Microfinance: towards an inclusive financial sector
Today, one of the key challenges emerging nations face while pursuing economic growth and development is how to counter poverty. Poverty is a multifaceted phenomenon that includes, but goes beyond…
Surmounting crises
Pakistan is in the grip of yet another crisis-this is a recurrent pattern in our history showing weaknesses in the system lacking socio-economic justice, and clash of various conflicting interests…
Shadowed by Bush, Obama seeks Africa legacy makeover
When President Barack Obama made his first extended trip to Africa last year as the world's most powerful leader, he tried to assuage a continent largely disappointed in its famous…
Argentine farmers see grains surge if next president opens market
Grains powerhouse Argentina could increase soy, corn and wheat output by as much as a fifth if the president-elected next year scraps export quotas, eases taxes and reverses other policies…
Market-style reforms widen racial divide in Cuba
Cuba's experiment with free-market reforms has unintentionally widened the communist-led island's racial divide and allowed white Cubans to regain some of the economic advantages built up over centuries. Under President…
The real dialogue we need
Borrowing the expression from the outstanding writer of mystery fiction and detective stories in Urdu, Ibn-e-Safi, a dear friend and an ardent supporter of Imran Khan asked me the other…
A monsoon catastrophe
Pakistan is highly vulnerable to devastating climate change, but the matter is at the lowest priority for the government. For the last three years, the country has topped the list…
Revolution on a whim
The sit-ins staged by the participants of Azadi and Revolution marches in the red zone for the last more than 25 days have done incalculable harm to the economy, made…
Economic policy imperatives
Given the precarious balance of payments and budgetary situation and high rate of inflation and low rate of economic growth, the PML-N government had some clear choices to make regarding…
Watch what markets don’t do as world politics turns nasty
Like so much in the investment world of late, it's what financial markets are not doing right now that is most intriguing. Over the course of the past month, conflicts,…
