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USAID in the News

Posted by  on Saturday, May 11th 2013     
Food Aid Reform

In an op-ed published in the Chicago Tribune, USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah, Secretary of State John Kerry, and Secretary of the Department of Agriculture Tom Vilsack explain “our hallmark food assistance program has not evolved with the times.” President Obama has proposed a number of reforms that could help the U.S.  ”feed up to 4 million more hungry people every year” while reducing costs. From purchasing locally-sourced food to using electronic payments, the officials say such strategies can help the U.S. “carry out its development mission more effectively and efficiently – not to perpetuate dependency, but to advance human dignity.”

In an editorial, the Chicago Tribune says it considers the current Food for Peace program a “terribly expensive and inefficient system. We’re pleased to see the Obama administration make a run at changing that… the administration has proposed a modest reform that can save money and feed more people.” The editorial continues,  ”Food aid can help to lift developing nations out of poverty, promote political stability and economic growth. It must be structured efficiently to achieve its objective. Reforming food aid would enable America to do justice to a large taxpayer outlay – and to save lives.”

USAID, Swedish Ministry for International Development, and African Development Bank launch Agriculture Fast Track at World Economic Forum

Business Day Live reports, the “fund – called Agriculture Fast Track – is the first of its kind and marks a new approach to development aid by western donors, that aims to promote economic growth through commercial agriculture.” In short, “Agriculture Fast Track’s purpose will be to fund some of the front-end costs of developing agricultural infrastructure, such as scoping, project design and feasibility studies, with the aim of leveraging private funding to commit to the projects.”

USAID in the News

Posted by  on Saturday, May 4th 2013     

In a recent editorial, the New York Times says that President Obama’s budget proposal to redirect some U.S. food aid funds to “buy food in bulk in countries in need or to provide individual recipients with vouchers or debit cards for local food purchases” rather than purchase the food in the U.S. and ship it overseas may be unpopular with domestic food producers, but it “will feed more people for the same amount the United States spends now.” The Times says “there is no excuse” for not enacting the change.

In another piece, “Proposal for Changes in Food Aid Sets Off Infighting in Congress,” the New York Times reports that the proposal ”has set off a jurisdictional fight among” lawmakers, “threatening to derail the most significant change to the program since it was created nearly 60 years ago.” USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah says, “This new reform would give us the flexible tools we need to get food to people who need it now, not weeks later,” adding that “we would still buy from U.S. farmers. But this way we can help feed two to four million more people without additional costs.”

LAUNCH, a series of forums to identify, showcase and support innovative approaches to global challenges, was recognized by Harvard’s Ash Center as a Top 25 Innovations in Government. Washington Post reported that “among the projects that made the cut is a public-private collaboration between NASA, USAID, the State Department and sportswear company Nike called Launch. The project, through a series of forums and networks, seeks to surface and accelerate the development of strong, innovative ideas.”

The Financial reports, “USAID announced the release of exciting new datasets and tools that increase transparency and provide the fuel for innovators and decision makers to solve problems.” The conference, “convened countries from the G-8 and New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition to discuss the potential of open data for agriculture and develop action plans to open and apply food security relevant datasets. To demonstrate the power of open data to deliver solutions, the conference also featured technologists and entrepreneurs who use USAID and U.S Government data to develop products to bring real solutions to the developing world.”

USAID in the News

Posted by  on Saturday, April 27th 2013     

This week, the President’s proposed Food Aid Reform in his FY2014 Budget Proposal garnered significant attention both from members of Congress at Administrator Shahs’ hearings on Capitol Hill and in the media.

This week Administrator Shah appeared before the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and the House Appropriations Subcommittee on State and Foreign Operations. Delving into the testimony, Politico says “Rajiv Shah – the bright young star at the United States Agency for International Development” – promoted “a more modern and science-based way” to deliver food aid to those who need it most. Shah testified that “Behind all this is President Barack Obama’s plan to revamp international food aid to allow more flexible, cash purchases overseas – rather than commodity shipments from the US.”

In its “Democracy In America” blog, The Economist notes that “USAID’s head, Rajiv Shah, is optimistic that the reformers will win this argument, pointing to a fiscal environment in which every dollar must be made to count.” In the New York Times piece titled “When Food Isn’t the Answer to Hunger”, Tina Rosenberg recalls that “in many places, people go hungry because there is no food. But in a lot of places, food is available and the market is working – people are just too poor to buy it. In those places, giving individuals or charitable groups cash to buy food can make food aid cheaper, faster and fairer.” Roseenberg adds that “by strengthening and not undercutting local farmers, cash aid also helps countries to avoid hunger later.”

The Hill, Bloomberg BusinessWeek and PBS also picked up Administrator Shah’s testimony this week and USAID’s Food Aid Reform.

Watch the segment on PBS:

USAID in the News

Posted by  on Friday, April 12th 2013     

President Obama’s 2014 Budget Proposal and Proposed Food Aid Reform

This week President Obama released his 2014 Budget Proposal, which introduced major reform in the delivery of food assistance. The Washington Post reports the White House has proposed “the first major change in three decades to the way the United States supplies food aid to impoverished nations, significantly scaling back the program that buys commodities from US farmers and ships them to the needy overseas.” Under a budget proposal released Wednesday, “nearly half of $1.4 billion in requested funds for the aid could instead be spent to purchase local bulk food in countries in need or to distribute individual vouchers for local purchases.” USAID administrator Rajiv Shah said in an interview, “We’ve made a strong commitment to provide more flexibility,” noting that “local purchase of food allows for a response time nearly 14 weeks faster” than shipping from the US, and also is “30 percent cheaper for certain types of commodities.” Shah added, “We recognize that any transition has to be done in a careful, thoughtful manner,” but argued that over the long term “spending money to build and modernize agricultural systems in current food-recipient countries ‘is ultimately what creates tens of thousands more jobs here in our country.’”

Oxfam’s Paul O’Brien welcomed the proposals, telling the Wall Street Journal: “The Obama administration has taken an important step towards long overdue reforms to bring food aid into the 21st century…This president’s proposal will get food to more hungry people faster, cheaper and more efficiently. Congress should pass them expeditiously.”

Read more about the Proposal in these publications: The Hill, NPR, Washington Post and Huffington Post. 

LGBT Global Development Partners spoke on advancing LGBT equality in developing and emerging market countries on April 8 in Washington. Photo credit: USAID

USAID Announces Initiative to Promote LGBT Rights Abroad

The four-year public-private partnership between USAID and Olivia Cruises, UCLA’s Williams Institute, the Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice, the Gay & Lesbian Victory Institute and the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency “will work with local LGBT groups to provide leadership training, research and other help, lending the imprimatur of the U.S. government to people who in many countries are outcast and vulnerable, “ The San Francisco Chronicle reports. “This partnership leverages the financial resources and skills of each partner to further inclusive development and increase respect for the human rights of LGBT people around the world,” noted Claire Lucas, senior advisor of the USAID Office of Innovation and Development Alliances. “It can be a real game-changer in the advancement of LGBT human rights.”

USAID in the News

Posted by  on Saturday, April 6th 2013     

Following up on his recent trip to Bangkok, Thailand, Deputy Administrator spoke to the Bangkok Post for an interview dedicated to LGBT issues. During the Q&A session, Steinberg explained that the agency is launching the “Being LGBT in Asia” project. The project, the first of its kind, “is a comprehensive research initiative focusing on six countries – China, Cambodia, Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam and the Philippines- to reach out to LGBT communities to find out from them what their priorities are or what kinds of discrimination they face and how we can most support their efforts to join the political, economic and social mainstreams of their countries.”

Deputy Administrator Steinberg speaks at gender equality event in Bangladesh. Photo Credit: USAID/Bangladesh

In an op-ed featured in Politico co-authored by Shelly Esque, President of the Intel Foundation, and USAID’s own Maura O’Neill, Chief Innovation Officer and Senior Counselor to the Administrator, the authors emphasize the need for affordable broadband in the developing world. Comparing the same barrier of phone lines and electricity to rural America, Esque and O’Neill iterate that the same phenomenon could close the digital divide through the expansion of mobile broadband. “Much research has proven broadband to be a catalyst to transformation in economic growth, social inclusion and the delivery of essential services like education and health care when coupled with strategic economic and social development policies.”

The Pakistan Observer reported this week on the Entrepreneurs Project in Pakistan. Through the project, USAID will train 26,000 women embellishers across Pakistan to improve their skills and ultimately increase their income. “Through this project, USAID provides female artisans with the skills to improve their products, access better markets, and increase their incomes.” Already, one participant exclaimed: “Now I don’t have to think about what I will feed my children anymore. Instead, I can think about my children going to school and learning things I don’t know.”

 

USAID in the News

Posted by  on Saturday, March 30th 2013     

This week USAID was featured in the Sudan Tribune for the announcement following World Water Day that ” it is committed to increase the number of South Sudanesewho have access to clean water and sanitation.” At present, “only 34% of South Sudanese have access to clean water according to statistics from South Sudan’s ministry of water resources and irrigation, leading to various dangerous diseases such as diarrhea that can lead to death, especially among vulnerable groups.”

Deputy Administrator Steinberg speaks in Bangladesh. Photo Credit: USAID/Bangladesh

Deputy Administrator of USAID Donald Steinberg is traveling this week on a three-day visit to Dhaka, Bangladesh. During that time, he launched USAID’s new environment conservation initiative, the Climate-Resilient Ecosystems and Livelihoods (CREL) project, a five-year $35 million program to involve local communities in the management of key ecosystems and develop alternative livelihoods for them to reduce dependence on protected area resources. He will also “meet government officials, including the ministers for agriculture and Environment and Forests to further the partnership between the US and Bangladesh through development assistance, with a particular focus on climate change and gender,” Financial Express reports.

In its “India Ink” blog, the New York Times interviewed USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah on “his recent trip to Mumbai about transformations in the development sector, the function of the private sector in development work and the aid agency’s new programs and partnerships aimed at reducing preventable child deaths.” During the Q&A session, Dr. Shah explained among other things that now, the agency is focused “on using our India mission as a development innovation laboratory to try and find those partners in the private sector, scientists and entrepreneurs who are creating great new solutions for development and then helping them apply those solutions here in India but also elsewhere in the world.”

USAID in the News

Posted by  on Saturday, March 23rd 2013     

This week Foreign Policy featured an excerpt from Administrator Raj Shah’s annual letter, which details USAID’s goals on defeating extreme poverty. The letter was released in conjunction with USAID Forward Progress Report, an overview of progress on a three-year reform effort within the agency. In The Hill‘s ”Congress Blog,” Bill Lane, the director of International Governmental Affairs for Caterpillar, and Save the Children CEO Carolyn Miles point out that “in Washington, we talk a lot about what doesn’t work, but finally there is a good story about one government agency investing in reform and delivering results” – USAID. Lane and Miles, co-presidents of the US Global Leadership Coalition, “applaud the goals of USAID FORWARD to modernize and strengthen US development programs, and while every indicator in the report is not perfect, the reforms are moving in the right direction.”

Administrator Shah spoke at the American Enterprise Institute to discuss the recently released USAID Forward Progress Report highlighting the past year’s successes and challenges in reforming the Agency and delivering better, more sustainable results. March 20, 2013. Photo credit: Pat Adams, USAID

In its “Global Affairs” blog, The Hill reports that according to Shah, the agency “managed to cut out the middle man in $745 million of its projects last year – a 50 percent increase from 2012.” In other words, explained Dr. Shah, “if the old model was hiring a contractor to build a road, the new model is partnering with engines of American innovation – corporations, foundations, NGOs, and faith-based communities – to help nations build innovation economies and democratic societies connected to our own.”

Meanwhile the Washington Examiner  reports that USAID’s Nancy Lindborg “spoke to the House Committee on Foreign Affairs…about the growing humanitarian crisis facing war-torn Syria.” Lindborg stated, “World Food Program (WFP) activities supported by the United States currently provide monthly rations to nearly 1.5 million within Syria and approximately 300,000 refugees in Jordan, Lebanon, Turkey, Iraq and Egypt.”

USAID in the News

Posted by  on Saturday, March 16th 2013     

On Friday, March 8, USAID joined in celebrating International Women’s Day here in Washington, D.C., Ghana and around the world. At the Duffor R. A Primary School in Ghana, USAID, in-collaboration with the Ghana Education Service, celebrated International Women’s Day with students, teachers, and assembly members under the theme “A Promise is a Promise: Time for Action to End Gender Based Violence in School,” Business Ghana reports.

USAID celebrates International Women's Day. Photo credit: USAID

In response to the March 5 front page story in the Washington Post, “Project’s Key Step is Left to Afghans,” Alex Thier, assistant to the administrator for the Office of Afghanistan and Pakistan Affairs, wrote a letter to the editor which appeared in Sunday’s paper. The letter challenges the article’s claim that USAID is “walking away” or “scaling back” efforts to complete the Kajaki Dam, but in fact USAID is tapping into the “increased capacity of the Afghans to take on responsibility for their own economic and social development.”

USAID In the News

Posted by  on Saturday, March 9th 2013     

This week Administrator Raj Shah visited India and Burma. The Press Trust of India reported on USAID’s announcement to extend “two of its flagship projects for child survival in India”. The renewed commitment of the two nations through the USAID, “aims to end all preventable child deaths and to strengthen India’s Call to Action on Child Survival and Development.” The agency “resumed work in Burma ” in November, after Washington suspended most sanctions against the country,” according to the AP. “Since then, USAID has committed $171 million to health, food security, democracy, human rights and rule of law programs.”

Dr. Rajiv Shah, USAID Administrator, spoke of USAID's commitment to engaging with civil society groups in Burma to support reforms. March 7, 2013. Photo credit: Richard Nyberg/USAID

In an interview with Reuters, Administrator Shah exclaimed the international community is slowly rethinking its policies toward Burma in light of the government’s decision to implement a number of reforms. He noted, “Everything we do is geared toward making these reforms sustainable and more durable, and if there’s backtracking, we will not continue to expand our efforts.”

The Yemen Times reports, “During the revolution, armed militias and government forces used hundreds of children’s schools as barracks and firing points” and they left many Yemeni schools “in complete disrepair, some destroyed entirely. Now, nearly two years later, 380 of those schools have been repaired, ” thanks to a number of organizations including USAID.

In Rome, Secretary Kerry Announces Nonlethal Assistance to Syria

Posted by  on Tuesday, March 5th 2013     

This originally appeared on State Department’s Dipnote Blog.

Stop four of Secretary Kerry’s Europe trip landed him in Rome and culminated with an announcement of $60 million in non-lethal assistance to strengthen the organizational capacity of the Syrian Opposition Coalition (SOC). With this announcement, the United States is now providing more than $115 million in non-lethal support for the civilian opposition. As liberated areas across Syria struggle to rebuild their communities without the support of the central government, this additional assistance will enable the SOC to help enhance the capacity of local councils and communities so they can expand the delivery of basic goods and essential services, fulfill administrative functions, and extend the rule of law.

Secretary of State John Kerry, with the Italian Foreign Minister Giulio Terzi and Syrian Opposition Council Chairman Moaz al-Khati, announces non-lethal assistance to Syrians. Photo credit: State Department

Significantly, the Secretary also announced that the United States would extend the provision of food rations and medical kits to the opposition, including the Supreme Military Council, in order to feed those in need and to tend to the sick and wounded.

In Secretary Kerry’s words: “We do this because we need to stand on the side of those in this fight who want to see Syria rise again in unity and see a democracy and human rights and justice.”

Standing in solidarity side-by-side with the Italian Foreign Minister Giulio Terzi and Syrian Opposition Council Chairman Moaz al-Khatib, Secretary Kerry noted that the international community stands with a united voice in its commitment to helping the Syrian people achieve their goals.

“The United States and all the countries represented here believe the Syrian Opposition Coalition can successfully lead the way to a peaceful transition, but they cannot do it alone. They need more support from all of us, and they need Bashar al-Assad to make a different set of decisions.”

While in Italy, Secretary Kerry attended a dinner with EU and NATO member foreign ministers and met with NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen, Estonian Foreign Minister Urmas Paet, Latvian Foreign Minister Edgars Rinkevics, and Lithuanian Foreign Minister Linas Linkevicius. He had the opportunity to meet with Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti and other government ministers and attend an event commemorating the 2013 Italian Year of Culture with Foreign Minister Giulio Terzi.

In a statement, Secretary Kerry also thanked Pope Benedict, who left the Holy See on February 28, for his leadership. He shared good wishes to the Pope on behalf of the American people.

You can follow his travel on www.state.gov.

Jared Caplan serves as a spokesperson and deputy director of the U.S. Department of State Regional Media Hub in Dubai.

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