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3 notable “new” storylines in the aid effectiveness conversation
From debates about “good” and “bad” charity, to David Letterman hammering Hugh Evans on how charity concerts end poverty, from Africa’s evolving philanthropic discourse, to trepidations about impact...
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Pirates, Captain Phillips, and international food aid
There is a serious damper on my leisure time activities: having two kids under 4 years of age. I don’t see many movies these days, but when Netflix gets it, I’m definitely going to check out Captain...
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Tech geek proclaims the unthinkable!
“Even in a country like Kenya, with a dynamic information and communication technology (ICT) sector, simply making data available is only one step in a longer process.” What?! Haven’t we in the aid...
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Doomed to fail: Outsiders’ assessments of the impact of mining and oil projects
Photo courtesy of friendsoflaketurkana.org I sat in a hot, dusty, sticky room, filled to the brim with community leaders and civil society representatives. We fanned ourselves and listened as the...
View ArticleBack to the “Bottom of the Barrel”? Will East Africa’s new oil and gas...
Oxfam America and the Brookings Institution will host “East Africa’s Oil and Gas Boom – Promise and Peril,” on Thursday, Feb. 20, in Washington, DC. You can view the event and join the conversation on...
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Heart, brains and muscle needed in East Africa’s oil boom
This post is based on my remarks today at an event Oxfam is co-sponsoring with the Brookings Institution to examine East Africa’s oil and gas boom and its potential impact on poverty. You can watch a...
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A taxing affair: Collecting oil revenues in Africa
Much is made about the (potential) benefits of billions of dollars of oil, gas and mining revenues in Africa but there has been far less attention on the ability (or willingness) of resource-rich...
View ArticleWill oil bring promise or peril to the communities of Turkana, Kenya?
How does an oil company engage with communities effectively when these communities have been plagued by years of poverty, conflict, and extreme marginalization from the rest of the country? The...
View ArticleWhat must be inexorably-linked in aid? Accountability and country ownership
“…together, accountability and country ownership are vital prerequisites to building the kind of capacity in developing countries that will help enable leaders and citizens to take responsibility for...
View Article“The Samaritans” elegantly demonstrates the need for serious aid reform
The Kenyan mockumentary, “The Samaritans,” continues to inspire conversations about the reality of working in an NGO. After a screening of the first two episodes of the series in DC last week, I had...
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“Absolutely” – Kenya President backs full oil contract disclosure
There was one lasting highlight for me from this month’s US-Africa Leaders Summit in Washington. But it wasn’t during the billion dollar deals between US corporations and African nations, nor in...
View ArticleLegal expert: “Reforms bring hope in Africa’s pursuit of equitable growth”
Allan Akombo is a freelance journalist in Nairobi. With one of the fastest economic growth rates globally, the narrative of Africa’s economic renaissance has only become stronger in recent times....
View ArticleAfrican Mining Ministers Endorse, Push for Reforms
Chatham House, aka the Royal Institute of International Affairs in London, is famously known for the “Chatham House Rule” wherein what was said at an event can be shared but not attributed to any...
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The President’s trip to East Africa: a TL;DR cheat sheet for Air Force One
Laura Rusu is the Policy and Campaigns Media Manager at Oxfam America. If you haven’t noticed, there’s been a lot going on (Iran, Iran, Iran!) and President Obama has been pretty busy. Today, he shifts...
View ArticleAmidst the flurry of President Obama’s visit, Kenya commits to a transparent...
Buried in the news of President Obama’s first official visit to Kenya last month was the announcement of important “joint commitments” by the U.S. and Kenya to address serious corruption and...
View ArticleWhat’s needed to ensure Africa’s oil boom is not a bust
Julie Kim is a Program Officer for Extractive Industries at Oxfam America. Oil prices are at their lowest in years. Looking ahead, expert analysts at Goldman Sachs have even flirted with the idea of...
View ArticleMultinationals are no-shows for gender equality
Maria Ezpeleta is the Gender Advisor for Oxfam America’s Extractive Industries team. A few weeks ago, I got on a plane headed for Nairobi. Never having been to Kenya, I was excited to set off for new...
View ArticleRich people can end poverty
A new program to provide a large number of poor people with a guaranteed minimum income got me thinking: Rich people can end poverty. Why don’t they? The math isn’t very hard. The richest 1 percent...
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Love in the time of oil
For the last year, Uganda has been caught in a love triangle. Harboring precious oil resources in its Lake Albert region, Uganda has been the subject of intense courtship from its neighbors, Kenya and...
View ArticleStanding up for humanity: What we need to do to tackle the hunger crisis
As a child, I remember seeing images of starving kids in Ethiopia on TV. Those images roused something in a lot of us, something that all the data that scientists and policy wonks use fail to deliver-...
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