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No Greta, we are not 'evil'
Speaking at the UN, 16-year-old Swedish activist Greta Thunberg said that if humanity really understands the science of climate change and still fails to act, we’re “evil.” Lomborg responds in Canada's newspaper of record, The Globe and Mail, that we don’t emit CO2 with malign intent. Indeed, it is a byproduct of giving humanity access to unprecedented amounts of energy which has allowed billions to escape poverty.
Ms. Thunberg tells us that if we don’t cut off fossil fuels by 2028, the young generation will never forgive us. This, however, is reflective of a blinkered first-world view. When the United Nations asked 10 million people around the world what they prioritize, they highlighted five issues: health, education, jobs, corruption and nutrition. Climate came last of 16 choices.
The article was also published in many other languages, including German (BILD), Danish (Jyllands-Posten) and Spanish (e.g. Milenio).
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How climate policies hurt the poor
A new study suggests that the massive cost of the Paris climate agreement will lead to an increase in poverty of around 4%. And the authors issue a stark warning that “stringent mitigation plans may slow down poverty reduction in developing countries.”
In his new column for Project Syndicate (available in four languages and syndicated with newspapers around the world), Lomborg argues that the world is in great danger of spending scarce resources on climate policies that hurt rather than help its poorest people. Governments should instead focus on growth-enhancing measures such as trade liberalization, which provide a pathway to increased welfare and greater equality.
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UK Aid to spend £600 million on family planning
"Family planning is one of the best investments in development. According to the Copenhagen Consensus, family planning is among the most cost-effective interventions - long-term benefits accrue from avoiding unintended pregnancies and unsafe abortions, and averting infant and maternal deaths. Every $1 invested in meeting the unmet need for contraceptives in the long-term can yield up to $120 in accrued annual benefits."
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Affordable solutions are better than exaggerations
We are constantly told scare stories about climate change, even though the evidence does not support the claims. What's behind the overblown rhetoric? Nearly three decades of policy failure. In fact, since climate talks began in 1992, the world has emitted as much carbon dioxide from fossil fuels as all of humanity did before that from the beginning of time.
We need to change the script: instead of scaring people into accepting expensive policies that have failed for decades, we should focus on innovating green technologies so they eventually outcompete fossil fuels.
 Lomborg's article was published in newspapers around the world, including China Daily, The Herald Sun (Australia), Børsen (Denmark), Il Foglio (Italy), Svenska Dagbladet (Sweden), Milenio (Mexico), Listin Diario (Dominican Republic) and Los Tiempos (Bolivia).
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In an interview with South China Morning Post, Bjorn Lomborg argues that the best way to make people resilient against extreme weather is helping them escape poverty:
“Back in the 1920s, about half a million died from climate-related problems per year, but since then, it’s declined to 20,000 per year. It’s not because disasters have become less frequent, it’s simply because by becoming rich, we are not nearly as affected by them.”
And helping developing nations to overcome poverty with the help of plentiful, reliable energy also has positive side effects for the environment:
 “As we become rich, we’ll be able to clean up the air. Likewise, improvements in farming methods mean that we could produce far more food on less land, and can leave more land for nature – no longer do we need to cut down rainforest in Brazil to make way for pastures.”
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Presidential candidates should stick to facts on Syria
Is global warming to blame for the Syrian war? Despite better knowledge, Democratic presidential candidates Pete Buttigieg, Beto O'Rourke and Bernie Sanders promote the idea of climate wars because superficially, it’s a compelling message — and a way to link to one of Americans’ greatest fears.
If we think about it, though, it’s an utterly ridiculous — even offensive — conceit that the best way rich Americans could help people in Syria is by cutting carbon emissions. We need to fix man-made climate change by ensuring that innovation can drive down the cost of low-carbon energy alternatives. But linking rising temperatures to every single challenge facing humanity just distracts from what we really need to focus on, as Lomborg argues in USA Today.
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What politicians get wrong about hurricanes and climate
As Hurricane Dorian made landfall in the Bahamas and the US East Coast, global-warming activists, newspaper columnists, TV commentators and politicians drew links between climate change and hurricanes. Lomborg demonstrates in New York Post that their claims aren't supported by the facts, and they divert our attention from smart policies to ineffective ones.
No wonder researchers who study extreme weather and climate change warn that overselling the link risks eroding “scientific credibility” and distracting from the things we need to do to be better prepared for extreme weather.
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Bjorn Lomborg recently visited New York City to attend events related to the UN General Assembly such as Gates Goalkeepers. During his time in the Big Apple, he was booked by several of the country's most prominent talk shows to discuss climate policy, such as Tucker Carlson Tonight (interview starts at the 6:35 minute mark), Varney & Co and Making Money.
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World leaders just met in New York for a climate summit that did little more than add to the hysteria drowning out any sober talk on climate policy. Enough is enough. We must confront climate change, but hyperbole and bluster do the planet no favours.
 Lomborg writes in The Australian that this was the time we should have had a sensible discussion on cost-effective ways to reduce the worst of climate change’s damages. But sadly, growth policies, adaptation, green R&D and an optimal CO2 tax are not what we've heard from the climate summit in New York.
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The government of Bangladesh is aiming for a complete digitization of its land record management system by 2020, following recommendations by the Bangladesh Priorities panel of eminent economists that ranked land records digitisation as a top priority for the country. This is because electronic records can make transfers simpler, reduce corruption and promote good governance in the economic sectors.
New research evidence from Copenhagen Consensus and BRAC shows that at present, there is still no positive return from e-Mutation investment due to the current low outreach. Lomborg and Hasanuzzaman write in BDNews24 that if e-Mutation is scaled up nationwide, the evidence suggests a return of Tk 6 for each taka spent. Adding the spill-over effects toward economic growth suggests a phenomenal return of Tk 619 of benefits for every taka spent.
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Following a presentation to members of the German Parliament, Bjorn Lomborg talked to many of the country's top newspapers about smart solutions to climate change and other global problems. These interviews were published e.g. in Germany's largest-circulating newspaper BILD, the largest business paper Handelsblatt, one of the largest broadsheet papers in the country, Die Welt, and Berliner Zeitung.
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