On the Gates climate memo

There are a lot of things I agree with in Bill Gates’ new memo on climate change. The recent cutbacks on international spending on vaccination, malaria control, feeding the hungry, and poverty alleviation by many of the richest countries (driven in part by a desire for more military spending) is a catastrophe that will cost thousands if not millions of lives. Adaptation is a critically important part of addressing climate change, and a world with more prosperity and less inequality is one where we can better deal with the impacts of climate change – at least up to a point.

But in other areas I feel that it needlessly sets up a conflict between laudable goals: we can both mitigate emissions and alleviate poverty, disease, and hunger. While there are some tradeoffs it is more a question of policy priority than a zero sum game. Similarly, I feel that Gates is a bit too cavalier in his treatment of climate risk.

Given the strong reactions to Gates’ memo both on the left and the right, I thought it would be helpful to provide a more measured reaction and critique, and give some thoughts how to move forward to – as Gates suggests – have the most positive impact on the world.

A zero sum game?

Bill Gates – through his philanthropic work with the Gates Foundation – has done more than almost anyone else on the planet to meaningfully improve the lives of the world’s poorest. The Gates Foundation was the founding funder of Gavi which helped expand vaccination in the global south and drive down prices. They did key work to help eradicate polio, combat HIV, TB and malaria, deliver sanitation and clean drinking water, and worked to raise smallholder farmer yields and income through access to agricultural technology.

The recent gutting of USAID – and smaller reductions in aid spending by other countries – is a humanitarian catastrophe and threatens to undo much of the work that the Gates Foundation supported over the past few decades. I can see why, in light of these urgent needs, he is suggesting that resources to combat climate change be repurposed toward dealing with poverty, hunger, and disease.

But this assumes that funding for climate and development (to use a term to encompass help improve the lives of the world’s poorest) are inherently zero sum. And here I think that, for the most part, Gates errs in his analysis ...