Hughes, B. B., Solórzano, J., & Rothman, D. S., Irfan, R. I., Sahadevan, D. (2025, November 11). IFs energy model documentation. Pardee Center for International Futures, Josef Korbel School of Global and Public Affairs, University of Denver. https://pardeewiki.du.edu/index.php?title=Energy

Sahadevan, D., Irfan, M. T., Luo, C., Moyer, J. D., Mason, C., & Beynon, E. (2025). Charged for change: The case for renewable energy in climate action. UNDP; Pardee Institute for International Futures; Octopus Energy.

Solórzano, J., Hughes, B., Irfan, M., Xiong, Y., Kwasi, S., Ibrahim, A., Makhamatova, S., Hanna, T., Moyer, J. (2024, December 20). Protocol for making forecasts exogenous in the International Futures model. One Earth. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.xpro.2024.103414

Understanding future dynamics and trends in human and natural development is foundational for creating appropriate policy strategies to address planetary and development challenges. Here, we present a protocol for adding exogenous series for key variables, such as the shared socioeconomic pathways, to the database of the International Futures (IFs) integrated model. We describe steps for installing IFs and the SQLiteStudio software, understanding the IFs database, importing series, running the model, and extracting results.
For complete details on the use and execution of this protocol, please refer to Moyer.

Abu, T., Achore, M., Irfan, M., Musah, I., Azzika, T. (2024, December). The past, present, and future of Ghana’s WASH sector. An explorative analysis. Water Security. 23. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.wasec.2024.100185

Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene (WASH) are fundamental to human health and development. Initiatives like the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) propelled WASH inequities to the forefront of development. Several countries have undergone reforms to ensure universal access to WASH. Using Ghana as a case study, we traced the evolutionary path of Ghana’s WASH sector highlighting persistent socio-ecological and political-economic factors shaping the current WASH sector reforms and access. We then engage in an integrated assessment modelling to examine the viability and implications of achieving targets of SDG 6 using the International Futures simulation. We find a more feasible pathway to achieving universal WASH access should prioritize eradicating open defecation and surface water use often experienced in rural and urban slums.

Hanna, T., Hughes, B.B., Irfan, M.T., Bohl, D.K., Solórzano et al. (2024, April 16). Sustainable Development Goal Attainment in the Wake of COVID-19: Simulating an Ambitious Policy Push. Sustainability. 3309. https://doi.org/10.3390/su16083309

Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, the world was not on course to meet key Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) including SDG 1 (No Poverty) and SDG 2 (Zero Hunger). Some significant degree of additional effort was needed before the pandemic, and the challenge is now greater. Analyzing the prospects for meeting these goals requires attention to the combined effects of the pandemic and such additional impetus. This article assesses the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on progress toward the SDGs and explores strategies to recover and accelerate development. Utilizing the International Futures (IFs) forecasting system and recognizing the near impossibility of meeting the goals by 2030, three scenarios are examined through to 2050: A pre-COVID-19 trajectory (No COVID-19), the current path influenced by the pandemic (Current Path), and a transformative SDG-focused approach prioritizing key policy strategies to accelerate outcomes (SDG Push). The pandemic led to a rise in extreme poverty and hunger, with recovery projected to be slow. The SDG Push scenario effectively addresses this, surpassing the Current Pathand achieving significant global improvements in poverty, malnutrition, and human development by 2050 even relative to the No COVID-19 path. The findings emphasize the need for integrated, transformative actions to propel sustainable development.

Moyer, J. D., Pirzadeh, A., Irfan, M., Solórzano, J. R., Stone, B. A., Xiong, Y., Hanna, T., & Hughes, B. B. (2023, October 2). How many people will live in poverty because of climate change? A macro-level projection analysis to 2070. Climatic Change 176(13). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-023-03611-3.

Fossil fuel-based economic development both causes climate change and contributes to poverty alleviation, creating tensions across societal efforts to maintain growth, limit climate damage, and improve human development. While many studies explore key aspects of this dilemma, few direct attention to the pathways from climate change through socioeconomic development to the future of poverty. We build on projections of global temperature change (representative concentration pathways) and country-specific economic development (economic growth and income distribution across the shared socioeconomic pathways) to model how climate change may affect future poverty with the International Futures (IFs) model, projecting poverty across income thresholds for 175 countries through 2070. Central tendency scenarios with climate effects compared with scenarios that do not model climate change show that climate change-attributable extreme poverty will grow to 25 million people by 2030 (range: 18 to 30), 40 million by 2050 (range: 9 to 78), and 32 million by 2070 (range: 4 to 130) though overall levels of global poverty decline. If climatic tipping points are passed, the climate-attributable extreme poverty grows to 57 million people by 2030 (range: 40–72), 78 million by 2050 (range: 18–193), and 56 million by 2070 (range: 7–306). To mitigate baseline effects of climate change on extreme poverty, an improvement of global income inequality of 10% is required (range: 5–15%).

Verhagen, W., Pereira, C. C., Bohl, D. K., Meziere, M. E., Irfan, M. T., Moyer J. M. (2022). "Guinea-Bissau: Exploring Alternative Futures of Development. Report 1: Economic and human development trends to 2040."

UNDP Guinea Bissau & Frederick S. Pardee Center for International Futures. Bissau, Guinea-Bissau and Denver, USA.

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Sarah Dickerson, David Bohl, Barry Hughes, Mohammod Irfan, Jonathan Moyer, Kanishka Naryan, Alex Porter, Andrew Scott, and José Solórzano. 2019.

"Central America and the Carribean Regional Education Report." Invited Research Paper for USAID, Central America Mission. Developed in collaboration with Frederick S. Pardee Center for International Futures, University of Denver, Denver, CO.

This publication was produced for review by the United States Agency for International Development under task order AID-OAA-M-12-00020. It was prepared by Sarah Dickerson, David Bohl, Barry Hughes, Mohammod Irfan, Jonathan Moyer, Kanishka Naryan, Alex Porter, Andrew Scott, and José Solórzano of the Frederick S. Pardee Center for International Futures.

Alex Porter, David Bohl, Sarah Dickerson, Barry Hughes, Mohammod Irfan, Jonathan Moyer, Kanishka Naryan, Andrew Scott, and José Solórzano. 2019.

"The Future of Guatemalan Education." Invited Research Paper for USAID, Central America Mission. Developed in collaboration with Frederick S. Pardee Center for International Futures, University of Denver, Denver, CO.

This publication was produced for review by the United States Agency for International Development under task order AID-OAA-M-12-00020. It was prepared by Alex Porter, David Bohl, Sarah Dickerson, Barry Hughes, Mohammod Irfan, Jonathan Moyer, Kanishka Naryan, Andrew Scott, and José Solórzano of the Frederick S. Pardee Center for International Futures.

Alex Porter, David Bohl, Sarah Dickerson, Barry Hughes, Mohammod Irfan, Jonathan Moyer, Kanishka Naryan, Andrew Scott, and José Solórzano. 2019.

"The Future of Honduran Education." Invited Research Paper for USAID, Central America Mission. Developed in collaboration with Frederick S. Pardee Center for International Futures, University of Denver, Denver, CO.

This publication was produced for review by the United States Agency for International Development under task order AID-OAA-M-12-00020. It was prepared by Alex Porter, David Bohl, Sarah Dickerson, Barry Hughes, Mohammod Irfan, Jonathan Moyer, Kanishka Naryan, Andrew Scott, and José Solórzano of the Frederick S. Pardee Center for International Futures.