Development Futures

As part of the Lowy Institute Re-Cast series, we are republishing the best podcasts of 2024. In case you missed them the first time around or if you want revisit these engaging conversations, the Re-Cast series has you covered. China is facing many economic problems, at home and abroad. The two are connected. Weak demand at home has contributed to a sharp rise in Chinese manufacturing exports, especially in green technologies such as electric vehicles. Surging Chinese exports have in turn prompted a backlash from the United States, Europe, and others who accuse China of exporting overcapacity and damaging their own green industrial ambitions. In this episode, Roland Rajah, Director of the Indo-Pacific Development Centre (IPDC), talks with Dr Bert Hofman, one of the leading international experts on China’s economy and a widely respected development economist and practitioner. They discuss China’s development model, the idea of “Peak China”, whether China is exporting overcapacity, what this all means for developing countries, and Bert’s ideas for what the world should be doing in response. Dr Hofman is currently an adjunct professor at the East Asian Institute at the National University of Singapore and before that was with the World Bank for almost three decades, most recently as director of the World Bank’s country office in China.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Each year, the Lowy Institute updates is Pacific Aid Map – the most comprehensive database tracking aid and development flows to the Pacific Islands region ever assembled. In this episode of Development Futures, lead authors Alexandre Dayant and Riley Duke join Dr Jessica Collins to unpack the key insights from this year’s report and explore key questions. How is the international community supporting the Pacific as it recovers from the pandemic? What role is China playing in the region? And how is geopolitics shaping the allocation of development finance? These questions and more are explored in this episode.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Eighty years ago, the Bretton Woods agreement shaped the global financial system to build a better world. While its institutions remain vital, they are struggling to meet today’s challenges — climate change, economic insecurity, and a multi-trillion-dollar development financing gap. In this podcast, Lowy Institute researchers Alexandre Dayant, Michelle Lyons and Roland Rajah explore the proposal for an Indo-Pacific Economic Resilience Bank (IERB) — a bank that will aim to diversify critical supply chains, reduce China’s dominance in clean energy, and mobilise new capital for the clean energy transition in the Indo-Pacific. Read and download the Lowy Institute Analysis The case for an Indo-Pacific Economic Resilience Bank by Michelle Lyons, Roland Rajah and Grace Stanhope.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Can we measure national success beyond economic growth? Professor Robert Costanza speaks with the Lowy Institute’s Alexandre Dayant about why countries need to move away from gross domestic product as the measure of economic prosperity and factor in other complementary gauges of success. In a time of high inflation, increased cost of living, and growing environmental degradation, Professor Constanza argues that moving “beyond growth” is essential to achieving sustainable prosperity.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

China is facing many economic problems, at home and abroad. The two are connected. Weak demand at home has contributed to a sharp rise in Chinese manufacturing exports, especially in green technologies such as electric vehicles. Surging Chinese exports have in turn prompted a backlash from the United States, Europe, and others who accuse China of exporting overcapacity and damaging their own green industrial ambitions. In this episode, Roland Rajah, Director of the Indo-Pacific Development Centre (IPDC), talks with Dr Bert Hofman, one of the leading international experts on China’s economy and a widely respected development economist and practitioner. They discuss China’s development model, the idea of “Peak China”, whether China is exporting overcapacity, what this all means for developing countries, and Bert’s ideas for what the world should be doing in response. Dr Hofman is currently an adjunct professor at the East Asian Institute at the National University of Singapore and before that was with the World Bank for almost three decades, most recently as director of the World Bank’s country office in China.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Climate change is one of the biggest challenges for sustainable development around the world. Large developing economies, particularly in Asia, are now major sources of global emissions but need external assistance to accelerate their transition to clean energy. Meanwhile, many poor and vulnerable countries have contributed little to the climate crisis but face the worst of its escalating impacts. In this episode of Development Futures, Roland Rajah, Director of the Indo-Pacific Development Centre (IPDC), talks with Melanie Pill and Michelle Lyons — both IPDC climate policy research fellows and experts in climate finance – to examine the key issues and what needs to be done following the “historic” yet disappointing outcomes of the 28th Conference of the Parties (COP28) summit held in the United Arab Emirates at the end of last year. Among other issues, they discuss the outcomes of the COP28 summit, where to next on climate finance, the synergies and tensions between climate and development, how to accelerate progress in emerging Asian economies, the acute challenges facing vulnerable island states such as in the Pacific, the role and responsibilities of Australia, and their own practical ideas for how the world could do better in delivering on the climate and development progress needed.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Many of the most economically efficient policies to reduce emissions, such as carbon pricing, have proven difficult to implement. In this episode of Development Futures, the Lowy Institute’s Indo-Pacific Development Centre Research Fellow Michelle Lyons speaks with Professor David Victor from UC San Diego on how to make climate policy work and ways to accelerate decarbonisation of the global economy. Their discussion includes the roles of carbon and offset markets in addressing climate change, opportunities for Australia and Pacific Island countries to accelerate climate action if their bid to co-host the 2026 UNFCCC Conference of the Parties is successful, and the importance of enhancing national institutional capacity when seeking to mitigate and adapt to climate change.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.