climate change

As COP29 approaches, development economics can provide useful tools and insights to help tackle climate change.

Citizen training that builds households’ practical capability to segregate waste can deliver large, persistent and socially amplified improvements in waste management, making it a highly cost-effective climate policy in resource-constrained cities.

A one-size-fits-all approach to climate change won’t work in Mexico, where climate adaptation is highly unequal. Currently, private responses such as air conditioning, migration, and financial adjustment play a central role. These mechanisms are ofte...

Climate change is likely to keep more labour in agriculture in the very regions where agricultural productivity suffers most, exacerbating the ‘food problem’ just as economies would benefit most from diversifying away from agriculture.

Fragmented carbon markets, especially voluntary offsets, lack the credibility and scale needed to drive global decarbonisation. A proposal for an opt-in, unified global compliance carbon market could reduce emissions cost-effectively while channelling finance to lower-income countries.

New projections highlight the feedback loop between lower growth and increased conflict risk in Africa under climate change.

In El Salvador, extreme heat lowers agricultural productivity and rural incomes, pushing farmers – especially those with strong migrant networks – to use international migration as a climate adaptation strategy.

COP30 presents an ambitious agenda for advancing climate goals amid unprecedented global uncertainty. How can the economic evidence covered on VoxDev since COP29 – on biodiversity, agriculture, cities, health, and renewables – and the subsequent gaps, help shape more effective policymaking?