Post-disaster assessments changed my life by starting my career in disaster risk 
management. Three months after arriving in Indonesia as the World Bank’s environment coordinator, the Indian Ocean tsunami and related earthquakes struck Aceh and Nias at the end of 2004. I was asked to pull together the economic evaluation of the disaster’s environmental impact as part of what was then known as a damage-and-loss assessment. Subsequently, the World Bank, United Nations and European Union agreed on a joint approach to crisis response in 2008, including a common methodology for post-disaster needs assessment (PDNA).
Five ways to do better post-disaster assessments
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Germany, Japan, Laerdal Global Health, the Netherlands, Qatar and an anonymous donor—have joined since the launch of the Global Financing Facility replenishment. They join existing funders the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Canada, MSD for Mothers, Norway, and the United Kingdom to fund the GFF to improve the health and nutrition of women, children and adolescents.
today’s agri-food system. Whether it’s today’s soil moisture, tomorrow’s weather forecast, or the price of rice in Riyadh, every bit of data can improve the efficiency with which the world’s 570 million farmers put food into the mouths of its soon-to-be eight billion consumers. Digital technologies are facilitating the flow of data through the food system, shrinking information asymmetries and fashioning new markets along the way. How can we ensure these new markets are appropriately contested, and the treasure does not end up in the hands of a couple of gunslingers? Is there a public sector’s role in generating and disseminating data that on the one hand encourages innovation and competition and on the other reduces opportunities for market capture? One place to look may be at the crossroads of internet and public goods.
lately. Policymakers are concerned that America’s leading firms such as the FAANG stocks — Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix and Google — are having adverse results on the rest of us and making economic policy less predictable. Why is this? Many of the companies have improved the lives of people across the world with highly desirable and useful products. These superstar firms have also done very well for many of their stakeholders and investors. The numbers are staggering. These five tech companies together account for roughly half of the gains achieved by the Standard & Poor’s 500 stock index in 2018. And in recent weeks, Apple became the world’s first trillion-dollar corporation, with Amazon not far behind. While the superstar firms have made life easier for many consumers, it’s hard for economists not to wonder whether the effects of their stratospheric success are entirely benign.
