February 5, 2014 (WASHINGTON) – This statement is delivered on behalf of the Modernizing Foreign Assistance Network (MFAN) by Co-Chairs George Ingram, Carolyn Miles, and Connie Veillette

MFAN applauds Congress for including key reforms to U.S. international food assistance in the 2014 Farm Bill, which was approved by Congress following a 68-32 vote in the Senate yesterday and a 251-166 vote in the House last week. These reforms are an important incremental step in ensuring greater flexibility and efficiency of our international food aid programs. The legislation will now go to President Obama for his signature. We commend Congress, and in particular the leaders of the Senate and House Agriculture Committees –  Chairwoman Debbie Stabenow (D-MI), Ranking Member Thad Cochran (R-MS), Chairman Frank Lucas (R-OK), and Ranking Member Collin Peterson (D-MN), respectively – for including common-sense reform provisions to food aid in the five-year authorization bill.

These reforms include: the authorization of additional funds for Local and Regional Procurement, which will save time and money as well as support local farmers and food markets to better and more sustainably serve their own people; an increase in the share of funds that can be used for non-commodity expenses, allowing for a decrease in the need to monetize commodities; and greater transparency by requiring USAID to report on implementation costs of food assistance, including the cost recovery rate for monetized food aid.

U.S international food assistance programs are critical to helping hungry people around the world, but the current approach is outdated. The reforms included in this legislation will mean reaching more people in need more quickly and putting U.S. taxpayer dollars to better use.

See below for a guest post from Adam Olson, Oxfam America’s Regional Advocacy Lead based in Chicago. Olson writes about the reforms to international food aid in the 2014 Farm Bill.  The original post appeared on Food Tank.

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Tucked away in Title III of the 2014 US Farm Bill, occupying just one of its 357 pages, quietly sits a reform that will empower thousands of farmers to feed millions more people a year suffering from hunger. Despite its practicality and comparatively low profile, it represents a long, hard fought victory. It’s an expansion of local purchasing of international food aid – and it’s worth celebrating.

Food aid is the backstop of our global food supply. When all else fails, it stands between life and mass starvation. With more than 850 million people suffering from hunger, efficiency in supporting their right to food matters. By using up to $80 million a year to buy food from local sources instead of distant American ones, the reform will feed millions more people. The concept is simple. For instance, if food aid was needed in Vietnam and rice was available in nearby Thailand, it could be purchased there instead of the current practice of shipping it from the US.

This process, proven by other food aid donors and a US pilot project:

1. Cuts food and delivery costs by 25-50%;

2. Reduces the average time it takes to deliver food by 14 weeks;

3. Reaches more people at a lower cost;

4. And, can have longer-term benefit of investing in farmers abroad, making them better able to support their own communities.

Despite all this, even small steps toward permitting local purchasing have been bitterly opposed by special interests, including agribusinesses and shippers. They cling to an antiquated status quo that requires all food to come from the United States. This made some sense when established in the 1950s, when my grandparents were farming in Minnesota. America had a surplus of cheap commodities and food aid was difficult to procure elsewhere. This hasn’t been true for a long time.

The old regime isn’t even particularly profitable for those who defend it, and they know it. In a hilarious Daily Show segment, a shipping industry representative repeatedly cites “heritage” as reason to maintain obsolete regulations. A Farm Bureau economist told Reuters she was more concerned with a loss of “pride” than farm revenue. Food aid amounts to about one percent of US agricultural exports – not enough to measurably impact commodity prices. My grandparents would have been proud to sell that fraction of their crop elsewhere in order to support fellow farmers abroad.

It’s taken common-sense sentiments like that, pushed in a sustained effort over years to achieve this victory. A coalition of organizations, including American Jewish World Service, Bread for the World, CARE, Catholic Relief Services, Mercy Corps, Oxfam America, and others have helped lead the charge. Champions on Capitol Hill have seen it through. The tragic case of Typhoon Haiyan’s impact in the Philippines and resulting outcry for change emboldened advocates as the Farm Bill went to conference committee. This win is a big, lifesaving step forward.

However, local food aid procurement remains the exception to the rule. If fully funded, the new reform would account for about 5 percent of total food aid activities authorized under the Farm Bill. The best approach is to remove the straightjacket and allow the US Agency for International Development (USAID) to choose the best way to procure food based on individual circumstances. By doing so, an estimated 17 million more people could receive food aid at no extra cost. There is no one-size-fits-all method (see USAID’s great infographics here), and there will always be a need for some commodities grown in the US, but experts should make the call for each situation free of legislative constraints.

We came close to ending more of those restraints last year. President Obama proposed sweeping reform to allow food aid to be purchased locally. Another proposal,offered as a Farm Bill amendment by Representatives Royce and Engel, failed by only 17 votes[i]. The vote was remarkably bipartisan – the issue always has been. In fact, the Bush administration unsuccessfully called for reform. Local purchasing of food aid is something everyone can get behind.

2014 is the year to do it. We expect the Obama administration to continue to push for reform. Budgetary pressures aren’t letting up, mandating the kind of cost efficiencies local purchasing delivers. The need for food aid seems set grow in the short-term; the increasing threat of climate disasters and manmade disasters, like the plight of Syrian refugees, demand a more responsible approach.

2014 is also the International Year of the Family Farmer. What a great time to allow more farmers to respond to food emergencies and break cycles of aid dependency through a more flexible food aid system. Reform in the 2014 Farm Bill, while an important victory unto itself, has given us the momentum to do even better.

See below for a post by MFAN Co-Chairs George Ingram, Carolyn Miles, and Connie Veillette.

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The U.S. has an important leadership role to play when it comes to supporting development and reducing poverty around the world. Foreign assistance serves our national interests by enhancing national security, expanding global economic opportunities, and promoting American values. In 2008, MFAN was established because of the growing recognition that U.S. foreign assistance and development policy needed to be strengthened and modernized in order to confront today’s challenges and bring about a more peaceful and prosperous world.

Since MFAN’s founding we have seen the Administration and Congress take actions to improve development policy and practice and make U.S. assistance dollars work smarter. Today, with the launch of our new policy paper, The Way Forward: A Reform Agenda for 2014 and Beyond, we both reflect on past achievements and humbly recognize there is much more work to be done.

MFAN’s new agenda outlines two powerful and mutually reinforcing pillars of reform – accountability through transparency, evaluation and learning; and country ownership of the priorities and resources for, and implementation of, development. These pillars are vital to building capacity in developing countries to enable leaders and citizens to take responsibility for their own development.

We applaud the many actions that have already been taken or put in motion to advance accountability and country ownership. For the Obama Administration, these include the commitment to fully implement the International Aid Transparency Initiative, USAID’s Partnership for Growth and Local Solutions initiatives, and the Millennium Challenge Corporation’s commitment to transparency reflected by its top ranking on the 2013 Aid Transparency Index. In addition it is particularly encouraging to see that transparency is embedded in the recommendations of the Global Development Council that were released this week. Congress has also taken up the reform cause with the creation of the Congressional Caucus on Effective Foreign Assistance, the introduction and reintroduction of the Foreign Aid Transparency and Accountability Act, and recent efforts to improve the efficiency and responsiveness of international food aid.

These next two years are an important window of opportunity for U.S. aid reform. The midterm elections in 2014 are certain to shake up the membership of Congress. In 2015, the Millennium Development Goals will expire and a new global development agenda will take its place. And 2016 will bring a new administration and further changes in Congress.  We urge the Administration and Congress to work together to institutionalize the important reforms that have already been introduced and continue to push forward on strengthening country ownership and accountability. The profound changes in international aid globally make the focus on these changes even more important to ensuring US aid effectiveness.

We will be tracking progress made on the key reform actions we outline in the paper and sharing our thoughts with the community, the Administration, and Congress. We invite – and look forward to – the dialogue that these recommendations will generate.

Washington, D.C.- This statement is delivered on behalf of the endorsing organizations: American Jewish World Service, Bread for the World, CARE, Church World Service, Maryknoll Office for Global Concerns, Modernizing Foreign Assistance Network, Oxfam America, Presbyterian Church USA, Save the Children, The Borgen Project, United Methodist Church: General Board of Church and Society.

As leading organizations working to fight hunger, poverty and malnutrition around the world, we welcome the Food for Peace Reform Act of 2014 proposed by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Ranking Member Bob Corker (R-TN) and African Affairs Subcommittee Chairman Chris Coons (D-DE). If enacted, this bipartisan legislation would provide up to 9 million more people with lifesaving aid at no additional cost by using taxpayer dollars more efficiently.

The bill modernizes U.S. food aid programs, removing outdated red tape and ensuring the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) can reach more of the world’s most vulnerable children and families quickly and effectively during times of crisis. The bill places food aid authorities into the Foreign Assistance Act while maintaining the objectives and core structures of the original program. It would allow USAID to run a 21^st century food aid program with the flexibility needed to meet increasing demand from humanitarian crises. We urge members of the Senate to swiftly pass this bill and ensure it is signed into law.

“With a growing number of crises around the world and volatile food and fuel prices stressing aid budgets, it is imperative to build on the momentum achieved through reforms included in the Farm Bill and FY14 appropriations and maximize flexibility to ensure tax dollars get a bigger bang for their buck. We look forward to working with members of both parties to ensure long overdue reforms are passed into law.”

The United States is the world’s most generous donor of food aid, and U.S. international food assistance is one of the most important expressions of American leadership and values abroad. Food aid helps feed 55 million people in need around the world every year, supporting both emergency responses and programs that tackle chronic hunger and malnutrition. This Act responds to the numerous studies and reports that conclude that our system for delivering food aid is plagued by inefficiencies that, if improved, would result in reaching more hungry people more quickly and at no additional cost. One Government Accountability Office study found that because of existing outdated rules, it can take four to six months for U.S. food aid to be procured, shipped and distributed in recipient countries. During urgent crises, these delays can be a matter of life and death.

See below for a guest post from George Ingram, Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution and MFAN Co-Chair. This piece originally appeared on the Brookings blog on November 13.

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Conventional wisdom has it that foreign assistance is best supported by a Republican president and a Democratic Congress—Democrats are generally supportive of foreign assistance and a Republican president can convince his party’s legislators to support his foreign assistance programs. Add to that the dysfunction of recent congresses and the continued heightened partisanship, and the prospects for the newly elected 114th Congress taking constructive action on foreign assistance would appear dim.

For three reasons, I believe this pessimistic structural assessment does not reflect current reality, though it’s true that funding levels will remain a struggle and could be a target of a future budget battle.

International Crises Remind Us of the World

Turning to the old adage of “never waste a crisis,” the inward-looking turn reflected in opinion polls at the beginning of the 2014 election cycle was reversed by early fall—likely due to the Islamic State (also known as ISIS) and Ebola, which, by reminding the body politic that we ignore the world at our own peril, returned the American public to its more historical position of supporting international engagement. Further, as analyzed by the U.S. Global Leadership Coalition, “isolationism” was the big loser in the campaign. While there candidates advocating for retrenchment from international affairs, few of those articulating a “closed door” were elected and a number of the new members have international experience through the military, business, and other venues (full disclosure: I serve as honorary chairman of the U.S. Global Leadership Coalition).

Strong Leadership on Committees to Continue

The congressional committees with jurisdiction over international affairs are likely to be under the leadership of committed internationalists who understand and support foreign assistance. Where the leadership will change in the Senate, the incoming chairmen of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the State-Foreign Operations Appropriations Subcommittee, Senators Bob Corker and Lindsey Graham, are strong supporters of foreign assistance and they and their staffs have demonstrated interest in legislation to modernize foreign assistance policy and programs. Their predecessors, Senators Bob Menendez and Patrick Leahy, respectively, also are strong supporters of foreign assistance and likely to serve as the ranking Democrats on the committees. In the House, Nita Lowey is slated to retain her position as the ranking Democrat on the State-Foreign Operations Subcommittee and the candidates to succeed subcommittee Chair Kay Granger also are supporters of foreign assistance. On the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Chairman Henry Royce and ranking Democrat Elliot Engel will retain their positions.

Less Partisanship, but Resources Remain in Jeopardy

Most of the current issues involving foreign assistance fly under partisan radar. Sure, there will be the perennial contest around family planning policies and struggles around funding for a few less favorite accounts like the United Nations and the multilateral banks. Members will disagree on the nature of and how exactly to confront the Islamic State and Ebola, but at the end of the debates they will support U.S. policies and resources to confront these two scourges.

Just as the Obama Administration has supported and continued key Bush Administration initiatives—notably PEPFAR (the President’s Emergency Plan for Aids Relief) and the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC)—so, too, has the Republican Congress generally supported Obama initiatives in the foreign assistance realm.

There are ongoing and new efforts to write some of the initiatives into law, specifically in three areas. There has been strong support for legislation to authorize Power Africa; the bill has passed the House and has good support in the Senate. In recent months Obama’s Feed the Future has been the subject of serious administration/Congress/civil society deliberations to draft implementing legislation, and those discussions are expected to result in a bill with strong bipartisan support. The Foreign Assistance Transparency and Accountability Act would write into law the Administration’s policy initiatives on data transparency and evaluation. It has bipartisan support and is the subject of discussions to move the current bill in the lame-duck session or a revised draft in the new Congress. That consideration of moving the legislation to the next Congress conveys legislators’ comfort with the idea that bipartisan cooperation is possible.

There is reason for concern on the matter of resources. Not from immediate action, as both House and Senate appropriations committees have marked international affairs for fiscal year 2015 at $49.9 billion, just below the FY 2014 level of $50.6 billion and $1.6 billion shy of the administration’s request of $51.5 billion for FY 2015. The current continuing resolution is actually at $50.4 billion. And the Congress is likely to support most or part of the administration’s emergency request for Ebola of $6.4 billion.

The greater concern is for FY 2016 and 2017. Sequestration kicks back in next year and there will be efforts to protect defense, possibly at the expense of non-defense accounts. And, while the appropriators will remain advocates of foreign assistance funding, the House and Senate budget committees have traditionally not been so supportive. Incoming chairman of the Senate Budget Committee Jeff Sessions is in keeping with this mold. Back to not wasting a crisis—Ebola, the Islamic State, and the continuing uncertainty through much of the Middle East should be enough to keep members focused on the importance of the ability of the U.S. to be an active participant in world events.

The Export-Import Bank and the Overseas Private Investment Corporation

Two related international affairs matters to keep an eye on are the reauthorization of the Export-Import Bank (EXIM) and the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC). EXIM does not traditionally fall under the development rubric, but the export finance agency is slated under the administration’s plans to provide $5 billion of the $7 billion of U.S. government funding for power projects under its signature initiative Power Africa. Over the past several years EXIM has been a prime target of conservative Republicans. Rejecting the arguments that it creates jobs, levels the playing field for U.S. exporters, and pays its own way, they attack the agency as corporate welfare. Anticipating Republican control of the Senate in the new Congress, they orchestrated a temporary extension of EXIM’s authorities to June 2015, so reauthorization of EXIM will likely be a donnybrook battle for the new session.

Reauthorization of OPIC is less controversial. A temporary extension is in the continuing resolution and will be carried forward in whatever replaces the continuing resolution (it expires December 11), either a new continuing resolution into early next year or an omnibus appropriations bill for the entire fiscal year 2015. A permanent reauthorization has been part of the Power Africa legislation and could be carried there or in other legislation.

Engage the Congress

Bottom line: it’s worth our time to engage with the 114th Congress, as there will be opportunities to improve our foreign assistance policies and programs and funding levels will need our support.

See below for a post by MFAN Co-Chairs George Ingram, Carolyn Miles, and Connie Veillette.

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Beginning this week, Congress will be calling administration officials up to Capitol Hill to answer questions about the President’s FY2016 Budget Request, which was released earlier this month. In advance of the hearings with Secretary of State John Kerry and USAID Acting Administrator Alfonso Lenhardt, we’ve given some thought to what issues we’d like to see come up and learn more about. See below for some of the questions on foreign aid reform that we’re itching to ask the Secretary and Acting Administrator… and we hope Congress is as well.

On accountability:

1)      Is the USG going to meet its commitment to full compliance with the International Aid Transparency Initiative? If not, which agencies/departments are lagging behind? What will the Secretary and Administrator do to exert the political leadership in order ensure their agencies meet the year-end deadline? [See more on this from Publish What You Fund and Brookings]

2)      How will the Secretary ensure that the evaluations now being conducted will (a) be methodologically rigorous and of good quality; (b) be made public in their entirety, and not just their summaries; and (c) be used to guide decision-making, and not just put on a shelf somewhere?

3)      Will the Secretary commit to working with Congress to lock in important reforms such as the Dashboard, the IATI commitment, and the requirement for all foreign assistance agencies to establish and implement evaluation policies? [See more on this from MFAN’s Co-Chairs]

On country ownership:

1)      How is the administration planning to continue and expand its support for initiatives like USAID’s Local Solutions that emphasize the importance of designing and implementing inclusive Country Strategies and programs that work with local partners to build local country ownership?

2)      What is USAID’s current progress towards meeting the goals of Local Solutions? How is Local Solutions being operationalized in-country and what are the outcomes and lessons learned to date? [See more on this from MFAN Co-Chair Carolyn Miles]

3)      In advance of this summer’s Financing for Development conference and in recognition of the changing landscape of development finance, how is the administration considering leveraging alternative finance mechanisms like domestic resource mobilization and co-financing? [See more on this from CGD and Oxfam]

On other reform issues:

1)      When will the second QDDR be released, how will accountability and country ownership be reflected in its recommendations, and who will be in charge of ensuring that it gets implemented?

2)      What progress has been made toward implementing the Partnership for Growth program in the four pilot countries of El Salvador, Ghana, Philippines, and Tanzania? Is the administration planning to expand the use of joint constraints to growth analyses in partner countries, which are a key component of PFG, with other partner governments? [See more on this from CGD]

April 16, 2015 (WASHINGTON) – This statement is delivered on behalf of the Modernizing Foreign Assistance Network by Co-Chairs George Ingram, Carolyn Miles, and Connie Veillette:

MFAN wishes to thank the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, especially Chairman Bob Corker (R-TN) and Ranking Member Ben Cardin (D-MD), for convening this week’s landmark hearing on the importance of reforming U.S. food assistance. U.S. food aid programs are instrumental in providing life-saving support to the world’s poorest and most vulnerable, but the current system needs to be improved to deliver more for both hungry people abroad and U.S. tax dollars.

Current laws requiring that food be shipped from the U.S. on U.S. flagged vessels results in time lags and increased transportation and administrative costs that put lives at risk. In addition, delivering U.S. food rather than purchasing locally or regionally sourced food, when available, can inhibit building self-sustaining agricultural systems. Common-sense reforms should be enacted to allow our food aid programs to deliver results faster, more effectively, and more efficiently – at no additional cost to American taxpayers.

We have already seen the positive impact of the small increases in flexibility that were included in the 2014 Farm Bill and the FY2014 appropriations bills. With an estimated one in nine people in the world being food insecure, this is a critical time to ensure that U.S. food aid programs have all the necessary tools at their disposal to respond quickly and effectively to those in need.

We are encouraged by the bipartisan efforts of Congressional champions like Senators Bob Corker (R-TN) and Chris Coons (D-DE) to fix our food aid system, such as the Food for Peace Reform Act (S. 525). We look forward to continuing to work with Congress to ensure our food aid dollars have the maximum impact.

April 16, 2015 (WASHINGTON) – This statement is delivered on behalf of the Modernizing Foreign Assistance Network by Co-Chairs George Ingram, Carolyn Miles, and Connie Veillette:

Today MFAN, as part of a broad coalition of international development advocates and stakeholders, including four former USAID Administrators, is urging President Obama to expeditiously nominate a permanent Administrator to the United States Agency for International Development. Under the leadership of Administrator Rajiv Shah, USAID has made dramatic steps to strengthen its capacity to deliver results for the American people and for people in developing countries around the world.

Having a Senate-confirmed appointee at the helm of USAID is essential to advancing U.S. development goals and the aid effectiveness agenda. We are calling on the President to nominate a new Administrator as soon as possible to sustain strong U.S. leadership on the development programs that play a vital role in support of our foreign policy goals and are crucial to the lives and well-being of men and women around the globe.

May 12, 2015 (WASHINGTON) – This statement is delivered on behalf of the Modernizing Foreign Assistance Network

MFAN is pleased to see that the Global Food Security Act of 2015 (S. 1252), recently introduced by Sens. Bob Casey (D-PA) and Johnny Isakson (R-GA), includes important reform elements that would help strengthen accountability mechanisms and promote greater country ownership of U.S. foreign assistance programs related to food security and global agricultural development.

Most notably, the legislation promotes accountability by requiring that specific and measurable goals and benchmarks are set and that monitoring and evaluation plans be created that reflect international best practices related to transparency and accountability. The legislation also requires the establishment of mechanisms for reporting results in an open and transparent matter, including how findings from monitoring and evaluation have been incorporated into program design and budget decisions. In addition, the bill requires that reporting on progress be made publicly accessible in an electronic format in a timely manner.

The legislation also demonstrates a commitment to principles of country ownership. It requires support for the long-term success of programs by building the capacity of local organizations and institutions and by developing strategies and benchmarks for graduating target countries and communities from assistance.

We applaud the bill sponsors for the inclusion of these elements as they are essential to ensuring greater effectiveness and sustainability of U.S. global food security and agriculture programs. However, we believe the legislation could be made even stronger in several ways. First, the coordinating function within the U.S. government should be given to the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), as our principal development agency and as the lead agency on the Obama Administration’s Feed the Future initiative. Second, the legislation should specify that local, developing country institutions should be the first option for implementing programs where appropriate capacity and conditions exist. Third, the amount of U.S. assistance authorized by the bill should be determined by locally-driven priorities and plans.

We look forward to working with Congress to ensure the reform elements in the bill are strengthened.

Broad Coalition Calls on U.S. Senate to Confirm Gayle Smith as USAID Administrator

June 15, 2015 (WASHINGTON) – This statement is delivered on behalf of the Modernizing Foreign Assistance Network by Co-Chairs George Ingram, Carolyn Miles, and Connie Veillette:

MFAN, along with a broad coalition of international development organizations, policy experts, and the private sector, is calling on the U.S. Senate to swiftly confirm Gayle Smith as the next permanent USAID Administrator. Having a Senate-confirmed appointee at the helm of USAID is essential to advancing U.S. development goals and optimizing the use of U.S. foreign assistance resources. As we cautioned in our open letter to the President in April, when the Administrator position was vacant in 2009 for nearly a full year, USAID and its programs suffered.

Gayle Smith is a strong and experienced leader and is well-equipped to further implement and institutionalize important reforms at the U.S. government’s lead development agency. Smith has long been a champion of the aid effectiveness agenda while ensuring development has a strong voice at the policymaking table. In her time as Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Development and Democracy, Smith has helped to foster a more robust interagency dialogue and coordination around U.S. development efforts.

At a time when we are responding to global crises in places like Nepal, Syria, and Yemen, and with the Millennium Development Goals expiring and a new set of goals taking their place, the United States cannot afford to be without a strong, permanent USAID Administrator to lead our engagement and represent our development interests internationally.  We are pleased to see that the Senate Foreign Relations Committee has scheduled a confirmation hearing for this week and urge a swift confirmation process in order to sustain strong U.S. leadership on development programs and the accountability of our foreign assistance.

July 28, 2015 (WASHINGTON) – This statement is delivered on behalf of the Modernizing Foreign Assistance Network (MFAN) by Co-Chairs George Ingram, Carolyn Miles, and Connie Veillette

Today the Modernizing Foreign Assistance Network is launching a new campaign, ACCOUNTdown to 2017, to track progress made toward strengthening the accountability and country ownership of U.S. foreign assistance. With ACCOUNTdown, we take stock of where Congress and the Administration are in meeting their reform commitments and the goals we laid out last year in MFAN’s The Way Forward and outline further steps that should be taken over the next 18 months to advance progress.

Bipartisan leadership over the past two decades has elevated and enhanced the ability of U.S. foreign assistance to confront threats, reduce poverty, and advance our interests. As the United States continues to face significant challenges around the world, effective foreign assistance remains as imperative as ever. Robust development policy and practice help support empowered citizens to hold their governments accountable and build local capacity to achieve sustainable results.

Over the next 18 months, we will push for and assess progress, and publicly report our findings. We urge Congress and the Administration to work together to institutionalize existing reform commitments around two critical pillars of development – accountability and country ownership.

October 20, 2015 (WASHINGTON) – This statement is delivered on behalf of the Modernizing Foreign Assistance Network (MFAN) by Co-Chairs George Ingram, Carolyn Miles, and Connie Veillette

MFAN welcomes the introduction of the Foreign Aid Transparency and Accountability Act of 2015 by Representatives Ted Poe (R-TX) and Gerry Connolly (D-VA) and Senators Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Ben Cardin (D-MD). This bipartisan legislation would codify important reforms to ensure that U.S. agencies involved in foreign assistance are focused on rigorous and consistent monitoring and evaluation of programs and on making comprehensive, timely, and comparable aid data publicly available. By strengthening its commitment to monitoring and evaluation and transparency, the U.S. government can better allocate aid resources and be held accountable by a range of stakeholders.

Earlier versions of this legislation have been unanimously approved by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in the 113^th Congress and by the House of Representatives in the 112^th Congress. We commend Representatives Poe and Connolly and Senators Rubio and Cardin for their continued leadership to enact this important legislation.

MFAN strongly supports this legislation. It is vital to guaranteeing that U.S. foreign assistance becomes as transparent as possible and programs are thoroughly evaluated. Enacting this bill will help pave the way for the U.S. Government to further embed aid effectiveness principles in its development policy and practice in order to get the most out of every dollar we spend. The positive actions we have seen this Administration take to improve the accountability of U.S. foreign assistance, such as creating ForeignAssistance.gov as a public venue for aid data, and the USAID and State Department evaluation policies, will be strengthened by this legislation.

We look forward to working with Congress to make this legislation even stronger by requiring that aid effectiveness approaches be rigorously applied to all foreign assistance, including security assistance, and reinforcing existing U.S. government commitments to transparency and evaluation, such as meeting its obligation on the International Aid Transparency Initiative.

November 10, 2015 (WASHINGTON) – This statement is delivered on behalf of the Modernizing Foreign Assistance Network (MFAN) by Co-Chairs George Ingram, Carolyn Miles, and Connie Veillette

Today the Senate Foreign Relations Committee unanimously endorsed the Foreign Aid Transparency and Accountability Act of 2015 (S. 2184), marking another victory for the bipartisan, bicameral legislation. This bill, recently introduced by Senators Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Ben Cardin (D-MD), would codify important reforms to ensure that U.S. agencies involved in foreign assistance are focused on rigorous and consistent monitoring and evaluation of programs and on making comprehensive, timely, and comparable aid data publicly available.

MFAN thanks Chairman Bob Corker (R-TN) and Ranking Member Ben Cardin (D-MD) for moving swiftly to take action on this legislation, and the bill sponsors for their continued leadership on efforts to make foreign assistance more transparent and accountable. This bipartisan legislation would help the U.S. government better track, measure, and allocate limited aid resources.

This swift action in the House and Senate underscores the broad bipartisan support for aid effectiveness and the need to act now to ensure our assistance programs have the greatest, most lasting impact. We urge both chambers to maintain the momentum to pass this important legislation by the full House and Senate.

Dear Senator:

On behalf of both the Modernizing Foreign Assistance Network – a coalition of international development practitioners and foreign policy experts committed to strengthening development as a key component of U.S. foreign policy – and InterAction – the largest alliance of U.S.-based international development and humanitarian NGOs, with over 190 member organizations operating in every developing country – we are writing to express our strong support for the “Foreign Aid Transparency and Accountability Act of 2015” (S. 2184), sponsored by Senators Marco Rubio and Ben Cardin.

U.S. foreign assistance budgets and programs should be transparent and based on rigorous evidence and learning to ensure the effectiveness of every dollar spent. S. 2184 would both establish evaluation guidelines for U.S. international development and economic assistance programs and centralize public access to data and reports through the existing ForeignAssistance.gov aid transparency website. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee unanimously approved this legislation in 2013 and again in 2015. A companion bill sponsored by Representatives Ted Poe and Gerry Connolly unanimously passed the House in 2012 and was approved by the House Committee on Foreign Affairs in 2015.

Specifically, the legislation would: 1) require the President of the United States to establish and implement uniform monitoring and evaluation guidelines – with measurable goals, performance metrics, and monitoring and evaluation plans – across U.S. international development and economic assistance programs; and 2) require the Secretary of State to ensure the ForeignAssistance.gov website contains detailed information regarding U.S. foreign assistance on a program-by-program and country-by-country basis that is updated quarterly.  It would further require that analysis be undertaken by the Government Accountability Office to inform Congress on relevant agencies’ adherence to these benchmarks.

While some progress has been made in recent years, today fewer than half of the more than two dozen federal departments and agencies involved in delivering U.S. foreign assistance have published data to ForeignAssistance.gov, and not enough meaningful aid information has been included. The time has come for the President to issue and oversee a set of common guidelines on the monitoring and evaluation of these programs and ensure that important aid information is available to the public. American taxpayers, along with partner country governments and citizens, deserve to have the ability to access comprehensive, timely, and comparable data on U.S. international development and economic assistance.

Given its strong bipartisan support in the previous sessions of Congress, we urge you to support and swiftly pass the “Foreign Aid Transparency and Accountability Act” to maximize the impact of our foreign assistance.

Sincerely,

George Ingram
MFAN Co-Chair
Brookings Institution

Carolyn Miles
MFAN Co-Chair
Save the Children

Connie Veillette
MFAN Co-Chair
The Lugar Center

Sam Worthington
President & CEO
InterAction

Endorsing Organizations (27):

Alliance to End Hunger
Bread for the World
CARE USA
ChildFund International
Congressional Hunger Center
Global Health Council
Global Poverty Project
Habitat for Humanity International
Helen Keller International
InterAction
International Youth Foundation
Mercy Corps
Millennium Water Alliance
Modernizing Foreign Assistance Network
ONE
Oxfam America
PCI (Project Concern International)
Plan International USA
Save the Children
The Borgen Project
The Hunger Project
U.S. Fund for UNICEF
USAID Alumni Association
VEGA (Volunteers for Economic Growth Alliance)
WASH Advocates
WaterAid America
Women Thrive Worldwide

November 11, 2015

The Honorable John F. Kerry
Secretary of State
U.S. Department of State
Washington, DC 20520

Dear Mr. Secretary:

On behalf of the Modernizing Foreign Assistance Network (MFAN), a coalition of international development practitioners and foreign policy experts committed to strengthening development as a key component of U.S. foreign policy, we are writing to urge your active support of the Foreign Aid Transparency and Accountability Act, introduced in the Senate (S. 2184) by Senators Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Ben Cardin (D-MD) and in the House (H.R. 3766) by Representatives Ted Poe (R-TX) and Gerry Connolly (D-VA). This bicameral, bipartisan legislation recently passed out of both the House Committee on Foreign Affairs and the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations and is worthy of the Administration’s strong endorsement. Specifically, the bill seeks to embed transparency and evaluation practices in the work of all agencies that administer U.S. foreign aid – longstanding priorities for both you and President Obama that would deliver greater impact in the developing world and in the lives of those we are trying to reach with our assistance.

The United States has made strides in recent years in improving the quantity and quality of U.S. foreign assistance data available to the public. President Obama’s sweeping Presidential Policy Directive #6 in 2010 declared accountability as a priority of his administration, stating “The United States will…Set in place rigorous procedures to evaluate the impact of policies and programs, report on results and reallocate resources accordingly, incorporate relevant evidence and analysis from other institutions, and inform the policy and budget process” as well as “Undertake a more substantial investment of resources in monitoring and evaluation, including with a focus on rigorous and high-quality impact evaluations.”

The establishment of the Open Government Partnership and the ForeignAssistance.gov website to centralize U.S. foreign assistance information continues to demonstrate this Administration’s commitment to openness and accountability, both to the American public and beneficiaries of U.S. assistance around the world. All three U.S. Open Government National Action Plans[1] have called for agencies administering foreign assistance to publish their aid information in line with the internationally agreed-upon standard, which is consistent with the U.S. commitment to the International Aid Transparency Initiative. Yet to date, only ten of the more than 22 agencies that manage foreign assistance programs have published any data to ForeignAssistance.gov since the launch of the website five years ago.

We know that improved oversight and accountability of U.S. assistance has been a personal priority for you. Under your leadership, the State Department’s recent 2015 Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review affirms the importance of data-driven decision-making for diplomacy and development. In addition, the State Department’s recently updated evaluation policy includes publication of full evaluations of unclassified foreign assistance evaluations on a rolling basis beginning this year.

We are grateful for your engagement on the aid effectiveness agenda over the years, including helping to approve similar legislation in both the 112^th and 113^th Congresses when you served as Chairman of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations. Given your commitment to accountability and effectiveness, both as Secretary of State and previously as United States Senator, we ask you to make known your strong support for passage of this sensible but critical legislation in order to sustain the ongoing efforts of this administration for years to come.

Thank you for your consideration, and we look forward to continuing our work together to maximize the effectiveness of U.S. foreign assistance.

Sincerely,

George Ingram
MFAN Co-Chair
Brookings Institution

Carolyn Miles
MFAN Co-Chair
Save the Children

Connie Veillette
MFAN Co-Chair
The Lugar Center

[1] “As outlined in past OMB guidance to Federal agencies, by December 2015, agencies managing or implementing U.S. foreign assistance will establish an automated and timely process for publishing foreign aid data to ForeignAssistance.gov. Throughout 2014, the United States Agency for International Development, the Department of State, Department of Health and Human Services, Department of Agriculture, Department of Defense, Department of Treasury, and other agencies will work to add or expand detailed, timely, and high-quality foreign assistance data to ForeignAssistance.gov.” (2^nd Open Government U.S. National Action Plan, 2013)

See below for a guest post from Lori Rowley, Co-Chair of MFAN’s Accountability Working Group and Director of Global Food Security and Aid Effectiveness at The Lugar Center. This post is part of MFAN’s ACCOUNTdown to 2017 Dialogue Series.

***

From the perspective of both U.S. taxpayers and recipients of U.S. foreign assistance, it’s been a very positive few weeks on both sides of the Capitol. Legislation to advance greater transparency of U.S. foreign assistance programs has now been approved by the House Foreign Affairs Committee and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

As a staff member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee under the leadership of Senator Richard G. Lugar (R-IN), I staffed the Senator when he authored the Senate companion bill  that Congressman Ted Poe introduced in the 112^th Congress and has continued to introduce in every Congress since then, The Foreign Aid Transparency and Accountability Act. The bill narrowly missed enactment in the waning days of that Congress – late in December of 2012 – despite a unanimous vote by the full House.

Since that time, interest in the topic of foreign aid effectiveness has not waned. Neither has the need for it. In fact, in today’s world, maintaining the effectiveness of our taxpayer dollars in keeping starving people alive with critical food aid, investing in women, smallholder farmers so they can improve their crop production and in turn feed their families, and supporting  HIV/AIDS victims with life-saving medical treatment is more vital than ever.  Our financial resources in supporting people in the developing world be able to move from living in crisis to living in stability are stretched to their maximum, with destabilized governments, drought and continued lack of access to water and basic education a constant across much of the world. We need to see where we’re investing, what we’re getting in return, and how we can make progress to move these countries and their citizens from being dependent on our aid to becoming our trading partners.

In my current position at The Lugar Center, we continue to endorse the critical investment in developing countries in order to promote a more prosperous and stable world.  We believe that an important component of this investment is ensuring its effectiveness through transparency, and we work to promote it. The Obama Administration took important steps in this area, with the creation of the webpage, foreignassistance.gov. Here taxpayers are now able to see how much of their taxpayer dollars go to a specific country and for what purpose. Further, the transfer of this data to the International Aid Transparency Registry provides even greater transparency regarding the flow of aid funds into each developing country by a host of donors, NGOs and others from across the globe.

While some federal agencies responsible for administering U.S. foreign aid are already living up to executive branch commitments to be more transparent about where and for what purpose taxpayer dollars are being spent, regrettably not all of them are. The posting of this information to foreignassistance.gov, is uneven and often incomplete. Only the Millennium Challenge Corporation has received a rating of “Very Good” on the Publish What You Fund 2014 Aid Transparency Index.  Frankly, all 22 federal agencies providing foreign assistance need to do better.

Here is where the Congress can play a critical role. By enacting legislation that requires all federal agencies providing foreign assistance to publish their data to the foreignassistance.gov webpage, the legislative and executive branches of government become partners in working to ensure transparency, and thus accountability in our foreign assistance. That is a win-win for both U.S. taxpayers and people across the globe who receive our aid. Locking in important steps to improve our foreign assistance seems ripe for action now, and I am hopeful that as we approach December of 2015, enactment of the Foreign Aid Accountability and Transparency Act won’t be a narrow miss as it was when I staffed this bill, but rather a full endorsement of foreign aid transparency and accountability by both the House and the Senate.

November 30, 2015

WASHINGTON – Seven months since her nomination by President Obama and nearly one year since the announcement that Administrator Rajiv Shah was stepping down, MFAN is pleased to see the Senate take action today to confirm Gayle Smith as USAID Administrator. Having a permanent USAID Administrator in place for the final 14 months of the Obama Administration is vital to sustaining strong U.S. leadership on development programs that are essential to our national interests and an expression of our core values.

“At a time when we are responding to major crises in places like Syria and Yemen, having a confirmed USAID Administrator could not be more urgent. While it has been disappointing that this nomination was held up for this long, putting those in need at risk, we are excited to now be moving ahead with such a strong leader,” said Carolyn Miles, MFAN Co-Chair and President and CEO of Save the Children.

Gayle Smith is a strong and experienced leader and, as a Co-Founder of MFAN, has long been a champion of the aid effectiveness agenda while ensuring development is an equal pillar of U.S. foreign policy.

“We know that Gayle is eager to hit the ground running and we look forward to working closely with her to continue to strengthen the capacity of USAID to deliver results,” said George Ingram MFAN Co-Chair and Senior Fellow at Brookings.

“Gayle Smith understands the importance of effective foreign aid and we fully expect her to speed up the momentum around institutionalizing key reforms, such as those included in the USAID Forward agenda and USAID’s Vision for Ending Extreme Poverty,” said Connie Veillette, MFAN Co-Chair and Senior Fellow at The Lugar Center.

Under former Administrator Shah and Acting Administrator Alfonso Lenhardt, USAID has proven the critical role that foreign assistance plays in these challenging times. Now under the leadership of Gayle Smith, the Agency can move towards fulfilling the “long-term commitment to rebuilding USAID as the U.S. Government’s lead development agency and as the world’s premier development agency,” as articulated by the 2010 policy directive on global development.

December 2, 2015

The Honorable Thad Cochran
Chair
Senate Appropriations Committee
Washington, DC 20515

The Honorable Barbara Mikulski
Ranking Member
Senate Appropriations Committee
Washington, DC 20515

The Honorable Harold Rogers
Chairman
House Appropriations Committee
Washington, DC 20515

The Honorable Nita Lowey
Ranking Member
House Appropriations Committee
Washington, DC 20515

Dear Chairmen Cochran and Rogers and Ranking Members Mikulski and Lowey:

As international humanitarian and development organizations addressing global hunger and malnutrition, we strongly oppose any provision in the omnibus appropriations bill that increases the percentage or portion of U.S.-sourced food aid commodities that must be transported on privately owned, U.S.-flagged commercial vessels.

In April 2014, the Department of Homeland Security warned that increasing agriculture cargo preference (ACP) restrictions on U.S. food aid from 50 percent to 75 percent would increase transportation costs for U.S. international food aid programs by $75 million annually, and result in up to 2 million vulnerable people losing access to life-saving food aid from the United States. This proposed change to cargo preference follows the Budget Act of 2013, which eliminated mandated reimbursements to USAID from Department of Transportation intended to offset part of the ocean freight cost of international food aid programs.  The cumulative effect drastically increases the cost of shipping U.S. food and will have an overwhelmingly negative impact on the ability to operate food aid programs efficiently.

As you know, U.S. international food aid supports the food and nutrition needs of 56 million children and families on average each year and, consequently, helps to stabilize situations that can become threats to our national security. We strongly believe that funding for humanitarian food assistance should be used for its intended purpose: to provide lifesaving emergency and development assistance to the most vulnerable.  Evidence shows that ACP restrictions on U.S. food aid are inefficient and costly, and result in considerable reductions in the volume of food aid provided to populations in need.

Given the current number of global food security emergencies, it is more important than ever that U.S. food aid use taxpayer money responsibly by reaching as many people as possible. We urge Congress to reduce the burden of ACP on humanitarian food aid, and reject any efforts to increase agriculture cargo preference (ACP) requirements on U.S. food aid.

Sincerely,

Action Against Hunger
American Jewish World Service
Bread for the World
CARE USA
Catholic Relief Services
ChildFund International
Church World Service
Concern Worldwide US
Evangelical Lutheran Church in America
Feed the Children
Global Poverty Project
Interaction
Mercy Corps
Modernizing Foreign Assistance Network (MFAN)
ONE
Oxfam America
Save the Children
The Borgen Project
The Hunger Project
World Food Program USA

As 2015 comes to a close and we head into the final year of the Obama Administration, we want to take some time to reflect on all that we as a network have accomplished these last twelve months to move the needle on U.S. aid reform. With your energy and support, we continued to push on our pillar issues of accountability and country ownership and the policy priorities we laid out in these areas in our paper, The Way Forward: A Reform Agenda for 2014 and Beyond.

MFAN’s Continued Work to Strengthen Accountability & Country Ownership

MFAN hit the ground running in 2015 on accountability and country ownership. MFAN partner Save the Children released a new report early in the year tracking USAID’s Local Solutions initiative in six countries. MFAN and Brookings hosted an event to highlight the findings of a new policy paper from the MCC, Principles into Practice: Transparency. Continuing on the transparency and data use track, MFAN in partnership with AidData, the State Department, and USAID hosted Do More With Data: Moving U.S. Government Aid Transparency Forward, an event that brought together internal and external drivers of USG foreign aid transparency to explore ongoing and new efforts to make data more accessible.

This year we welcomed Dr. Patricia Morris to the MFAN Executive Committee. Pat took over as the new President of Women Thrive Worldwide, a longtime MFAN partner, in January. We also welcomed a new staff member in 2015, as Stephanie Cappa joined the MFAN hub as our Senior Government Relations Manager.

Heading into the Spring, MFAN and Devex launched Reform for Results, an online series to engage the broader development community on progress made and emerging opportunities on MFAN’s policy priorities from The Way Forward. The series featured a video interview with U.S. Global AIDS Coordinator Ambassador Deborah Birx, OpEds from MFAN Co-Chairs George Ingram, Carolyn Miles, and Connie Veillette, Honorary Co-Chair Senator Richard Lugar (Ret.), and Executive Committee members Ben Leo, Tom Hart, and Tessie San Martin.

MFAN’s Country Ownership Working Group released a policy brief outlining recommendations for how to better measure country ownership, which, for example, can be applied to USAID’s Local Solutions initiative. The paper was met with enthusiasm by USAID, as they are currently working on developing and integrating new metrics into their ownership work. The Country Ownership Working Group also welcomed Save the Children’s Nora O’Connell and Oxfam’s Greg Adams as its new co-chairs in 2015, following on the great leadership of Tessie San Martin of Plan and Rodney Bent.

In July, MFAN launched its new ACCOUNTdown to 2017 campaign to track progress made toward strengthening the accountability and country ownership of U.S. foreign aid. The campaign will take stock of where Congress and the Administration are in meeting their reform commitments and outline further steps that can be made before the end of the 114th Congress and the Obama Administration. Also in July, coinciding with the Financing for Development Conference in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, MFAN released its Principles of Public Sector Domestic Resources Mobilization, outlining how the U.S. government can effectively help partner countries mobilize domestic resources for development.

As part of our continuing work to highlight MFAN’s policy priorities and engage with the Obama Administration, the Co-Chairs sent letters to OMB Director Shaun Donovan, outlining our priorities and how the Administration can make progress on them in its final year, and MCC CEO Dana Hyde, outlining our recommendations for the MCC’s forthcoming five-year strategic plan. In addition, MFAN Honorary Co-Chair The Honorable Jim Kolbe testified before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on the value of the MCC.

The Obama Administration’s Second-to-last Year

Early in the year, President Obama demonstrated his enduring commitment to development and effective foreign assistance in his State of the Union address and, following shortly after, his FY16 budget request. In the State of the Union address, the President called for a “more effective global effort” to combat development challenges like the Ebola crisis. The budget request included a number of provisions to help advance reform, including additional flexibility for food aid, a funding boost for the MCC, and an increase in USAID’s Operating Expenses budget.

Also early this year, USAID Administrator Raj Shah stepped down from his post after leading the agency for five productive years. Administrator Shah was a long-time champion for effective development, spearheading efforts such as USAID Forward, the Local Solutions initiative, and the establishment of USAID’s evaluation policy. In April, we released an MFAN-led community sign-on letter calling for a new USAID Administrator. Just two weeks later the announcement was made that MFAN co-founder Gayle Smith was nominated.  As the community anxiously awaited Gayle’s confirmation, MFAN organized another community sign-on letter in June to urge the Senate to confirm her as USAID Administrator.

At the end of April, the much anticipated second Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review was released. We were pleased to see the document focus on transparent and accountable governance and the better use and analysis of data, and the emphasis on building internal capacity at State and USAID in the area of monitoring and evaluation. We look forward to continuing to work with the State Department on the implementation of this QDDR in the New Year.

This fall marked the much-anticipated launch of the Sustainable Development Goals at the annual meeting of the United Nations General Assembly. President Obama strongly endorsed the ambitious in his address during UNGA.

Foreign Aid Reform on Capitol Hill

The year was also an active time in the fight to make U.S. foreign assistance more effective in Congress. This spring the Senate Foreign Relations Committee held a landmark hearing on food aid reform, convened by SFRC Chairman Bob Corker (R-TN) and Ranking Member Ben Cardin (D-MD).  The hearing was an opportunity to highlight the importance of legislative efforts like the Food for Peace Reform Act, introduced by Senate champions Bob Corker and Chris Coons (D-DE) earlier in the year, and to make the case for why the current systems to needs to be improved in order to deliver more for hungry people around the world. To capitalize on the moment, MFAN, as part of a broad coalition of international development organizations, signed on to a statement of support for food aid reform.

In October, the Foreign Aid Transparency and Accountability Act of 2015 was introduced in the House by Reps. Ted Poe (R-TX) and Gerry Connolly (D-VA), and in the Senate by Sens. Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Ben Cardin (D-MD). Just a few weeks after introduction, the House Foreign Affairs Committee and Senate Foreign Relations Committee took up and approved the bills. MFAN and InterAction also organized a community sign-on letter in support of the bill and the MFAN Co-Chairs sent a letter to Secretary Kerry urging his support, recognizing that the State Department has been a hurdle to getting the bill passed in previous congresses.

Meanwhile, the Senate confirmed Gayle Smith as the new USAID Administrator in November, seven months after being nominated. MFAN and our partners were pleased that the Senate finally took action to fill this important position.

Onward to 2016

We are rounding out 2015 on a high note, as the House of Representatives recently unanimously passed the Foreign Aid Transparency and Accountability Act. In the New Year, we hope to see the Senate take similar action so that we can see this legislation enacted. We look forward to a busy 2016 as MFAN and our partners continue to push Congress and the Administration to prioritize accountability and country ownership to make U.S. foreign assistance more effective and sustainable. Early next year we will be holding our next public check-in on our ACCOUNTdown to 2017 campaign and will continue to update our ACCOUNTdown Dialogue Series, so stay tuned!

Broad Coalition Calls on U.S. Senate to Confirm Gayle Smith as USAID Administrator June 15, 2015 (WASHINGTON) – This statement is delivered on behalf of the Modernizing Foreign Assistance Network by Co-Chairs George Ingram, Carolyn Miles, and Connie Veillette: MFAN, along with a broad coalition of international development organizations, policy experts, and the private sector, … Continue reading Broad Coalition Calls on U.S. Senate to Confirm Gayle Smith as USAID Administrator

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