony Maciulis met with the World Bank’s Director of Infrastructure for West Africa Franz Drees-Gross, to discuss the project's details.

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World Bank economist: The poorest are getting poorer globally
World Bank economist: The poorest are getting poorer globally | Global Stage

World Bank economist: The poorest are getting poorer globally

It’s a staggering statistic and a marked setback from the years before the COVID-19 pandemic—the world’s poorest countries are falling further behind, and the wealth gap between the least and most developed nations is growing. One in three of these countries is poorer today than in 2019.

Ayhan Kose, World Bank Group’s Deputy Chief Economist, said that the combined shocks of multiple crises, including the pandemic, wars in Ukraine and the Middle East, food insecurity, and inflation, have taken a massive toll on the 75 least developed economies.

Kose spoke to GZERO’s Tony Maciulis as the annual Spring Meetings of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund were underway this week in Washington, DC.

“When the food price goes up, the price of oil goes up. That has significant implications for these economies,” he told GZERO. “Where we are now, when you look at 2020-24, they registered the weakest growth rate on average since the 1990s.”

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How to save our future from the crises we create
How to Save Our Future From the Crises We Create | GZERO World

How to save our future from the crises we create

Who has the most at stake in making the world a better place? Young people.

After all, the decisions we make today affect their future more than any other age group.

“Not just the young people who make up half of the world's population today, but the 11 billion people who are yet to be born by the end of this century," asks UN Foundation President Elizabeth Cousens, "what are we leaving to them?”

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Food emergency: what to do when people are hungry now
Global Hunger Is About to Get a Lot Worse — We Need to Get on Top of It | GZERO World

Food emergency: what to do when people are hungry now

On global issues, the international community must walk and chew gum at the same time. It needs to learn to deal with simultaneous crises that play off each other, says UN Foundation President Elizabeth Cousens.

That's why we dropped the ball on hunger.

Now the needs are huge and growing. We haven't seen a lot of images of starvation yet, but they are coming, Cousens tells Ian Bremmer on GZERO World.

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Our unsustainably unequal world
Ian Explains: Our Unsustainably Unequal World | GZERO World

Our unsustainably unequal world

The past is still very much with us.

It's almost the first anniversary of Russia's war in Ukraine. On March 11, it'll be three years since the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a pandemic. And 2022 was the sixth warmest year on record since ... 1880.

We are still dealing with the fallout from all three events. But not equally.

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Global economy headed to a recession
Global Economy Headed To A Recession | Economist | Dambisa Moyo | GZERO World

Global economy headed to a recession

Most of the global economy is more likely than not headed toward a recession in 2023. But don't only blame it on inflation and Russia's war in Ukraine.

The economic slowdown this year "is an acceleration of already structural problems around growth, that really started before the pandemic," renowned global economist, Dambisa Moyo tells Ian Bremmer on GZERO World.

Moyo says global inflation is not going anywhere, as the likelihood of a worldwide recession looms large.

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