OPM to present at the Australasian Aid Conference, and other news (7 February 2020)

Each week we highlight some of the international development stories from across the globe that have caught our attention:

• Oxford Policy Management is to present at the 2020 Australasian AID Conference in Canberra later this month (17 February – 19 February). OPM’s Chief Economist, Mark Henstridge, and Programme Manager, Ben French, will discuss how narrowing disparities between developing and developed countries can provide an opportunity to reshape traditional donor-government relationships.
  
  OPM’s Senior economist, Stevan Lee, will also present the Thicker Diagnostics working paper which explores a the integration of political and economic approaches for analysing development challenges. Read more about the conference on DevPolicy.

• Zimbabwe’s Ministry of Health and Child Care has announced that the treatment coverage for Tuberculosis has increased by 13% over the last five years and now stands at 83% across the country. Funding from USAID in 2014 have been used to scale up the prevention and treatment of TB, which has seen a 49% reduction in mortality rates from the disease. Read more in Zimbabwe Daily.

• Development partners, including the World Bank and the Japan International Cooperation Agency, have pledged $4.25 billion in assistance for Bangladesh over the next four years. $1.2 billion of the this will be used to tackle the impacts of climate change in the country. Read more in The Independent (Bangladesh).

• The German International Development Cooperation Agency (GIZ) has announced it will provide a $16 million grant to support sustainable agriculture techniques in West Africa in the next five years. Announced during the inauguration of the West African hub of the Organic Agriculture Knowledge Centre, which aims to disseminate local knowledge of ecological and organic agriculture throughout the region. Read more in Afrik 21.