Of Interest
you are currently viewing::World Cannot Recycle Its Way Out of Plastics Crisis, Report WarnsAugust 4, 2025--The 8 billion tons of plastic waste that have amassed on Earth pose a grave and growing danger to human health, according to a new report published in the leading medical journal The Lancet. Ahead of a U.N. conference on plastic pollution, authors warn that countries urgently need to cut production. The world churns out more than 200 times as much plastic today as it did in 1950, and production is only rising. Microscopic bits of plastic waste have been found nearly everywhere, from the bottom of the sea to the clouds over Mount Fuji, as well as in the food we eat, water we drink, and air we breathe. Scientists have found microplastics in human lungs, brains, and bone marrow, among other organs, as well as in blood, semen, and breast milk. Source: yale.edu |
Accelerating Blue Finance: Instruments, Case Studies, and Pathways to Scale
June 7, 2025--The ocean drives economic prosperity and environmental stability for billions of people. Yet it is under threat from overfishing, pollution and climate change.
Public financing isn't enough to respond. The answer: unlock private capital to conserve marine life, prevent overfishing, and build coastal infrastructure to resist floods.
The Longevity Dividend
June 3, 2025--Aging populations should be embraced, not feared
The story of demographic doom has become familiar: Declining birth rates will cause populations to shrink, while longer lifespans will increase the costs of pensions and eldercare. Relatively fewer workers will have to pay for it all.
Sustaining Growth in an Aging World
June 2, 2025--Older populations need not lead to slumping economic growth and mounting fiscal pressures
The demographic dividend that has supported global economic expansion in recent decades will soon make way for a demographic drag. In advanced economies the share of working-age people is shrinking already.
Green Technologies: Decarbonizing Development in East Asia and Pacific
June 2, 2025--East Asia is helping the rest of the world decarbonize and encouraging the domestic adoption of renewable energy. But there is an imbalance: Even as the region's innovation and investment improve global access to green technologies, the region's own emissions continue to grow, because of the reluctance to penalize carbon-intensive practices.
A Critical Look at Dollar Dominance
May 23, 2025--The dollar remains central to the global economy despite the search for alternatives.
How has the US dollar dominated the global financial system for so long? Harvard economics professor Kenneth Rogoff seeks to answer this question in Our Dollar, Your Problem. As the world comes to terms with the dollar’s weaponization in geopolitical rivalries and recent flight from US financial assets, the book couldn't be timelier.
Economics and Nature's Laws
May 23, 2025--A provocative new book proposes a radically different approach to economic theory
Among ongoing efforts to rethink the basic tenets of mainstream economics is a provocative new book by James Galbraith and Jing Chen. The authors sweep aside the intellectual structure of mainstream theory-which rests on concepts like the marginal utility theory of value, market equilibrium, and a steady state for the economy-and propose a radically different approach: "entropy economics."
AI Needs More Abundant Power Supplies to Keep Driving Economic Growth
May 13, 2025--The power-hungry technology requires policies to help expand electricity supplies, incentivize alternative sources, and help contain price surges
Artificial intelligence is an emerging source of productivity and economic growth that's also reshaping employment and investment.
Africa Poised to Become a Global Leader in Carbon Markets, Says New Report
May 7, 2025--A new report, the 2025 Africa Carbon Market Outlook (ACMO 25) says Africa is poised to become a global leader in carbon markets.
