Voices

What Is Science and What Is Delivery?

Having just returned from Dartmouth and meetings with the Center for Health Care Delivery Science, I’ve been thinking about the phrase “Delivery Science.” World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim’s use of the term in recent speeches is related to using evidence-based experimentation to improve poor health, education, water, and basic service outcomes in the developing world.

Reflecting on this, I think, in many ways, “science” and “delivery” are distinct and need to be understood as different but reinforcing principles. So let’s break it down.

World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim called on private equity firms to increase their investments in developing countries to help generate the growth, jobs, and equality needed to end extreme poverty.

“We have a fantastic opportunity to work together,” Dr. Kim told hundreds of investors at the 15th Annual Global Private Equity Conference, hosted by the Bank Group’s private sector arm IFC and the Emerging Markets Private Equity Association (EMPEA).

“…Private equity is going to play a critical role in whether or not we can truly have high aspirations for the 1.2 billion people living in absolute poverty in the world,” he said in a speech that was liveblogged and followed on Twitter with #wblive and #GPEC2013.

I recently visited a math classroom in Frumusani, Romania, where half of the students are Roma. It's critically important for all countries to invest in education in order to stay competitive in the global economy. That means education for all, including communities such as the Roma that have long faced discrimination. Please watch the video to hear more.

Read the first of this two-part blog post here.

The idea of a peer learning network for tax administrators came when I realized that tax authorities in different countries had many of the same questions: How do we initiate risk management? How are other countries dealing with compliance issues? How do countries ensure speedy VAT refunds and yet prevent fraudulent claims? And so on.

So why not get the tax officials from different countries together and provide a platform to discuss their challenges, experiences and innovative ways of solving problems. Mix them with a dose of tax experts from developed tax systems, et voila! That’s how TAXGIP (Tax Administrators eXchange for Global Innovative Practices) was born – it provides opportunities to exchange knowledge and good practices, and share experiences.

A significant share of the population in the Kyrgyz Republic – 37 percent – lived below the poverty line in 2011, according to the latest available data. And despite a relatively modest population of about 5.5 million, poverty rates across oblasts (provinces) span a striking range -- from 18 percent to 50 percent.

Why? Well, that is a surprisingly difficult question to answer.

Also available in: English

Birkaç hafta önce İstanbul’da gerçekleştirilen Birleşmiş Milletler Orman Forumu’nun 10. Oturumunun açılışı ve Türkiye Başbakanı Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’ın orman kaybının durdurulması konusunun ciddiye alınması yönünde küresel topluluğa yaptığı ateşli çağrı ile ilgili bir blog yazısı yazmıştım. Başbakan Erdoğan bu çağrıyı alışılmadık bir şekilde iklim değişikliği veya biyolojik çeşitlilik kaybı ile ilgili endişelere herhangi bir atıfta bulunmadan yapmıştı; bunun yerine basit bir şekilde “bunu ahlaki sorumluluk gereği gerçekleştirmemiz gerekiyor” demişti.

Erdoğan konuşmasında "İnsanlığın karşı karşıya olduğu küresel tehditler ‘bana ne başkasından’ deme lüksünü ortadan kaldırıyor’” demiş ve eklemişti: “Biz sadece gövde taşıyan, gövdesinin üzerine kafa, o kafanın içinde beyin taşıyan fizyolojik varlıklar değiliz. Biz kalp, ruh ve vicdan taşıyoruz.”

Peki günlerce süren tartışmaların ve müzakerelerin sonucunda BM Forumu neyi başardı? Forum, Erdoğan’ın çağrısına karşılık verdi mi?

Her ne kadar bunu hemen görmek mümkün olmasa da, bu soruların cevabı tek kelime ile “evet”. Parantez içinde ifade edilen metnin neticede daha açık bir anlayışa ve somut eyleme yol açtığı bu tip müzakerelerde görüşlerin birbirine yavaş bir şekilde yakınlaşması her zaman belirgin bir şekilde gözlemlenemeyebilir.

Also available in: Türkçe

A couple of weeks ago, I blogged about the opening of the 10th Session of the United Nations Forum on Forests, in Istanbul, and Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s impassioned challenge to the global community to get serious about stopping the loss of forests. Unusually, he did this without reference to the usual concerns about climate change or biodiversity loss, but instead quite simply said – we have a moral responsibility to stop this.

"The global threats which humanity faces eliminate the luxury of saying, ‘What do I care?’” Erdoğan said. “We are not only creatures of bodies, heads, and brains. We carry hearts, we carry souls, and we carry a conscience.”

So what did the UN Forum accomplish after days of discussions and negotiations? Did the Forum rise to Erdoğan's challenge?

Last week, the Scripps Institution of Oceanography released data showing that CO2 atmospheric levels had briefly passed 400 parts per million (ppm) and were close to surpassing that level for sustained periods of time. This is bad news. At 450 ppm, scientists anticipate the world will be 2 degrees Celsius warmer than pre-industrial times, and world leaders have agreed that’s a point of dangerous consequences.

Along with this grim news came important new research findings from Professor V. Ramanathan of the Scripps Institution at the University of California, San Diego, and other researchers regarding short-lived climate pollutants – black carbon, methane tropospheric ozone and some hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs). While we continue – and must continue – to hammer away at reducing CO2 emissions, their work supports the argument that also reducing these short-lived climate pollutants (SLCPs) can have an immediate effect on slowing warming and the resulting sea-level rise.

Aadhaar Card

When it comes to ID systems, India's Aadhaar initiative sets a high bar for the rest of the world. Aadhaar is a state-of-the-art online system that provides unique 12-digit ID numbers to residents of India. These numbers can be used for a wide range of public and private services.

Available in Français

Rachel Kyte and others in the Political Champions group met with officials in Haiti. Photo credit: PNUD Haiti Standing atop a disused amphitheater in a disused airforce base, we could see over the surrounding area. On the right, a sea of shacks nuzzled together in hope and desperation. On the left, stretches of cracked concrete with just one shack here, one shack there.

The emptying expanse to the left was the story of success. More than three years after the massive earthquake that shattered so much of Port-au-Prince, Haiti, rental subsidies were moving households quickly out of camps to houses in the community.