Ideas in Development

900 million people will be added to African cities by 2050. Getting this unprecedented urban transition right is one of the defining development challenges of our time.
In this opening episode of our new Ideas in Development series on cities, Kurtis Lockhart, founder of the Africa Urban Lab, joins us to set the scene. We discuss why the link between urbanisation and prosperity is breaking down in Africa, what that means for the continent's future, and what the series ahead will explore.
Read the show notes on our Substack: https://ideasindevelopment.substack.com/
Check out Africa Urban Lab: https://www.aul.city/

What actually changes when AI meets institutions, infrastructure, and the people inside them?
Oliver Hanney and Deena Mousa recap the Ideas in Development series on AI, drawing on conversations with Raghuram Rajan, Umar Saif, Rose Mutiso, Josh Lerner, Anton Korinek, Bruno Caprettini, Niriksha Shetty, Claire Cullen and Utkarsh Saxena.
They cover the key takeaways: why the binding constraint question matters more than the model question; what the data desert problem means for national AI strategies; why access and value capture are not the same thing; and what AI is doing to the growth escalators lower-income countries depend on. And conclude with the most important questions this series did not resolve.

What should a technology minister in a developing country actually focus on when it comes to AI?
Umar Saif, computer scientist, former minister of Science and Technology, and IT, in Pakistan, and AI company founder, joins the Ideas in Development series on AI to discuss why data and politics, not technology, are the real bottlenecks to AI in developing countries.
In this wide-ranging episode we discuss what he learned from his time in government, why the rush towards sovereign AI capacity may be a costly distraction, his worries for the future, and where he is optimistic.
Read the full show notes on our Substack: https://ideasindevelopment.substack.com/

What happens to a growth model built on services when AI can do some of those services itself?
Raghuram Rajan joins the Ideas in Development series on AI to discuss how India's economy grew through services exports, why that model may be more resilient to AI than critics assume, and what policymakers need to get right on human capital, universities, and digital access to stay ahead.

Why is there a gap between innovation and impact?
Josh Lerner joins the Ideas in Development series on AI to discuss how technology diffuses around the world, touching on the role of venture capital, universities and China.
We then cover what this means for the diffusion of AI, and what can be done to speed up diffusion to developing countries.