INSIDE DEVELOPMENT
In this section:
Iraq Mission Director Dawn Liberi Tells Foreign
Press about $5.1 Billion in U.S. Aid
Natsios and Kolbe Discuss the Future of U.S.
Foreign Assistance
Agency Scores A+ on Computer Security, Tops
Government
Liberia’s Sirleaf, First Woman President
in Africa, Addresses U.S. Congress
Liberia Vice President Boakai
Indonesian Children to Get Sesame Street in 2007
Malawi Muslims Start Business School after U.S.
Iman Visits
Iraq Mission Director Dawn Liberi Tells Foreign Press about
$5.1 Billion in U.S. Aid
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Workers lay cable as part of the expansion of a water
treatment plant in Sharq-Dijla, Iraq. The work was completed
in May 2005, increasing the city’s supply of potable
water by about 50 million gallons per day. 16.
Tom Hartwell, USAID
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The $5.1 billion in American aid programs in Iraq carried
out by USAID are helping to defeat the insurgency, helping
the government of Iraq to build a unified government effective
at the local and national level, and helping Iraqis to expand
their economic base, said Mission Director Dawn Liberi recently.
“Iraq relies on oil for the majority of its revenue
but that doesn’t produce a lot of jobs, so we’re
focused on helping expand the non-oil economy and build a
market economy base,” Liberi told reporters Feb. 24,
at the Foreign Press Center in Washington.
Of $21 billion in U.S. aid to Iraq, USAID has been responsible
for $5.1 billion spent on 12,000 projects in all 18 provinces,
she said. About half of the projects provided essential services
and improved infrastructure; the other half promoted development:
health, education, humanitarian assistance, and agriculture.
Vaccinations of children under age 5 cut measles and other
diseases, and kept the country polio free. U.S. assistance
also helped restore over 1,000 megawatts of power.
“We’ve also been involved in helping to restore
water supply to several million people, as well as helping
to focus on water and sewage,” she said.
The Agency helped establish the Electoral Commission in
Iraq, which ran three elections during the past year. It trained
15,000 domestic monitors and poll agents, and helped publicize
the constitution. This helped voting turnout rise from 7 to
12 million, Liberi said.
Aid programs also support civil society and the Iraq independent
media and news agency. Civil society is seen as key to helping
the Iraqi government overcome many ethnic and sectarian issues.
“We work through about 1,300 local Iraqi nongovernmental
organizations and civil society organizations and the majority
of our programs are carried out by Iraqis,” Liberi said.
On the economic side, USAID helped the Iraqi government
establish an investment promotion agency and revitalize the
business registry, which allows firms to get more information
on credit, marketing, and internet access and to understand
world pricing. Over 30,000 Iraqi businesses were registered
in the past six months.
To improve literacy, USAID is helping the Ministry of Education
train more than 100,000 teachers, publish more than 8 million
new textbooks, and enroll more than 14,000 students in an
accelerated learning program.
The Agency provides assistance to persons suddenly displaced
by conflict or natural disaster. More than 300,000 Iraqis
have benefited from such assistance. And to support effective
government, the Agency is providing training for many provincial
council members and ministerial level officials.
Since “Iraq was actually one of the breadbaskets of
the Middle East,” she said, USAID is helping to increase
production of dates and to reclaim productive marshland areas
that had been drained by Saddam Hussein.
“We’ve helped to increase wheat production. On
test plots in three governorates, we’ve demonstrated
a 40 percent average increase in wheat yield using a cost-effective
technical package. In 2004 to 2005, national wheat production
increased by six percent,” she said.
Natsios and Kolbe Discuss the Future of U.S. Foreign Assistance
Former USAID Administrator Andrew S. Natsios told a public
meeting recently that changes to the structure of the U.S.
foreign aid agency and a shift of U.S. diplomats from Europe
to the developing countries, will be “far more important
than they appear to be.”
“The Third World was clearly part of the Cold War,
but it was a secondary level of interest—it was not at
the center of our vital national interests,” Natsios
told the Council on Foreign Relations on Feb. 28 in Washington.
“What the secretary [of state Condoleezza Rice] essentially
announced a few weeks ago was that the locus of American vital
national interests has profoundly shifted away from Europe.”
Speaking alongside Rep. Jim Kolbe, R-Ariz., chairman of
the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Foreign Operations,
Natsios said: “If, in fact, the locus of our vital national
interest is shifting geographically, it’s also shifting
institutionally away from the nation-state.”
Natsios, who is now a distinguished professor in the practice
of diplomacy and an adviser on international development at
the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown
University, said that “real” threats to the United
States are “the criminal drug cartels, which are tied
in with terrorist networks, which are tied in with international
illegal arms markets, which are tied in to money-laundering
rings and human trafficking rings.”
He called this “the darker side of globalization.”
Natsios also noted that major development success came in
countries on the border of the former Soviet bloc. He said
that the threat of domination by former or current communist
powers such as Russia and China was so great it forced their
smaller, newly independent neighbors to institute reforms
that made development successful.
In addition, since the United States believed its interests
were affected by what happened in those former socialist regions,
it offered not just foreign aid but diplomatic and even military
support as well.
Kolbe told the meeting that the shift in U.S. diplomacy
toward the developing world announced by Rice was “long
overdue.”
“But I think some of the other things that are suggested
in there—the moving around of accounts and so forth,
I’m not too sure how much of that is going to really
have a great impact.”
“There’s no question that our foreign assistance
programs are highly fractured and divergent and, in some ways,
not very coherent… we have them in USAID, but we have
a lot of it in the State Department, and increasingly we see
pieces of it over here in Defense. We have the Centers for
Disease Control under HHS that has a little piece of this.
“And so you have pieces of foreign assistance that
are everywhere now in the government, and there isn’t
a very coherent direction to it. And I think that’s the
important thing about having a [deputy] secretary of state
that can provide some overall guidance for that.”
Kolbe noted concern that U.S. foreign assistance might be
shifted “away from the kind of long-term thinking of
development assistance and poverty reduction that is supposed
to be the mission of USAID.”
He said that instead, American foreign aid could be shifted
into what he called “State Department thinking—what
is in the national interest right now, what is it that our
security interests are concerned about.”
The Arizona Republican said the Bush administration had
boosted foreign aid through its $15 billion AIDS program and
the $5 billion per year Millennium Challenge Corporation plan.
“And both of those have been outside of the structure
of USAID,” he said.
He also asked how Congress can “maintain support in
the country” for a growing foreign aid budget, noting
that “development assistance and child assistance programs
have doubled in the last six years.”
Kolbe said, development assistance needs to be “sustainable
itself,” and he called for working “outside the
traditional box…of little programs that we have done
through USAID that have been spent in different countries
and have had only marginal impact in the long-term.”
“In the end we have to talk about opening markets—we
have to talk about allowing these countries to have access
to our markets,” he concluded.
Agency Scores A+ on Computer Security, Tops Government
USAID received an A+ grade on an annual survey of federal
agencies’ computer security, coming in with the only
perfect score of 100 among the 24 agencies surveyed in 2005.
The Computer Security Report Card, released March 16 by
the House Government Reform Committee, had an average grade
of D+. This was the same as last year. Aside from USAID, other
agencies winning A+ were the Department of Labor, Social Security
Administration, Office of Personnel Management, and Environmental
Protection Agency. It was the same grade the Agency received
in 2004—though the numerical score that year was 99.
John Streufert, acting chief information officer for the
Agency, said: “For the second year in a row, USAID led
the federal government in IT security in FY 2005. In FY 2004,
USAID was the first and only Agency to have achieved an A+;
in FY 2005, USAID was the first and only organization scoring
a perfect 100 of 100 points.
“We couldn’t be more pleased with the extraordinary
Agency teamwork among missions and bureaus that this grade
recognizes,” he added.
The annual report card is the result of the Federal Information
Security Management Act of 2002, which aims to ensure that
government computer systems are secure. The act requires agency
chief information officers and inspectors general to compile
information and report to the House committee each year.
The overall grade average was pulled down by the more than
one dozen agencies that received low Ds and Fs. Among those
getting Fs were the departments of Energy, Veterans Affairs,
Health and Human Services, Interior, Defense, State, Homeland
Security, and Agriculture.
Liberia’s Sirleaf, First Woman President in Africa,
Addresses U.S. Congress
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Liberia President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf attended a
social function at the White House with President George
W. Bush during a visit to the United States in March.
Sirleaf also addressed a joint session of Congress,
telling the members of Liberia’s citizens: “Our
dream has the size of freedom.”
Eric Draper, White House
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Liberia’s Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, the first elected
woman president of any African nation, visited the United
States in March to address a joint session of the U.S. Congress
and for a series of meetings with international development
organizations. President Bush also hosted Sirleaf at a White
House reception.
“It was the leadership of the 108th Congress, more
than two years ago, that paved the way for a United Nations
force that secured our peace and guaranteed free and fair
elections,” she told Congress March 17.
“It was your $445 million addition to a supplemental
appropriations bill that attracted additional commitments
from international donors. With those funds, we have laid
the foundation for a durable peace, not only in Liberia, but
in the whole West African sub-region.”
Liberia was founded in 1820 by a small group of former slaves
from the United States. After those founders, thousands of
freed slaves followed and established settlements.
“Our special relationship with the United States brought
us benefits long before the autumn of 2003,” she said.
“Thousands of our people, including myself, have been
educated in American missionary schools and gone on to higher
training in this country,” she said. “But most of
our people have not been as fortunate as I was.
“Always poor and underdeveloped, Liberia is only now
emerging from two decades of turmoil that destroyed everything
we managed to build in a century and a half of independence.”
From 1989 to the signing of the Accra Comprehensive Peace
Agreement (CPA) in August 2003, over 250,000 of the country’s
3 million people died and another million were driven from
their homes, including hundreds of thousands who fled the
country. Rape and other forms of sexual violence against women
and girls were pervasive.
Over 80 percent of Liberia’s population is illiterate
and lives below the poverty line. The unemployment rate exceeds
70 percent.
During former President Charles Taylor’s final years
in power, USAID focused on health, agriculture, and peace-building.
As the fighting entered Monrovia in 2003, U.S. and European
relief activities kept many alive.
By 2004, the United Nations Mission in Liberia (UNMIL) deployed
the world’s largest UN peacekeeping force of 15,000 troops
and 1,000 police.
Of the $200 million in U.S. aid for Liberia’s reconstruction
voted by Congress, USAID distributed $108 million; the State
Department provided $39 million; Defense provided $35 million;
and Treasury spent $18.5 million.
In support of elections, USAID trained civil society organizations
to educate voters and observe the voting; supported Liberia’s
National Elections Commission; strengthened political parties;
and helped provide nation-wide coverage of the election process.
Liberia Vice President Boakai
Liberia Vice President Joseph Boakai received help from
USAID on his journey from one of six boys born to illiterate
parents to the second-highest position in his country. After
attending primary and high school in Sierra Leone and Liberia
with support from his extended family, Boakai graduated from
the College of West Africa in 1972 with a bachelor’s
degree in business administration. He then received a USAID
fellowship to help continue his education, traveling to the
United States and graduating from Kansas State University
in 1976.
Boakai went on to jobs in both the public and private sector.
He worked for the Liberia Produce Marketing Corporation in
the 1970s, then served as Liberia’s minister of agriculture
from 1983 to 1985. He later worked as a consultant to the
World Bank in Washington and also founded a firm dealing in
agricultural equipment and consultancy. He has served as board
chairman of the Liberia Wood Management Corporation and of
the Liberia Petroleum Refining Company.
Boakai personally financed and constructed a 6.9-mile road
project connecting Foya Kama and Warsonga Village in Lofa
County, where he was born. He also influenced the establishment
of the Liberia Opportunity Industrialization Center there.
Indonesian Children to Get Sesame Street in 2007
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Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice talks with students
at the MakMuriyah madrassah in Jakarta, where she also
announced that USAID will help bring Sesame Street to
schools in Indonesia. The school is part of President
Bush’s Education Initiative for Indonesia. To her
right are Ambassador B. Lynn Pascoe and USAID/Indonesia
Mission Director William M. Frej.
Yulianty Susilo, USAID/Indonesia
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Jakarta, Indonesia—Secretary of State Condoleezza
Rice announced an $8.5 million partnership between USAID,
the Sesame Workshop, and Indonesia to create a new Indonesian
version of the popular children’s television program
Sesame Street during a March 14 visit here.
Speaking to students, teachers, and parents at the MakMuriyah
madrassah during a March 14 visit, Rice said the Indonesian
version of Sesame Street will help build a foundation for
successful life-long learning for that country’s children,
as it has for children around the world. Rice was in the country
on the second leg of a three-nation trip, which also included
stops in Chile and Australia.
Indonesia’s Sesame Street, to debut in 2007, will feature
Indonesian Muppet characters, educational content reflecting
Indonesia’s values and cultural diversity, locally produced
live action and animated films, and classic Sesame Street
segments that have entertained children around the world for
decades.
Indonesia, the world’s largest Muslim-majority country,
has a strong tradition in puppetry, which officials believe
will provide an excellent platform for Sesame Street’s
approach. The television programs will address a major challenge
in the Indonesian education sector since only a small number
of children have access to early childhood education.
The USAID-Sesame Workshop partner-ship for Indonesia is
part of USAID/Indonesia’s broader $157 million education
initiative, which is now working in 1,000 public and private
schools to improve the quality of basic education. The program
is expected to reach 9,000 schools by 2010.
USAID/Indonesia’s Decentralized Basic Education (DBE)
program is introducing more participatory teaching and learning
techniques to increase student performance in math, science,
and reading; assisting local governments to more effectively
manage and deliver education services; and helping youth to
obtain relevant work and life skills to better compete for
jobs in the future. The mission has expanded the education
initiative to meet long-term education needs in post-tsunami
Aceh as well.
USAID Mission Director William M. Frej, said: “By improving
school readiness in basic literacy and numeracy, the Indonesian
Sesame Street program will help millions of Indonesia’s
children develop the skills they need to have a successful
school experience.”
The Indonesian version of Sesame Street is the latest in
a line of collaborations between USAID and the Sesame Workshop
to design and produce Sesame Street programs that appeal to
children in other countries, including Egypt, South Africa,
India, and Bangladesh.
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First Lady Laura Bush, left, and actress Nafisa Ali
pose with the cast of Galli Galli Sim Sim, India’s
version of Sesame Street.
Sanjay Gupta, Turner
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Malawi Muslims Start Business School after U.S. Iman Visits
By Jim Fisher-Thompson
Washington File Staff Writer
WASHINGTON—The visit to Malawi of a prominent
American imam has had lasting effects on the educational infrastructure
of the developing southern African nation.
Following a series of sermons delivered by Imam Darryl Wainwright
emphasizing self-reliance, Malawi’s Muslim community
decided to establish a business school at a mosque, using
volunteer teachers. Wainwright toured the nation as part of
the State Department’s worldwide outreach program to
Muslims.
Muslim outreach has been an important task as well for USAID.
Starting in 2003, for example, the Agency established the
Islam Working Group to provide advice and guidance to development
experts working in Muslim communities in Europe and Central
Asia. USAID currently is operating programs aimed at building
democracy and civil societies in 10 predominantly Muslim countries
in Eastern Europe and Central Asia.
The self-help project in Malawi was inspired by the American
imam’s preaching after Juma’ah prayers at a mosque
in the capital in October 2005, according to a document provided
by the U.S. Embassy in Malawi’s capital, Lilongwe.
The imam gave “an inspirational message that focused
on the importance of education, hard work, and self-reliance
for Muslims,” the embassy reported. When the congregation
then asked him for money to start a school, Wainwright “encouraged
them to look first to their own resources rather than waiting
for outside assistance.”
The American imam cited the example of his own mosque in
Baltimore, which started a school completely on its own, employing
volunteer teachers.
The group of young Muslim professionals in Lilongwe who
took up Wainwright’s suggestion began with one course,
business accounting, and within a month the initial class
of five students had grown to 50.
The school’s new principal, after contacting the U.S.
Embassy to thank Wainwright for his help, said he hoped the
school would help train Muslims who, in turn, could improve
the social and economic welfare of Lilongwe’s Muslim
community.
The principal said his school could serve as a model for
other mosques in Malawi, emphasizing: “We attribute all
this to Imam Wainwright’s visit.”
Washington File is a product of the Bureau of International
Information Programs, U.S. Department of State.
http://usinfo.state.gov
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