News

Tax avoidance like that highlighted by the Paradise Papers is among the threats to the economic and social aspirations of the international community – embodied in the Sustainable Development Goals – since tax not paid denies an important stream of financing, experts meeting with United Nations member States in Geneva this week said.

UNCTAD presented in Kigali its review of the country's progress in building a knowledge-based economy

The Viet Nam Biodiversity Conservation Agency, focal point for the implementation of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) and the Nagoya Protocol on Access and Benefit Sharing (ABS) approved a decree on the Management of Access to Genetic Resources and Benefit Sharing. The decree supports and enhances the development and implementation of the 2008 Vietnamese Biodiversity Law of 2008.

The United Nations Commission on Science and Technology for Development concluded its twentieth session on the evening of 12 May with countries reaffirming its role as the United Nations torch-bearer for science, technology and innovation for development.

"Scientific and technological progress is an essential means to eradicate poverty and create a better world for all. We should not see it as an existential threat," said Dr. Mukhisa Kituyi Secretary-General of UNCTAD about the opening of the twentieth session of the United Nations Commission on Science and Technology for Development (CSTD), the premier platform of the UN system that tackles science and technology questions and their implications for development.

In the face of climate change, many developing countries need better technology to help them predict crop yields to ensure secure sources of food. The Chinese Academy of Sciences' Institute of Remote Sensing and Digital Earth offers a solution with "wall-to-wall" measurements of agronomic and climatic conditions - all made available through its CropWatch web service. The scientist who runs it, Bingfang Wu, visited the UN's Commission on Science and Technology for Development, convened by UNCTAD in Geneva, Switzerland on 23-25 January, to discuss what the service has to offer.

The tide of misery brought on by epidemics in developing countries could be stemmed if health services were able to predict outbreaks. Dhesi Baha Raja, a co-founder of Artificial Intelligence in Medical Epidemiology, thinks the power of machine learning can be used to increase outbreak prediction - and that multilateral forums like the Committee for Science and Technology for Development, convened by UNCTAD on January 23-27, can help spread the technology.

Policy makers can be a bridge between people who are passionate about ideas and a place where those ideas can be implemented, says Ticora Jones, whose work links up universities and local communities looking to technology to address development challenges. Ms. Jones was speaking at the UN's Commission on Science and Technology for Development, convened by UNCTAD in Geneva, Switzerland, on 23-25 January.

It is becoming clearer that tackling urgent development challenges like access to affordable homes and clean water requires mixing and matching traditional and non-traditional sources of innovation and investment. UVI Research and Technology Park Executive Director Gillian Marcelle, whose varied career spans academia, commerce and development agencies, visited the UN's Commission on Science and Technology for Development, convened by UNCTAD on 23-25 January, to spell out how she sees the way forward.

What does innovation have to do with reducing poverty? Participants at a meeting of the UN's Commission on Science and Technology for Development, convened by UNCTAD, on 23-25 January heard many answers, among them the concept of frugal or jugaad innovation. But what is that? One of its foremost proponents Jaideep Prabhu, co-author with Navi Radjou of Jugaad Innovation: Think Frugal, Be Flexible, Generate Breakthrough Growth, explained.