IMPACT blog: This Week at USAID – July 26, 2010

By: Staff Person
July 27, 2010

Tomorrow’s MFAN and Global Health Technologies Coalition (GHTC) co-hosted briefing was featured on USAID’s IMPACTblog weekly event calendar.  See all of the USAID-related events this week below: Senior Deputy Assistant Administrator for Management Drew Luten will testify before the Commission on Wartime Contracting on Subcontracting in Iraq and Afghanistan. Administrator Shah and Ambassador Richard Holbrooke will appear before … Continue reading IMPACT blog: This Week at USAID – July 26, 2010

New GMF Paper Creates a Model for a Global Development Strategy

By: Staff Person
July 23, 2010

MFAN Partner the German Marshall Fund of the United States this week hosted a discussion on a new paper that offers a model for a U.S. Global Development Strategy. The paper was written by MFAN Principal and GMF Senior Resident Fellow Jim Kunder and MFAN member Jonathan White, senior program officer at GMF. The paper, titled “The Roadmap for a Grand Bargain: Comments on a U.S. Global Development Strategy,” draws from existing foreign assistance approaches and recent support from the Obama Administration and Congress for the notion of formulating the United States’ first-ever global development strategy for the 21st century.

MFAN Partner CGD Reviews New FAA Draft, Questions Sec. Clinton’s Rationale for Elevating Development

By: Staff Person
July 22, 2010

“More concerning is that State and USAID have had little interaction to date with staff writing the new bill. This doesn’t bode well for striking a grand bargain between the administration and Congress on either a new development direction (which will likely require some legislation) or passing a new global partnership act (which will require support from the administration, including State and USAID).”

GMF Transatlantic Blog Series Explores Relationship among Three Ds

By: Staff Person
July 19, 2010

“Absent direct, personal intervention by President Obama to define his own vision of aid reform and to take the actions needed to enforce the reforms, the stalemate will continue, and plans to strengthen the third D will suffer.”

Aid Reform that Works: How Ownership, Partnership, Coordination, and Innovation Should be the Core of America’s New Approach to Development

By: Staff Person
July 12, 2010

To demonstrate principles of effective aid – and communicate what still needs to be done – MFAN canvassed its Partners to share cases in which a new, innovative way of thinking led to improving the livelihood of an individual, a community or a country. The following success stories articulate some of the core principles – Ownership, Partnership, Coordination, and Innovation – that MFAN believes should provide the underpinnings of foreign assistance reform.

Washington Post Columnist: President Has Hard Choices to Make on Development

By: Staff Person
July 9, 2010

“The Pentagon says it wants out of the development business because that’s not what it does. So the question, which apparently the White House will resolve, is whether development is going to be a distinct, though coordinated, function. That is, who’s going to be in charge of development out in the field.”

USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah Speaks on Global Health Initiative

By: Staff Person
July 2, 2010

On Tuesday, Administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) Dr. Rajiv Shah spoke at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) regarding the president’s Global Health Initiative (GHI), and the steps that USAID is taking to provide effective, long-term assistance.

MFAN Partners Respond to Obama’s G8 Statement on Development

By: Staff Person
June 29, 2010

In a new post on the Center for Global Development’s Rethinking U.S. Foreign Assistance Blog, MFAN member Sarah Jane Staats reviews Obama’s recently released announcement on the G8, “A New Approach to Advancing Development.” Staats applauds the statement for putting a “little more meat on the bones” of U.S. global development strategy, but notes that the real challenge … Continue reading MFAN Partners Respond to Obama’s G8 Statement on Development

Partner Series: InterAction’s Mission to Reform Aid

By: Staff Person
June 24, 2010

InterAction is a coalition of U.S.-based nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) advocating greater coherence of U.S. foreign aid and development programs. InterAction has called for development to be elevated as a national priority, emphasizing its significance if our nation seeks greater engagement with the rest of the world.