Briefs
FrontLines - May 2010
USAID to
Increase African
Programs
NAIROBI, Kenya— Administrator
Rajiv Shah said on
his first trip to Africa as
USAID chief that he plans
to increase funding and staff
for programs in Africa to
help the continent reduce
poverty, disease, and illiteracy,
the Associated Press
reported May 15.
Shah spoke during a sixday
trip to Africa that
included Sudan.
USAID has offices in 23
African countries. The
Agency funds and runs programs
to improve health,
food security, democracy,
and entrepreneurship in
Africa.
Niger Seeks to
Feed 1.5 Million
NIAMEY, Niger— Niger’s
transitional government
announced May 17 the
launch of a food distribution
operation for nearly 1.5 million
people facing severe
shortages, Agence France-
Presse reported.
“This distribution of supplies
complements other
operations which are
already under way and
involves coming to the aid
of a population estimated to
be a little under 1.5 million
people,” said spokesman
Mahamadou Dan Dah.
According to the United
Nations, around 7.8 million
Nigeriens—more than half
the population—are in need
of food, out of the approximately
10 million affected by
the crisis in the Sahel region.
The search for food has
sent thousands flocking into
Maradi, the main city in
south-central Niger.
American
Donations to
Haiti Reach $1.3B
Four months after the
Haiti earthquake, Americans
have donated $1.3 billion
for disaster relief there,
according to the Center on
Philanthropy at Indiana
University.
The Haiti donations are almost
equal to the $1.5 billion given
after the Asian tsunami in 2004,
USA TODAY reported May 13.
About half the Haiti donations
were raised by the American
Red Cross, which collected
$444 million, and Catholic
Relief Services, which raised
$136 million, according to The
Chronicle of Philanthropy.
Members of a coalition of aid
organizations called InterAction,
which include the American
Red Cross, Catholic Relief
Services, World Vision, the U.S.
Fund for UNICEF, and Save the
Children, have planned to split
their funds almost equally
between immediate relief and
long-term reconstruction in
Haiti, InterAction President
Sam Worthington said.
“We have the largest humanitarian
disaster in an urban setting
since World War II. It is tapping
the limits of our capacity to
respond,” Worthington said.
Infections Cause
Two-thirds of Child
Deaths Each Year
More than two-thirds of the
estimated 8.8 million deaths in
children under 5 worldwide in
2008 were caused by infectious
diseases like pneumonia, diarrhea,
and malaria, according to
a study on behalf of the World
Health Organization and UNICEF,
Reuters reported May 12.
High-income countries
account for only around 1 percent
of the under-5 deaths. Almost
half of such deaths occurred in
five countries—India, Nigeria,
Democratic Republic of Congo,
Pakistan, and China.
Long Winter Leaves
Mongolians in Need
GENEVA—The United Nations
says nearly 800,000 people in
Mongolia need humanitarian
aid to recover from a long and
heavy winter, the AP reported
May 12.
At least 7.5 million animals—
over 17 percent of Mongolia’s
total livestock—died this
winter so far.
The U.N. said Wednesday
that animals are still dying as
heavy snowfall and cold temperatures
continue. Malnutrition
has also increased and
deaths of children under 5 have
jumped by 35 percent since January
in the affected regions.
New British Aid
Chief Halts Projects
in Homeland
LONDON—The new British
government has cut back aid
spending on projects inside
Great Britain to focus funds on
fighting poverty in needy countries
overseas, the Daily Telegraph
reported May 17.
Andrew Mitchell, the new
secretary of state for international
development, said spending
should not be spent on
“frivolous” home-grown projects.
He cancelled five programs,
saving about $700,000,
and froze all U.K.-based projects,
worth $8.4 million.
Cancelled projects include a
grant to a Brazilian-style dance
group in London; training for
outdoor education tutors and
nursery school teachers on
development and global issues;
and booths at summer pop
music festivals.
All savings will be redirected
to countries where it is
expected to have a greater
impact on global poverty. The
international aid budget has
been protected from cuts that
are expected in most other
spending departments.
Countries Slash
Health Spending
After Getting Aid
LONDON—After getting millions
of dollars to fight AIDS,
some African countries
responded by slashing their
health budgets, new research
says, according to the AP.
Although the international
community spent billions in
health aid to supplement health
budgets in poor countries over
many years, development money
prompted some governments to
spend on entirely different
things which cannot be tracked,
The Lancet reported April 16.
International health aid
jumped from about $8 billion in
1995 to almost $19 billion in
2006, with the United States
being the biggest donor.
Most countries in Latin
America, Asia, and the Middle
East doubled their health
budgets. But many in
Africa—including those with
the worst AIDS outbreaks—
trimmed their health spending
instead.
In The Lancet study, for
every dollar received from
donors, poor countries transferred
up to $1.14 originally
slated for their health budgets
elsewhere. The research was
paid for by the Bill &
Melinda Gates Foundation.
“We don’t know what
countries are doing with their
own money once the donor
money comes in,” said Christopher
Murray, director of the
Institute for Health Metrics
and Evaluation at the University
of Washington and one of
the paper’s authors.
Murray’s paper also found
debt relief had no effect on
health spending.
Afghan Arrested in
Scheme to Defraud
USAID
KABUL—An Afghan citizen
working on a project funded
by USAID was arrested by
Afghan authorities in May
and charged with embezzling
nearly $193,000 while working
as a finance coordinator
on a $229 million local governance
program.
Ahman Samim Sediqi
was responsible for depositing
monthly tax payments from the
Agency’s implementing partner
to Afghanistan’s Ministry
of Finance into a local bank
account. When the ministry
reported that it had not received
the payments, an investigation
was initiated. Local law
enforcement officials, aided
by investigators from USAID’s
Office of the Inspector General,
discovered that the bank deposit
slips Sediqi had submitted to
the partner as proof of payment
were not legitimate.
Sediqi remains in jail in
Kabul awaiting trial.
From news reports and other
sources
★
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