News

As a Canadian, my 'mygration' story is not unusual – a mix of different places and several unknowns. For a start, I know a lot more about my mother’s side than my father’s. The father of my grandma arrived in Canada as a young child, and his family had left Russia because antisemitism was (once agai...

Is eradicating poverty, a goal the United Nations’ hopes to achieve by 2030, actually feasible? New research out of Ecuador says yes – if governments are willing to pay for it....

Understanding why some societies develop while others lag is crucial for the UN and anyone else interested in the 2030 Agenda – be they policymakers, academics or NGOs. In this Q&A, Dr. Eleonora Nillesen talks about her research on corruption and development, and how it earned her the acclaimed ...

On Earth Day, Saturday April 22 2017, scientists will descend from their ivory towers in more than 500 cities across the globe to stage a huge March for Science. The scientists are coming out en masse to champion “robustly funded and publicly communicated science as a pillar of human freedom and pro...

I heard about the 2017 APPAM Conference through my university network. At the time, I had just finalised a paper on environmental policy in the Water-Food-Energy Nexus of the Mekong Region, which became the foundation of my current thesis. When I saw the conference themes, I thought it would be a go...

Reports on the fight against global poverty are often optimistic — sometimes too optimistic. Part of the problem is “our” reliance on a simplistic measure, which draws an absolute poverty line of $1.90 per day in so-called 2011 international purchasing power parity. What can we do ...

PhD fellow Jennifer Waidler recently returned from a visiting fellowship at the University of Western Cape, South Africa. There she worked with Prof. Stephen Devereux, Research fellow at the Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex and Professor at the University of Western Cape. They ...

“An outstanding contribution to society – world leading,” is one verdict by an independent review committee on the work carried out by the United Nations University – Maastricht Economic and Social Research Institute on Innovation and Technology (UNU-MERIT) and the International Centre for Integrate...

Boats are floating on the still surface of a bay in Northwest Tanzania. I have come to a village in the Kigoma region to do research on small-scale fishing and the value chain from lake to market. I am here to look especially at the different roles played by men and women, to identify gender-based b...

“Worldwide about a billion people defecate in the open — including 600,000 in India. So when Sikkim in the far northeast of India was declared ‘Open Defecation Free’ in 2016, we were curious. How did this small state, capped by Himalayan peaks and dotted with Buddhist monasteries, ...

When people ask me where I’m from, I pause. I take a deep breath and try to decide if I should give the long story or the short story. I was born in Abergavenny, a small town in Wales. When I was one year old, we moved to Hong Kong, and spent an amazing 10 years living there....

“Peru is at a critical juncture politically, economically and socially,” says Dr. Michiko Iizuka. “Their economy has been growing significantly for the past 10-15 years and during that period, poverty has decreased – but now economic growth is slowing due to the decline in commodit...

The Dutch government’s refusal to allow Turkish ministers to visit Rotterdam and address the large number of Dutch-Turkish citizens on how to vote in the Turkish constitutional referendum of April 16 was a game-changer in the Dutch elections....

Stakes are always high in peace operations, so decent training is vital for the various roles of peacekeepers, the implementation of the mission mandate and for ensuring operational unity, coordination and coherence. ...

The UN wants to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030. But, as many of us are acutely aware, the SDGs are not only ambitious but also complicated. A kaleidoscope of grand visions, the 2030 Agenda aims to rebuild our world from the ground up, in a work plan covering everything from the en...

Hunger and food security are two of the most pressing issues for the UN – issues only made harder by climate change and armed conflict. Against this backdrop, UNU-MERIT joined a global challenge: to draft and debate a plan in support of SDG#2 — and end hunger. Higher education is changing: tra...

After months of fighting, Iraqi Security Forces have finally regained control of the eastern half of Mosul, the last urban stronghold of Islamic State in Iraq. They are now advancing on the city’s west. The recapture of the northern Iraqi city will be a strategic victory for Iraq and its internation...

EU leaders have agreed to a plan that will provide Libya’s UN-backed government €200 million for dealing with migration. This includes an increase in funding for the Libyan coastguard, with an overall aim to stop migrant boats crossing the Mediterranean to Italy....

Set amid a rapidly changing backdrop, our roundtable discussed the many systemic challenges to UN peacekeeping. The session was part of the ‘Future Force‘ conference held in The Hague, 9-10 February 2017, co-organised by Ortrun Merkle, Diego Salama and Pui-hang Wong of UNU-MERIT. Speaker...

Female research scientists are more productive than their male colleagues, though they are widely perceived as being less so. Women are also rewarded less for their scientific achievements....