Read all posts for ‘developing countries’

In October 2012, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) published the World Economic Outlook (WEO), a forecast for more than 180 countries based on macroeconomic indicators such as gross domestic product (GDP), inflation and fiscal balance. Ghana’s 2012 GDP of +8.18% has it listed as one of the top 20 fastest […]

This was the first time I bought something on the black market. Yet I would have expected to have to enter a semi-legal market for purchasing other items than a perfectly ordinary SIM card. But when the Myanmar government stopped issuing temporary SIM cards in July 2013, the only way […]

Poverty and unemployment are chronic ailments that afflict much of South Africa’s scattered township population. These townships, known as shanty towns in much of the rest of the world, comprise a large percentage of the overall population of the country and therefore any conversation about South Africa’s future cannot be […]

Just 19 years into democracy, ‘development’ and ‘transformation’ continue to be buzzwords in South Africa. Both terms fit equally well into the conversation around the country’s inclusion in the BRICS group of emerging national economies and the G20. There’s no arguing with the figures related to South Africa’s economic growth […]

  Valentyna is in her 70s. She sells used books on the street right under an old rusty fence. I come closer and pick up an extremely old copy of Boccaccio’s “Decameron”. She doesn’t mind a bit of a chat with me and says that she has been in this […]