The last time I was in Uganda (more years ago than I care to think about) Kampala was a quiet and relatively traffic free environment. I stayed in a very run-down Speke Hotel where large fruit bats would hang upside down in a tree whose branches spread across the hotel room balcony. Unsurprisingly I found…

The malaria problem In the mid 1990s my late wife Ruth (a medical doctor and epidemiologist specializing in malaria control) and I (an agricultural planner and manager specializing in small farmer development schemes), both of us old friends of Mokoro, were working in Tanzania in the East Usambara Mountains. Despite the widespread use of preventive…

In the course of the last six months I have had the opportunity to work in two countries with very different profiles in terms of their relative wealth and economic complexity. Brazil today is claiming world power status, with the seventh largest economy and a modern industrial base that includes nuclear energy and an aviation…

In probably my shortest field mission so far, I recently spent two nights and three days in Botswana and Zimbabwe, scoping some proposed work on enhancing rural infrastructure. I had at least expected to spend the two nights in the same bed, but arrived in Kasane (northern Botswana) to be told that we would leave…

‘Extreme disparities in income are slowing the pace of poverty reduction and hampering the development of broad-based economic growth.’ Kofi Annan, Africa Progress Panel, 2012 The issue of inequality is on the table – for all the wrong reasons. As the body of evidence pointing to the increasing gap between the world’s richest and the…

Perhaps I should introduce myself as this is my first contribution to the Newsletter… and it will tell you about my first assignment for Mokoro. I may be new to Mokoro, but I’m certainly not new to this business.. with almost 20 years and 35 countries under my belt.. I was obviously just a bit…

Advocates for more secure land rights for the poor and vulnerable are a diverse and disparate group and not always of one mind on how to achieve their objective. Nonetheless, in January 2014, we were all united in mourning the sudden and unexpected loss of a much loved and respected mentor – Professor Patrick McAuslan….

In the face of discernible fatigue around the Post-2015 Agenda, Mokoro’s seminar brought a fresh perspective to the question of what’s next after the MDGs, focusing specifically on the education sector, and bringing to bear emerging thinking on inequality, a preview of the latest report on global education progress, and new research into how partners…

The national budget lies at the intersection of all important decisions to be made in the public sector. By allocating resources as a means to realise policy goals, the budget is intrinsic to the policy-making process itself. Getting it right, then, deserves a concentrated, multi-shareholder effort, and in this vein the 2013 ODI-CAPE conference brought…

Sitting in the diplomatic enclave in the capital, Kinshasa, it is very hard to visualise the vastness of the Democratic Republic of Congo (‘DRC’) – stretching as it does from the South Atlantic across jungles and savannah to Lake Tanganyika – and bordering nine countries1. With the majestic Congo River draped around its shoulders, the land…