Clean water access: shovels, pipes, pumps, treatment processes
Food: roads, shovels, pipes, pumps, transportation
No interdisciplinary approaches needed. Resources, rule of law (so builders don't abscond with funds), a tidbit of path planning, and Bob's your Uncle. Lower the costs and mitigate the risks.
For example, the logistics to provide plumbing to developing nations are extremely difficult because of the instability of these regions as well as the lack of cooperation from developed nations to precisely help in these much needed regards. A lot of the help these places get come in the form of philanthropic pursuit or misguided help that end up either not helping or sometimes worsening the situation.
Not only that, but there are many interests at play that also get in the way of these places developing. For many powerful actors in these countries the status quo is good enough and any form of development actually threatens their position. And yes, sadly, this applies to plumbing as well!
It's very true that we know how to do plumbing, in the technical sense, but in reality we don't know how to do plumbing in these regions because our technical knowledge is not applicable given the socio-political situation. So this does require an interdisciplinary approach, one that involves sociology, psychology, economics, politics, etc.
Pipes, shovels, and pumps solve a lot of core problems for a community. Where and how they get laid down doesn't require sociology or political economy research. You might care about the people displaced by the infrastructure, which a compassionate person will, but don't forget that home construction and legal recompense for eminent domain are also known.
The major difference between your and my approaches: while the interdisciplinarists are arguing about the impact of infrastructure development on endangered plants and relative value of indigenous pottery buried for several thousand years, the pragmatists are getting people out of the bondage of poverty and enabling them solve their problems themselves because they have risen above subsistence.
Note there is value to ensuring the endangered plants are maintained and the indigenous pottery is studied -- as well as the knowledge gained from all fields that might come to an interdisciplinarists table -- but one must recognize the advancement of patron-funded knowledge is a bottleneck when it stands in the way of well-understood solutions.
And that action that's totally appropriate but people are just too squeamish for would be ... what, an armed invasion to impose "better" cultural values?
However, more steelmaned and aligned to my original statement, as well as more common when facing decisions, being okay with the realistic tradeoffs that an endangered plant might have a reduction in habitat.
Because if you are, I have some unfortunate news: metaphysics is woo woo. And if you do not believe me, try doing a survey and see what results you get. Or, if you do not trust the opinion of the general public, try also running surveys within scientific and Rationalist communities, or even here on HN, and see if your results are substantially different.
One of the many things I find interesting about metaphysics, and humans (but I repeat myself) is that "most" humans, particularly those who are more educated, tend to be certain that metaphysics is dumb/useless/etc, yet the fact that they are unable to articulate the reason why this is true (and defend the articulation in a sound manner) seems to have little to no effect on their opinion of the quality of their belief (a behavior that would not be a source of pride or tolerated here when it comes to topics like computing).
But unfortunately, this idea itself is metaphysical, so it can be easily dismissed by the initial belief. It's like a bootstrap problem of sorts.
Your parent comment and subsequent followup are difficult for me to parse. If others had similar difficulty, it could account for the downvotes. I did not downvote your comments.
Genuinely curious: what's difficult to parse?
I think part of the problem is how inconsistently the domain of Metaphysics is perceived by many in general, and then there's also the fact that New Agers have to some degree hijacked it and caused an association between the word and "woo woo" to form in people's minds, so when they hear the word, they believe it IS "woo woo". This is the phenomenon at which my "childish" sarcasm is aimed (what's good for the goose is good for the gander is my excuse).
The countries which are not poor and disorganized did not get there through the benevolent study by their betters.
And I don't mean only Africa or Asia, (before someone calls me racist). Any country has had this problem.
The simplest solution is to instate mandatory community service, preferably in lieu of military service, but it could be a sort of "Subotnik" as seen in the USSR, which would be used for... You guessed it, doing community/public service work. Then you have all the manpower and just need food (some compensation/thanks is good) tools and organization/training (can double as job training).
Not much to ask imo, but of course many people will cry about it. Mostly people from countries with a lot of homeless and unpaid internships, but it's not like most people want to do unpaid work much, either. On the bright side, most people won't raise much of a fuss about it, either.
So that's not happening. Government officials stealing foreign aid is happening. Local production is not happening. Wars are happening. Toilets are not. Etc.
What stops this labour being used in corrupt or self serving fashions just as the money is?
The ancient Incan Empire collected taxes in labor (basically part-time slavery, everyone had to do their 2 months a year or so), and they managed to build enormous infrastructure across the Andes in just a few decades. And in high quality. Many of the roads can still be seen, 500 years after they were built.
How did they prevent capture of this labor by corrupt local officials? I don't know.
What stops anyone from using a kitchen knife to stab someone to death?
If you look at it that way, you'll get nothing done.