By David Wheeler - The Chinese Year of the Tiger will soon cede to the Year of the Rabbit and, from a climate perspective, some might view the transition as apt. Since last December, after all, the heroic agenda of Copenhagen has morphed into the timid menu of Cancun. But appearances can be deceiving in the climate game, and [...]By David Wheeler - In this blog, I’ll let others do most of the talking. For a clear conservative position on climate change, let’s turn to last week’s address on climate and development by Andrew Mitchell, the Conservative Secretary of State for International Development in the new British government. This government, you will recall, is headed by David Cameron, [...]
By Mead Over - About a year ago the Institute of Medicine assembled a committee of 12 to advise the US on the implications for its policy towards Africa of the long-term burden of AIDS there. The two co-chairs of the committee, Tom Quinn and David Serwadda, will release the report findings to the press on Monday, November 27 [...]
By Amanda Glassman - In a refreshing and necessary change from the last decade’s focus on more money, the 2010 World Health Report —released yesterday by the WHO—focuses part of its attention on the problem of health system inefficiencies, estimating that 20% to 40% of all health spending ($1.5 trillion USD) is currently wasted. The report indicates that this [...]
By Rachel Nugent - Secretary General Ban Ki-moon last week named Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin of Nigeria to be the next executive director of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), replacing Dr. Thoraya Obaid who held the position for 10 years. Dr. Osotimehin is a professor of medicine at Ibadan University. He served a brief time as Minister of Health [...]
: skip to main skip to sidebar Kopsa Otte Agriculture Blog Kopsa Otte CPAs Advisors have been involved in Income Tax Planning , Estate Planning Succession Planning for over 30 years . For more information about Kopsa Otte services , please contact us via e-mail at lkopsa kopsaotte.com or call 800-975-4829. Monday , November 22, 2010 HAPPY THANKSGIVING TO YOU May your stuffing be tasty May your turkey , plump May your potatoes and gravy Have never a . lump May your yams be delicious And your pies take the , prize And may your Thanksgiving dinner Stay off your thighs From our office to yours , we wish you a blessed Thanksgiving Kopsa Otte Staff Posted by Legal : Disclaimer at 12:52 PM Older Post Home Visit us on Facebook : at facebook.com kopsa.otte Wondering about the IRS's important due
By Lawrence MacDonald - With less than a week to go until the start of the next round of global climate negotiations, in Cancun, Mexico, climate policymakers see further work on ambitious finance pledges made at the Copenhagen climate talks last year as key to progress towards collective action to avert runaway climate change. Mexico’s ambassador to Washington has [...]For those of you who are interested on an update on my son, Tony, please click on the link below:http://www.omaha.com/article/20101121/NEWS01/711219923/-1#drunken-drivers-wasted-lives 
By Nancy Birdsall - The New York Times’ Nicholas Kristof makes recommendations for charitable giving this season here. But he missed half the point and way more than half the potential impact. Here’s what I had to say in a comment on his blog: Nick Kristof: You are leaving out leverage! Please do a complementary column on how contributors [...]: skip to main skip to sidebar Kopsa Otte Agriculture Blog Kopsa Otte CPAs Advisors have been involved in Income Tax Planning , Estate Planning Succession Planning for over 30 years . For more information about Kopsa Otte services , please contact us via e-mail at lkopsa kopsaotte.com or call 800-975-4829. Saturday , November 20, 2010 EXTENSION OF ETHANOL TAX CREDIT VITAL TO ETHANOL INDUSTRY Grand Island Independent TheIndependent.com reports that Sen . Ben Nelson says extending the Volumetric Ethanol Excise Tax Credit VEETC may not be on lawmakers' radar , but that not extending VEETC could be detrimental to Nebraska's ethanol industry and the state's economic recovery . While the subsidy is supported by several farm and commodity groups , the American Meat Institute , along with most
By Nandini Oomman - A couple of days ago, I posted a blog on the first ever Global Symposium on Health Systems Research, and raised the question: “Will Research Make Health System Strengthening Sexier?” I’m not in Montreux, but I am following some of the sessions from Washington D.C., thanks to Twitter, Blogs, Webcasts! I’ve seen multiple re-tweets of [...]
By Sarah Jane Staats - This is a joint post with Kaci Farrell. During a House Financial Services subcommittee hearing on the global financial crisis and Nigeria’s financial reforms, CGD vice president for programs and senior fellow Todd Moss said Nigeria’s economic and political stability are inextricably linked to each other and to U.S. national interests. He urged members to support the [...]: skip to main skip to sidebar Kopsa Otte Agriculture Blog Kopsa Otte CPAs Advisors have been involved in Income Tax Planning , Estate Planning Succession Planning for over 30 years . For more information about Kopsa Otte services , please contact us via e-mail at lkopsa kopsaotte.com or call 800-975-4829. Thursday , November 18, 2010 MIDWEST FARMLAND BUBBLE I thought you might be interested in the article in Reuters . Reuters reports that some Nebraska agriculture-related retailers and implement dealers have seen sales rise by as much as 40 this year due to a booming commodity . market The article also notes that surging grain prices and growing investor interest are lifting farmland prices in the Midwest , and bank regulators fear that another U.S . bubble may be inflating , as farmlandBy Amanda Glassman - In response to my previous post on Coke in Africa, comments from A. Barnes and Eric Meade draw our attention to the use of Coca-Cola distribution networks as ways to distribute essential medicines and supplies in poor countries. This is one of those nuggets that people always highlight when lamenting lack of access in Africa [...]
By Todd Moss - This is a joint post with Stephanie Majerowicz. Our colleagues Sarah Jane Staats and Connie Veillette have already explained how the recent election results might affect foreign aid. The 150 Account, which includes aid, is a prime target as Congress takes aim at the budget deficit. One silver lining may be that belt-tightening could also [...]By Nandini Oomman - Today, researchers, donors, policymakers, and advocates from around the world met in Montreux, Switzerland for the first ever Global Symposium for Health Systems Research. The objectives of the conference, laid out in an interesting Debategraph , are to collectively establish a science-based approach to accelerate universal health coverage. The topic of health systems failure sounds [...]
By Ben Leo - Yesterday, the two Fiscal Commission co-chairs, Alan Simpson and Erskine Bowles, put forward their long-awaited draft proposal. I was looking forward to seeing bold, creative ideas for getting America’s fiscal house in order. I wasn’t disappointed. They leave no sacred public cow untouched. However, one thing nearly made me fall out of the chair. These [...]By Lawrence MacDonald - Leave it to Owen Barder, a CGD visiting fellow who writes an eponymous blog in Ethiopia, to notice something surprising about this year’s Commitment to Development Index that had escaped my notice: the UK has fallen from 5th place when the Index was launched in 2005 to 16th place today: For people in the UK [...]By Amanda Glassman - Last week’s Bloomberg Businessweek reports on Coca-Cola’s efforts to expand its market in Africa, which the reporter Duane Stanford describes as the final frontier in Coke profits. Coke is now in a street-by-street campaign to win drinkers, trying to increase per-capita annual consumption of its beverages in countries not yet used to guzzling Coke by [...]