For most development workers, keeping it real is what helps to stay in the industry. For Todd Moss, it’s keeping it simple.
In 2005, he got Nigeria an $18 billion debt relief with a “simple” two-page proposal.
“I authored the analysis that the Nigerian finance ministry used to get reclassified as IDA-only inside the World Bank and then my simple two-page proposal for a first-ever discounted buyback at the Paris Club was used as a framework for the actual negotiations,” he explained in an e-mail to Devex.
That kind of straightforward analysis is also helping college students better understand development concepts. In 2007, he published a textbook titled “African Development: Making Sense of the Issues and Actors.” A new edition of that book will be published in June.
If Moss can make debt relief and university courses that easy, he most certainly has a few other fixes for development up his sleeve. Indeed, Moss has five research projects under way:
- Proposals for using cash transfers as a way to fight the “oil curse” in poor countries, especially those where oil has only recently been discovered.
- An analysis of how development contributes to counterterrorism programs in Africa’s Sahel region.
- Projections of how IDA-21 might impact the work of the World Bank.
- An examination of the best ways to use risk management tools in poor nations.
- Zimbabwean engagement and reconstruction.
Moss said his own success in development is due in part to his ability to take his work but not himself too seriously. That means holding onto idealism while staying the course of quick and efficient problem solving.
“If we weren’t idealistic and didn’t want to make the world a better place, then we wouldn’t be working in this field,” Moss said. “But, at the same time, we have to be hard-headed in our analysis and practical with our ideas or we’re probably going to do more harm than good.”
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