Aid, growth and development – an interview with Finn Tarp
Channel: UNU-WIDER
Date: 2014-09-11

Finn Tarp, Director of UNU-WIDER, presents the findings from the aid and growth theme of the major ReCom – Research and Communication on Foreign Aid  programme that was undertaken by the Institute in 2010-2013. One of the key conclusions of the programme was that aid has a positive effect on growth on average in the long run.  Professor Tarp also elaborates on the findings on the other themes of the programme; employment, governance and fragility, environment and climate change, gender equality, and the social sectors.
 
More about ReCom research findings and recommendations can be found at http://www.wider.unu.edu/recom.

Questions
00:09  What is UNU-WIDER?
00:38  What is the key to UNU-WIDER's impact?
01:16  This interview was filmed in Vietnam. What does Vietnam illustrate about aid, growth and development?
01:46  Within UNU-WIDER's 2010-13 research programme, what was 'ReCom – Research and Communication on Foreign Aid?'
02:33  What have your discovered on aid and growth?
02:56  How important is the overall contribution of aid to growth?
03:34  What time period did you use for the analysis?
03:58  Why is this important? What did you find?
05:06  Only two of the 36 countries seemed to go against the positive trend – what did you find in these cases?
06:00  In an influential paper (2005, 2008) Rajan and Subramanian found 'little robust evidence' (positive or negative) of a systematic impact of aid on growth?
​06:59  You also did a meta-analysis. What is it?
07:55  What did your meta-analysis re-examining the data of Doucouliagos & Paldam show?
10:48  Does using different methodological approaches give a more robust result?
12:48  What did you conclude in your research on aid and employment?
13:37  Are health and education economically significant?
14:33  How closely are the social sectors and gender equality related?
15:23  What came out of the research on governance and fragility?
16:09  What about climate change – can aid help?
17:07  In a climate-constrained world, what energy choices do developing countries face?
18:47  What does UNU-WIDER see as the future agenda for development economics?
19:45  How can we access all the ReCom research material?

More about UNU-WIDER: http://www.wider.unu.edu