S7 Ep30: The end of aid dependency

S7 Ep30: The end of aid dependency

From VoxDev Development Economics by VoxDev.org

June 10, 2026 · 23 min · Season 7 · Episode 30

About this episode

The episode discusses the future of global development and the shift away from traditional aid dependency, featuring insights from a panel of experts.

This episode follows a wide-ranging panel convened at Stanford's King Center on Global Development, featuring Gyude Moore, as well as Gates Foundation CEO Mark Suzman, former USAID Administrator and Ambassador Mark Green, and Chair and Founder of the Liquidity and Sustainability Facility Vera Songwe - The future of global development: Approaches and partnerships for a new reality . Bilateral aid to sub-Saharan Africa will fall by between 16% and 28% this year, according to the IMF. In past downturns, multilateral and humanitarian funding tended to fill the gap when bilateral aid dropped. This time those channels are shrinking too. Gyude Moore, who ran the Liberian President's Delivery Unit under Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, thinks the contraction is structural rather than a passing effect of the Trump administration, and that recipient countries should stop expecting the old arrangement to return. He wants economic growth put at the centre of development rather than treated as one programme among several. Instead of letting donors decide which programmes are run, he says, countries should run a growth diagnostic: a way of identifying the two or three constraints doing most to hold an…

People in this episode

Guests: Gyude Moore, Mark Suzman, Mark Green, Vera Songwe

Topics covered

  • aid dependency
  • global development
  • economic growth
  • partnerships
  • sub-Saharan Africa
  • funding
  • sovereignty through analytics

Keywords

  • aid dependency
  • global development
  • economic growth
  • sub-Saharan Africa
  • funding
  • sovereignty
  • analytics

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Gates Foundation, USAID, IMF

Places: sub-Saharan Africa, Stanford

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