When a disaster strikes, we are urged to send money, and many people do—but is there a better way to fund the relief effort? My guests this week, DFID chief economist Stefan Dercon and CGD senior analyst Theo Talbot, believe that insurance can help.

A multi-year project just came to fruition with the endorsement by the Board of the World Bank of its new set of safeguards—the social and environmental standards that govern Bank-funded projects in client countries. CGD's expert on multilateral development banks, senior fellow Scott Morris, joins me to discuss.

Got 27,000 Canadian dollars? If so, why not sponsor a family of refugees? In this week's CGD podcast, Senator Ratna Omidvar discusses Canada’s experience of migration and refugees, and its unique program of private sponsorship.

IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde joins the CGD Podcast to discuss how challenging global economic conditions, including a combination of low growth, a limited number of jobs, and rising inequality, are fueling the rise of nationalism and populism that are a threat to global cooperation.

It’s been three weeks since the UK voted to leave the European Union in the move popularly known as Brexit, and the consequences are still becoming apparent. Senior fellow and director of CGD Europe Owen Barder joins the podcast from London this week to take a balanced look at possibilities for the UK’s future, and consider implications for the country and the developing world.

Ann Mei Chang wants to “turn development upside down.” That’s how she describes the aim of the Global Development Lab, the arm of USAID that she runs. The Global Development Lab is tasked with finding new, innovative development solutions, testing them, rolling them out, and then trying to scale them.

The UK government-sponsored AMR Review, led by Lord Jim O’Neill, describes a burgeoning human tragedy wrought by growing antimicrobial resistance which, if unchecked, could see one person die every three seconds by 2050. O'Neill joins the CGD Podcast to discuss how we can fight back.

With longer-lasting crises and greater flows of refugees, is the current humanitarian system up to the challenge? International Rescue Committee president David Miliband emphasizes the need for better evidence, goals, metrics, and coordination.

A billion premature deaths this century – that’s the estimated toll of smoking. One solution is to encourage smokers to switch to less harmful nicotine delivery systems, like e-cigarettes. But does switching our focus to harm reduction mean letting go of the “endgame” – a completely tobacco-free future? 

More people are in need and for longer; that’s the global humanitarian crisis in a nutshell. Just before the World Humanitarian Summit, World Bank president Jim Yong Kim and the IRC's David Miliband discuss the blurring of the line between development and humanitarian response.