Today’s episode is on SDG3.8 - Achieve Universal Health Coverage. Universal Health Coverage means ensuring everyone, everywhere, has access to quality essential health care services, medicines and vaccines. It also means ensuring that health expenditure isn’t a large proportion of total household expenditure. Universal Health Coverage encompasses all of the other targets under SDG3. It’s essential - and it’s also a bit of a utopia, if you look at the current state of many health systems...

Welcome to Episode 6 of Good Will Hunters, in our new series on SDG3 - Good Health and Wellbeing. Today’s episode looks at SDG 3.7 - By 2030, ensure universal access to sexual and reproductive health-care services, including for family planning, information and education, and the integration of reproductive health into national strategies and programmes. Specifically, we’ll be focusing on a new program which I am incredibly excited about - it is the Elimination Partnership in the...

Welcome to Episode 5 of Good Will Hunters, in our new series on SDG 3 - Good Health and Wellbeing. Now firstly - I have to apologise. I promised you an episode on each of the SD3 targets, however we are skipping SDG3.5 on substance abuse. We just couldn’t find a great guest for the episode and the show must go on. However, I am very open to doing the episode at a later date, so if you work in substance abuse internationally, particularly in the Pacific, and would like to chat, get in...

Welcome to Episode 4 of Good Will Hunters, in our new series on SDG 3 - Good Health and Wellbeing. So far in the series, we’ve looked at maternal and child health and infectious diseases. The response to the series has been enormous - last week I appeared on Radio New Zealand talking about the unacceptably high rates of child mortality in Kiribati. This series was designed to raise attention to the fact that we are not on track to meeting SDG3, and we must take urgent action. Today I am...

Welcome to Episode 3 of Good Will Hunters, in our new series on SDG 3 - Good Health and Wellbeing. In our previous episode, we looked at infant and child mortality in Kiribati. The wonderful folks at the Devpolicy Blog published an article on the episode if you’d like to check it out. If you’ve listened to our first two episodes, you’ve probably seen a theme beginning to emerge. We are, in no way, shape or form, on track to achieving SDG3. We are falling behind on all targets, and many of...

Welcome to Episode 2 of our SDG3 series. In this series, we’ll be going through each of the targets of SDG3. In our previous episode, we looked at maternal mortality, and specifically some exciting work happening right here in Australia to developed inhaled oxytocin, to help prevent postpartum hemorraghe, which is one of the leading causes of maternal death. We also heard about the importance of connectivity and support networks for nurses and health workers in remote areas, dealing with...

SDG3.1 - Reducing Maternal Mortality, with Prof. Michelle McIntosh and Cherolyn Polomon by Good Will Hunters

This 10th and final episode of A little Less Conversation is one that is both reflective and future facing. If you’re looking to know more about the outcomes achieved at COP28, the architecture of the loss and damage fund and Australia’s climate finance ambitions and commitments more generally, you’ve come to the right place. Jess Mackenzie chats with David Higgins, the branch head of international net zero pathways, within the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water...

Climate change is impacting society in a myriad of ways, yet some groups are experiencing these impacts disproportionately. In this episode we take a deep dive into gender, youth and elders in the Pacific; How are they experiencing climate change? What are their priorities? and What does effective climate leadership look like? In this episode, we are joined by Carolyn Kitione, a youth leader and learning coordinator with Shifting the Power Coalition. Shifting the Power Coalition -...

In a short time in the federal Parliament, Senator David Pocock has made a name for himself as someone willing to speak out on the big issues on behalf of the people most affected. These include taking on the Government over fossil fuels, climate change and other issues including cost of living. In this episode of A Little Less Conversation, Rachel and Dermot chat to Senator Pocock about his advocacy on climate change and his profound commitment to the Pacific, how his experiences through...

Climate change could be a political football, easily booted from agency to agency, if there was no true will to progress the agenda. It is true that climate falls under the remit of a number of government agencies – but thankfully, there is the will to ensure it is divided up carefully and with thought. Howard Bamsey, who has spent much of his career as a diplomat and in climate change, joins the podcast to tell Rachel and Dermot all about the architecture of climate governance.

Adaptation and mitigation are two terms commonly used in connection with how to approach responses to climate change: do we spend our energies trying to address the root causes of climate change, or do we work on strategies to help us adapt? In this episode, Sala George Carter of the Australian National University and climate change activist Lisa Viliamu Jameson join us to discuss the twin approaches. Torres Strait Islands Our Islands Our Home campaign: https://ourislandsourhome.com.au ...

Have you heard about sea grapes? They're a form of edible seaweed found in parts of the Pacific. They're nutritious, particularly for maternal health, and delicious. And they fetch a great price at market. They're sometimes even known as the next superfood. What makes sea grapes particularly interesting to us is the sustainability element: growing them depends on the sustainable development of nearby mangroves. And this is where Nature Based Solutions comes in. Nature based solutions...

Australia made headlines earlier in 2023 with the announcement it was rejoining the Green Climate Fund, reviving interest in the fund. It is the world's largest climate fund, and aims to give a boost to transformative climate action in the form of grants to affected nations. It has attracted its fair share of criticism, particularly over lengthy delays in actually getting money to where it is needed. In this episode, the GCF's deputy executive director Henry Gonzalez details how the fund...

Loss and damage has quickly emerged as a key theme of COP28, with the news ahead of the summit that rich countries would set up a loss and damage fund, as promised last year. So what is loss and damage, and how has it become the latest frontier in the fight against climate change? Two loss and damage experts join us on this episode to explain more: Julie-Ann Richards, who is the strategy lead for the Loss and Damage Coalition; and Dr Melanie Pill, with the Lowy Insitute....

Australia’s Climate Ambassador Kristen Tilley has been in the job for just over a year, and in that time has worked to drive Australia’s climate ambitions, whether in decarbonising or ambitions to become a renewable energy superpower. She speaks with Jessica Mackenzie and Dermot O’Gorman about harnessing foreign policy, trade and development policies to drive climate outcomes interntionally. Ambassador Kristen Tilley:...

A Little Less Conversation is a podcast series bringing together ACFID, Good Will Hunters and WWF Australia to discuss how to drive action on climate change through an international development and policy lens. In this episode, we discuss what’s coming up in the series: who we’ll be talking with, what we’ll be talking about, and why we’ve chosen this topic at this time. We’re releasing this in the lead up to COP28 https://www.cop28.com, and just after the most recent PIF leaders meeting...

Good Will Hunters, ACFID and WWF Australia present 'A Little Less Conversation, A Little More Climate Action". We'll be bringing you a series of conversations on the focus on climate in Australia's international development program. Make sure you subscribe, episodes drop soon!

CID '23 Civic Space Panel by Good Will Hunters

CID '23 Emeline Siale, on Civic Space by Good Will Hunters

It's here! Join Jess and Rachel as they sit down to discuss the New International Development Policy. Sources referenced in the show are linked below: DevPolicy Blog: https://www.foreignminister.gov.au/minister/penny-wong/media-release/australias-new-international-development-policy-and-development-finance-review?_gl=1*bws6sv*_ga*NzY1NDkwOTI2LjE2ODc5MjI0NjI.*_ga_8Z18QMQG8V*MTY5MTQzOTI3NS43LjEuMTY5MTQzOTI4Mi41My4wLjA. ACFID...

Australia has a proud history of supporting people affected by crises. It has been a champion for the rights of women and girls, led the charge on disability inclusion, and been a steadfast supporter of disaster affected countries around the world. But as the global humanitarian landscape shifts, Australia must realign its strategy to ensure it continues to reach the people in greatest need. Humanitarian crises are today driven overwhelmingly by conflict and violence, and the persistent...

Australia is recognising the importance and relevance of Southeast Asia, with a DFAT Office of Southeast Asia and a standalone Southeast Asia Economic Strategy in the works. ODA reflects this region as a priority, with an additional $470m announced in the October 2022 budget for it. But beyond dollars, there are some very real and practical ways of engaging with Southeast Asia. Sandra Hamid, who is based in Jakarta, served as the Indonesian country representative to The Asia Foundation....

The private sector is increasingly becoming a player in the development space. Whether through the provision of grants or becoming directly involved in the provision of essential services or investments in sustainability, the private sector has an increasing interest in stepping into a space that has been traditionally occupied by NGOs. How can for-profits and not-for-profits meet in the middle? Is it always just about the greater good? And how can private or blended finance help us to meet...