Experts
Jeffrey Sachs
Director, The Earth Institute
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Jeffrey Sachs on the Power of Solar Energy
Jeffrey Sachs on the "phenomenal promise" of solar energy. Read More
September 13, 2008 | In Environment
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What do you tell young people who want to act against global poverty?
Sachs encourages students to go abroad and see life as it is lived for the poor up close. Read More
September 13, 2008 | In Inspiration & Wisdom
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The UN is much maligned, but vital for creating global agreements, Sachs says. Read More
September 13, 2008 | In Politics & Policy
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What's your advice to the next administration?
Sachs recommends a department for international sustainable development. Read More
September 13, 2008 | In Politics & Policy
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How can we better fight global poverty?
We need a mix of government, private and voluntary sectors, Sachs says. Read More
September 13, 2008 | In Life & Death
Jeffrey D. Sachs is the Director of The Earth Institute, Quetelet Professor of Sustainable Development, and Professor of Health Policy and Management at Columbia University. He is also Special Advisor to United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. From 2002 to 2006, he was Director of the UN Millennium Project and Special Advisor to United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan on the Millennium Development Goals, the internationally agreed goals to reduce extreme poverty, disease, and hunger by the year 2015. Sachs is also President and Co-Founder of Millennium Promise Alliance, a nonprofit organization aimed at ending extreme global poverty.
He is widely considered to be the leading international economic advisor of his generation. For more than 20 years Professor Sachs has been in the forefront of the challenges of economic development, poverty alleviation, and enlightened globalization, promoting policies to help all parts of the world to benefit from expanding economic opportunities and wellbeing. He is also one of the leading voices for combining economic development with environmental sustainability, and as Director of the Earth Institute leads large-scale efforts to promote the mitigation of human-induced climate change.
In 2004 and 2005 he was named among the 100 most influential leaders in the world by Time Magazine. He was awarded the Padma Bhushan, a high civilian honor bestowed by the Indian Government, in 2007. Sachs lectures constantly around the world and was the 2007 BBC Reith Lecturer. He is author of hundreds of scholarly articles and many books, including the New York Times bestsellers Common Wealth (Penguin, 2008) and The End of Poverty (Penguin, 2005). Sachs is a member of the Institute of Medicine and is a Research Associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research. Prior to joining Columbia, he spent over twenty years at Harvard University, most recently as Director of the Center for International Development. A native of Detroit, Michigan, Sachs received his B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. degrees at Harvard University.
