The shape of change is emerging
š Global governance, interrupted.
FROM THE EDITORāS DESK
WorldWise readersā
A big part of what goes into producing this newsletter demands a daily practice of sifting through news and analysis. Itās always been driven by a sense of curiosity about the bigger picture behind disparate reports. Of late, thatās being tinged by a sense of trepidation, and Iād hazard a guess itās a sentiment shared by many.
Thatās not just because of the tectonic shifts underway on global governanceāthereās another dose of those developments belowābut because of how fractious this particular set of changes feels, regardless of where you stand on the specifics (yes, thereās much to criticise about the way things were too).
I still believe in getting at optimism through realism. But the terrain is getting more challenging. And while thatās happening āout thereā, we all have lives and projects to juggle (hence this post getting to you with a slight delay).
ClichĆ©d as it is, I do believe that change needs to be seen as an opportunity for new directions. The post shared earlier this month, about this as a time to get intentional, was written in the context of changing careers. But the message isnāt limited to that. How we position ourselves in this moment of history could use some intentionality too, as much of it as we can manage. I donāt know about you, but Iām still working on figuring that out.
Anita
INSIGHT | views & analysis
Cutādissolvedāremade?
We pick up where we left off from the last editionāa month later, the momentous changes to globally significant US programmes and policies are taking shape more clearly.
USAID dismantled
The rapid and extensive programme cancellations, staff reductions and overall restructuring of US foreign aid continues, along with legal battles around the Trump administrationās actions. After the 90-day pause pending a review, over 80% of USAID programmes have been cancelled, amounting to around 5,200 contracts. Some 1,600 staff were fired in the US, and nearly all direct hires worldwide have been placed on administrative leave.
A leaked list suggests that essential health programmes havenāt been spared, and humanitarian workers report that waivers intended to protect life-saving aid were not effectively implemented. Reports also suggest that the agency may be dissolved and replaced by a new bureau embedded within the State Department.
Global impact of foreign aid cuts
Serious concerns continue to be raised about the impact on life-saving food and medical aid globally. Millions of people will be affected and at least hundreds of thousands could die due to the cuts. Health organisations and former government officials also warn of a resurgence of diseases like malaria, tuberculosis, polio, and HIV/AIDS. The impacts extend to programmes that improve nutrition, water and sanitation, and general health care around the world.
After the cuts: deficits and adaptations
The turmoil and uncertainty is rippling out to the broader global development sector. The US has been the largest single aid donor, disbursing approximately $72 billion in 2023, much of it through USAID. While philanthropic organisations and other donors are being called upon to fill the void, most analysts suggest this wonāt be enough in scale and speed. Bill Gates has warned that "no foundation could fill in the gap left by U.S. funding cutsā. The EU has come out to say it cannot do it, and other traditional donors like Canada and the UK have been cutting development assistance in recent yearsāin the case of the UK, aid spending has just been slashed further, to 0.3% of national income, to boost defence. Emergency funding mechanisms tend to be for geographically restricted crises.
In certain places and sectors, China has already stepped in to fill that gap. Some observers have called for building new coalitions between multilateral lenders, philanthropic organisations, and countries that now face an abrupt need to end reliance on donors. This could be an opportunity for poorer nations to regain control over domestic development agendasāa key objective of longstanding efforts that are nowadays reflected in the decolonisation movement.
Other policy changes with a global impact
Hundreds of staff at the top US agency that oversees globally significant weather and climate research (NOAA) have been fired. The administration has also fired thousands of employees at US science agencies and announced reforms set to slash federal funding for science. NASA is no longer supporting the international panel that prepares scientific assessments on climate change (IPCC). A data collection programme that provided essential information on public health (DHS) to about half of the worldās nations will be closing as a result of the foreign aid cuts. The National Institutes of Health has ended funding for studies into the health impacts of climate change. Funding of studies into vaccine hesitancy and uptake are also terminated or limited.
Executive orders have been signed to dismantle the Inter-American Foundation, the US African Development Foundation, and the US Institute of Peace. A multi-billion dollar initiative designed to help developing countries transition to clean energy sources has been scrapped, as has an initiative working to boost electricity access in Africa specifically.
āRemakingā the UN?
The administration has pulled out of the UN climate fund established in recent years to help vulnerable countries cope with natural disasters, adding to the dent in climate finance tied up with foreign aid cuts. It is also reportedly opposing UN commitments to expanding the role of women in peacekeeping operations, has rejected the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, and has issued a "loyalty test" to UN agencies, private charities, and nonprofits who will now be asked to declare whether they have ever worked with entities that embrace "anti-American beliefs." Some analysts suggest the administration may be looking to āremakeā the UN so it rubber-stamps deals it wants to pursue.
[Selected sources: Devex, Reuters, Bloomberg, WaPo, ProPublica, Semafor, Economist, POLITICO, CGD, Foreign Policy]
GLOBAL BRIEFING | around the world
News highlights
š On development
Large-scale projects built or planned to extract critical minerals across Africa are replicating colonial models of infrastructure, economic links and inequities, Duncan Money writes in World Politics Review.
Andre Aranha Correa do Lago, president of the COP30 climate summit due to take place this year in Brazil, says its leadership will āpress for multilateralism and respect for scienceā, Gloria Dickie reports for Reuters.
Severe power outages are becoming increasingly common in Latin America, a region that relies on hydropower for energy security, Jorge C Carrasco reports for Dialogue Earth. Brazilās dependence on hydropower, which can lead to blackouts in drought conditions, hasnāt stopped investment in big data centres that consume huge amounts of energy, Thiago Lima writes for The Guardian.
In Peru, human rights groups are alarmed by a controversial law that prevents NGOs from taking legal action against the state for human rights abuses, Dan Collyns reports for The Guardian.
Extreme poverty has plummeted in India, according to the Economist.
No country is on track to meet all 17 of the UNās Sustainable Development Goals by the target year of 2030 according to a new analysis, reports Eurasia Review.
š„ On climate change
What we think of as an āenergy transitionā is actually turning out to be an āenergy addition,ā Daniel Yergin writes in Foreign Affairs: as renewable energy rises, the amount of energy derived from coal and oil has also kept growing to all-time highs with no major decline in the share of hydrocarbons in the global energy mix. Jean-Baptise Fressoz argues that the phrase āenergy transitionā reflects a false notion appropriated from science in an interview with Rachel Donald for Planet : Critical.
Brazil is planning to launch a $125 billion fund to protect tropical forests when it hosts the COP30 climate summit later this year, Martha Viotti Beck and Simone Iglesias report for Bloomberg and Jesse Chase-Lubitz reports for Devexāmeanwhile, eight miles of Amazon rainforest are being cleared to build a four-lane highway in the lead-up to the summit, Ione Wells reports for BBC News.
The Amazon rainforest region is a rising frontier for oil and gas drilling, Andre Cabette Fabio reports for Context. Raoni Metuktire, Indigenous leader of the Kayapo people in Brazil, says he plans to ask President Lula to reconsider an oil mega-project at the mouth of the Amazon river that could be given the green light by the countryās environment agency, AFP reports.
A NASA analysis found that last year, the global sea level rose by an average rate thatās 35% higher than expected, reports Kasha Patel for The Washington Post.
Young people in Madagascar are reporting high levels of anxiety, depression, and worry about the impacts of climate change, Rebecca Ann Hughes reports for Euronews.
š± On environmental protection
While the International Seabed Authority negotiates regulations on deep-sea miningāwith daily updates available hereāit may be forced to consider and potentially approve mining applications before environmental safeguards are in place, Todd Woody writes for Bloomberg.
An acid spill from a mine owned by a Chinese company has contaminated a major river with signs of pollution detected at least 100 km downstream, potentially affecting millions of people, AP reports.
Solar parks in Indiaās Tamil Nadu state are relying on glyphosate-based herbicides to control vegetation, and nearby communities fear long-term health effects from groundwater contamination and air pollution, Gowthami Subramaniam reports for Mongabay.
Of the nine āplanetary boundariesā that scientists have defined as critical to maintain the Earthās stability, all of which are now exceeded, thereās one that gets hardly any attention: ānutrient flowsā, or the overflow of nitrogen and phosphorus from agriculture and industry into nature, Jonathan Mingle writes in The New York Review of Books.
Last month, countries convening at the resumed COP16 biodiversity summit agreed to a funding strategy on how to mobilise at least $200 billion per year by 2030 to help developing countries conserve biodiversity, according to reports by Carbon Brief, AP, Bloomberg and Devex. They also launched the Cali Fund, a previously agreed mechanism which urges industries that commercially benefit from biodiversity to contribute 1% of profits or 0.1% of revenue for conservation.
The Amazonās Indigenous communities are developing their own AI tools to protect their land and traditions, Meghie Rodrigues reports for Atmos.
Views of Note
š” As the world becomes increasingly unstable, climate change has been sidelined by geopoliticsāenter āgreenhushingā. But sustainability is tied up with security, Bertrand BadrĆ© and Thomas Crampton argue in Eco Business.
The rise of āgreenhushingāāwhen companies downplay environmental goals for financial or political reasonsāreflects not just changing communications strategies, but rising tensions between competing priorities.
š” The case of Greenland is a prime example of how climate change could spur a global contest for land, Michael Albertus argues in Foreign Affairs.
Threats of territorial conquest are once again becoming a central part of geopolitics, driven by a new phase of great-power competition, growing population pressures, shifts in technology, and, perhaps most crucially, a changing climate.
š”šļø In an interview with Tim Phillips for VoxDevTalks, Pushpam Kumar from the United Nations Environment Programme says rising external debt is eating into natural capital.
High external debt levels worldwide have forced ecologically-rich nations to exploit their natural resources to generate revenue. Debt-for-nature swaps offer a promising solution to this problem, but remain challenging to implement in practice.
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PLUS | in other editions
UPDATE | from the network
The Second Global Conference on Air Pollution and Health, taking place this week in Cartagena, Colombia, highlights evidence-based solutions that can be implemented across sectors and locations. The health benefits linked to the UNECE (UN Economic Commission for Europe) Convention on Long-Range Transboundary Air Pollution, which is the only binding regional treaty on air pollution in any region, is attracting interest from East and South Asia and Latin America. UNECE argues it also shows the benefits of multilateral cooperationādetails here.
The FAOās Commission on Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture, the only permanent intergovernmental body focused on conserving all types of biological diversity for food, is meeting this week to discuss its role in meeting global biodiversity commitmentsādetails here.
Also this week, the Monaco Blue Initiative (MBI) held its 16th meeting to discuss key themes expected at the Third UN Ocean Conference due to take place in Nice from June 9 to 13, and to prepare for the Blue Economy & Finance Forum to be held just prior to the conference in Monaco on June 7 and 8ādetails here.
Discussions during the 41st UN-Water Meeting, taking place from 2ā3 April in Rome, will be organised around the first-ever UN-wide Strategy on Water and Sanitation that launched in July 2024ādetails here.
PS.
Thank you.
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Created and edited by Anita Makriājournalist/writer, producer and editorial adviser covering global development and science in society. I also help selected organisations with compatible values to strengthen their media work. LinkedInĀ | Instagram | Email