Photographer Morgana Wingard reports on a USAID-funded water project in Afadjtator, Ghana.
When I wake up, I groggily roll out of bed, and half-asleep, I jump into a hot shower. Then, I fill up my water bottle with cold water from the tap, brush my teeth with water from the faucet, and wash my hands. These simple amenities that we take for granted are truly luxuries. Because in Africa, 70 to 80 percent of disease is related to water. Most people don’t have a faucet with running water, or even clean water nearby that they can drink or brush their teeth with.
We visited a joint project with USAID and Rotary International that provides clean water to thousands of people in Afadjtator, Ghana. As we arrived, the townsfolk swarmed us with welcoming cheers. Though we didn’t build the wells they are benefiting from, our tax dollars did. The United States is contributing approximately $13.4 million to improve water and sanitation in Ghana over the next four years. And thanks to this join project in Afadjtator, 86,000 more people will be able to wake up in the morning and get a glass of clean water.
Captions, from top to bottom and right to left: New well build through the joint water and sanitation project with USAID and Rotary International; Woman from the community carrying water from the well back to her house; Ed Goeas walks with children from the community; Jen Pihlaja walks with children from the community; Women filling up at the new water pump; Sheila Nix, ONE’s US Executive Director cuts the ribbon with local chiefs for the newest water pump in the community; Laurie Moskowitz, ONE’s Senior Director of US campaigns, laughs with local community members.
Last week, the Brookings Institution hosted an event on US Aid and Transparency for Global Development. Administrator Rajiv Shah of the US Agency for International Development (USAID) gave a speech focused on the ways that USAID is fulfilling a government-wide commitment to increase transparency and accountability, both in relation to aid and to development more widely. Administrator Shah’s message was that we should keep pushing relentlessly, for it is only through a “more transparent, honest, and clear system” that citizens will understand the results we can achieve in development.
After the event, I had the opportunity to interview USAID’s Deputy Assistant Administrator for Policy, Planning, and Learning Tony Pipa on USAID’s transparency strategy and the work ahead:
Why does transparency and accountability matter for development?
First, it allows partner countries to better manage their aid flows, and also helps empower their citizens to hold their governments as well as donor governments to account. From our standpoint, it provides a better understanding of what we’re doing, where we’re doing it, how we’re doing it, and to what effect. And then there’s the international accountability component. It sheds light on commitments and progress that both the US and other donor countries and organizations make. Transparency that empowers citizens to hold their governments to account forces us to be more effective and to be better cooperators and coordinators, to engage in development cooperation that lowers our own transaction costs by making sure we’re as focused as possible, and -– as the Administrator was saying –- be relentless.
This piece by Gregory Adams was originally published on Oxfam America’s Politics of Poverty blog.
Most people probably weren’t paying attention to the Washington Post business page on Dec 25. (Myself, I was trying to corral two toddlers and navigate a sea of Legos and torn paper). But for people in poor countries who are trying to lead their societies out of poverty, Christmas day brought good news: USAID is changing the way it works to get closer to the people it’s trying to help.
Dy Yong keeps the books for the rice Bank Committee so that everybody can see how it run and maintained at the Rice cooperative in Takom village, Battambang. The rice store committee has many members and they introduce villagers to the principles of trading rice to give them security at a much reduced rate than the market offers. Photo by Jim Holmes/Oxfam.
Check out this great new slideshow from USAID reviewing the eleven biggest global health events of last year. It’s a very nice overview of some of the huge strides and achievements made in global health during 2011.
USAID’s Dr. Raj Shah gave us an update on the latest surrounding the famine in the Horn of Africa while ONE’s CEO Michael Elliott briefed our national network of faith leaders on ONE’s comprehensive hunger and agriculture campaigns. More than 13 million of our sisters and brothers in east Africa are vulnerable to hunger and lack of access to clean water at this time –- and there is something we can do about it!
During the fall season, and especially around Thanksgiving, it’s critical that we do all we can to fight the famine and secure a future where there is hunger no more. Get your local faith community involved and sign up for ONE Sabbath.
Fifty years ago today, in 1961, John F. Kennedy established the US Agency for International Development to unify US foreign assistance efforts and focus on long term development solutions. Today, we can look back and celebrate all that USAID has accomplished over the years and consider the future of foreign assistance.
Inspired by a recent meeting with USAID’s Raj Shah, Dr. Jill Biden and National Security Council Senior Director Gayle Smith, ONE MomAmy Graff shares why Americans should feel good about supporting foreign aid.
Elisa Morgan dances with a group of Village Reporters in Lwak, Kenya. Photo credit: Morgana Wingard
A family living in a mud hut at the end of a dusty trail in east Africa has less than you would ever imagine. No television. No toys. No running water. Certainly not a refrigerator filled with fresh food. Mom probably sleeps on a small rickety cot with a pile of brothers and sisters. Dad sleeps on the ground.
Right now, some of the world's biggest oil companies are fighting to keep some of their deals with foreign governments secret. Let's tell big oil we won't be bullied.
Cuts to poverty-fighting programs won't balance the budget, but they will set back progress on Canada's development priorities and risk jeopardizing existing investments.
2011 marks 30 years since the first cases of AIDS were documented. Take a closer look at the specific, achievable goals we must hit by 2015 to make this year the beginning of the end of AIDS.
