Prioritizing Development
A Cost Benefit Analysis of the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals

An analysis of the UN's development targets up until 2030, and the case for prioritizing the most powerful investment areas.

Bjorn Lomborg (Edited by)

9781108401456, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 7 June 2018

554 pages
24.6 x 17.5 x 2.6 cm, 1.11 kg

'That sort of principle, which associates benefits with costs, ought to be applied to massive investments in human development. Unfortunately, we need to choose which terrible blights we need to prevent and which we do not. People hate thinking that way (and they hate those who write about it). Nobody wants to put dollar values on a disease, a treatment, a life, an ocean, or the future of a country. But feel-good virtue alone rarely succeeds, and, if the Millennium Development Goals have demonstrated anything, it is that this planet and the people who live so tenuously on it will survive only if we spend our money on programs that work.' Michael Specter, The New Yorker

This book is a unique guide to making the world a better place. Experts apply a critical eye to the United Nations' Sustainable Development agenda, also known as the Global Goals, which will affect the flow of $2.5 trillion of development aid up until 2030. Renowned economists, led by Bjorn Lomborg, determine what pursuing different targets will cost and achieve in social, environmental and economic benefits. There are 169 targets, covering every area of international development – from health to education, sanitation to conflict. Together, these analyses make the case for prioritizing the most effective development investments. A panel of Nobel Laureate economists identify a set of 19 phenomenal development targets, and argue that this would achieve as much as quadrupling the global aid budget.

Foreword Stefan Dercon and Stephen A. O'Connell
Introduction Bjorn Lomborg
1. Benefits and costs of air pollution targets for the post-2015 development agenda Bjorn Larsen
2. Targets for biodiversity and deforestation Anil Markandya
3. Climate change Isabel Galiana
4. Beyond civil war: the costs of interpersonal violence James Fearon and Anke Hoeffler
5. Data revolution: the cost and benefit of data needed to monitor the post-2015 development agenda Morten Jerven
6. Post-2015 consensus: education challenge paper George Psacharopoulos
7. Benefits and costs of the energy targets for the post-2015 development agenda Isabel Galiana and Amy Sopinka
8. Benefits and costs of the IFF targets for the post-2015 development agenda Alex Cobham
9. Benefits and costs of the trade targets for the post-2015 development agenda Kym Anderson
10. Benefits and costs of the health targets for the post-2015 development agenda Prabhat Jha, Ryan Hum, Cindy L. Gauvreau and Keeley Jordan
11. Benefits and costs of the non-communicable disease targets for the post-2015 development agenda Rachel Nugent and Elizabeth Brouwer
12. Benefits and costs of the women's health targets for the post-2015 development agenda Dara Lee Luca, Johanne Helene Iversen, Alyssa Shiraishi Lubet, Elizabeth Mitgang, Kristine Husøy Onarheim, Klaus Prettner and David E. Bloom
13. Benefits and costs of TB control for the post-2015 development agenda Anna Vassall
14. Benefits and costs of the infant mortality targets for the post-2015 development agenda Günther Fink
15. Benefits and costs of the HIV/AIDS targets for the post-2015 development agenda Pascal Geldsetzer, Salal Humair, David E. Bloom and Till Bärnighausen
16. Benefits and costs of the Malaria targets for the post-2015 consensus project Neha Raykar and Ramanan Laxminarayan
17. Benefits and costs of digital technology: infrastructure targets for the post-2015 development agenda Emmanuelle Auriol and Alexia Lee González Fanfalone
18. Returns to investment in reducing postharvest food losses and increasing agricultural productivity growth Mark W. Rosegrant, Eduardo Magalhaes, Rowena A. Valmonte-Santos and Daniel Mason-D'Croz
19. Benefits and costs of the gender equality targets for the post-2015 development agenda Irma Clots-Figueras
20. Benefits and costs of the food and nutrition targets for the post-2015 development agenda Susan Horton and John Hoddinott
21. Benefits and costs of the population and demography targets for the post-2015 development agenda Hans-Peter Kohler and Jere R. Behrman
22. Benefits and costs of two science and technology targets for the post-2015 development agenda Keith Maskus
23. Benefits and costs of the water sanitation and hygiene targets for the post-2015 development agenda Guy Hutton
24. Benefits and costs of the poverty targets for the post-2015 development agenda John Gibson
25. Good governance and the sustainable development goals Mary E. Hilderbrand
Conclusion: identifying phenomenal development targets Finn Kydland, Tom Schelling and Nancy Stokey
How to implement the global goals, knowing what does a lot of good and what doesn't Bjorn Lomborg.

Subject Areas: Environmental economics [KCN], Development economics & emerging economies [KCM], Political corruption [JPZ], United Nations & UN agencies [JPSN1]