Senior Fellows Testimonials

The global migration problem cannot be wished away; it has to be managed. Morocco provides an example of how responsibility for migration management can be handled by African states. The latest statistics of the European Border and Coast Guard Agency (FRONTEX) identify the Western Mediterranean route from Morocco to Spain as the busiest migratory route into Europe last year, with 57,034 illegal attempts to enter the continent recorded. However, a parallel look at the Moroccan gover ...

Since the Fed’s July meeting, when the Fed Funds Rate had a 0.25% cut, fears about the impact of the US-China trade war on the global economy have escalated. The US yield curve inversion received much attention as a harbinger of a slowdown in the global and US economic outlooks. We approach here whether lights on next monetary policy events can be obtained from reading the minutes of the Fed’s meeting – and of the July meeting of the ECB governing council – released this week. The ...

La création d’instruments financiers à la Conférence de Bretton Woods, à la fin de la Seconde  Guerre mondiale, était une nouveauté pour l’époque et avait sonné la fin du chacun pour soi « monétaire », en jetant les bases d’un système de changes fixes mais ajustables reconnaissant, cependant, et dès le départ, la primauté du dollar de la nouvelle grande puissance. Le Fonds monétaire international (FMI) devant se charger de venir en aide aux pays à la balance des paiements déficitai ...

“O! WRETCHED MORTALS, OPEN YOUR EYES” Leonardo da Vinci, creator of the ever beautiful and impenetrable Mona Lisa, noted 500 years ago that he realized the importance of water, which is, the artist jotted in his notebooks , “the driving force of all nature”, the vetturale di natura, the vehicle of nature. Da Vinci was not only acclaimed by kings and wealthy nobility like the Florentine Medici’s for his paintings , but the genius, possibly one of the greatest minds and creative pow ...

Income inequality is high in Morocco. In 2013, the share of national income of the richest 10% in Morocco stood at nearly 32%, 12 times higher than the share of national income of the poorest 10% of the population. High inequality can adversely affect long-term growth as it tends to be associated with underutilization of human potential. This paper argues that, drawing on international experience, there is much more that Morocco’s government can do to reduce inequality while at the ...

This note approaches the relationship between natural wealth and economic growth, using the case of Sub-Sahara African economies as an illustration. Delving into recent World Bank reports, it highlights how a sustained positive correlation between natural capital and GDP growth happens through the transformation of the former into other forms of assets: produced capital, human capital and other intangible assets. Governance features and the quality of macroeconomic policies are of t ...

Argentina’s peso tumbled and stocks plunged after last Sunday’s primary elections. The perception of a likely victory of President Macri’s opponents – Alberto Fernandez, and running mate, Christina Fernandez de Kirchner - has sparked a new shift in investor preferences away from peso assets, pressures on the exchange rate, and hikes on sovereign spreads. Unless fears of a return to policies prevailing before Macri are assuaged, the market rout tends to deepen as a negative feedback ...

Earlier this month, the World Resources Institute based in Washington D.C. revealed that 17 countries, home to one-quarter of the world's population, are facing extremely high water stress. Below is an international press review of the global water crisis by Helmut Sorge, former Foreign editor, and Middle East expert for Germany's leading newsmagazine "Der Spiegel", and columnist at the Policy Center for the New South.    “A QUARTER OF THE WORLD IS FACING A LOOMING WATER CRISIS” “ ...

Thirty months into President Trump's radical trade policy, it is time to take stock. American firms tend to give the President the benefit of the doubt - that the aim is not protection (which most don't want) but opening up markets overseas, striking better trade deals, and reducing the nation's big trade deficit. So far, however, none of this has happened. Instead, there is virulent uncertainty, barriers against American firms are going up, Europe, Japan and China have struck impor ...

Purpose This study aims to exploit the abundance of solar energy resources for socioeconomic development in the semi -arid Northeastern Brazil as a potent adaptation tool to global climate change. It points out a set of conjuncture factors that allow us to foresee a new paradigm of sustainable development for the region by transforming the sun’s radiant energy into electricity through distributed photovoltaic generation. The new paradigm, as presented in this essay, has the transfo ...