Devex Newswire: The nonprofit 'regranting' to Gates

Today, Open Philanthropy announced the first winners of its experiment to fund other nonprofits directly, in the name of reducing duplication. Also in today’s edition: A once-every-five-year battle over United States food aid, and how to help Afghanistan’s women and girls. Giving TO Gates Open Philanthropy, founded by billionaire couple Dustin Moskovitz and Cari Tuna, is trying something new. Normally the grant-making and research organization gives directly to charities. But last year it launched a $150 million “regranting” challenge to fund existing philanthropic programs in order to avoid duplicating their work. More than 100 funders applied and the four winners were announced today: $70 million for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to work on vaccines and education; $45 million to the U.S. Agency for International Development’s Development Innovation Ventures; $25 million for the Eleanor Crook Foundation’s nutrition work; and $10 million to the Singapore-based Tara Climate Foundation, which focuses on Asia’s clean energy transition. “One way of achieving scale is to go in with others, collaborate, pool your funds in order to be able to give an organization a larger grant over multiple years than what you might do if you were each individually making grants,” Cecilia Conrad, who advised Open Philanthropy on the design of the contest, tells my colleague Stephanie Beasley. An Open Philanthropy spokesperson says that the organization is still deciding whether to make the challenge an annual event. Read: Gates, USAID among Open Philanthropy's $150M regrant contest winners Devex @ Davos The World Economic Forum’s 53rd annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland, kicks off next week and I will be on the ground along with our Editor-in-Chief Raj Kumar. In addition to reporting what development themes are unfolding and moderating a few sessions inside the Davos Congress Center, we will be hosting a number of events on the sidelines of this frenetic week. On Tuesday we’ll be hosting a roundtable discussion with Microsoft on the critical importance of supporting progress in low- to middle-income countries, and the need to advance solutions to global development challenges such as food insecurity and disaster preparedness, and later in the day we’re hosting an event with Verizon and the EDISON Alliance on improving lives through affordable and accessible digital solutions across education, health, and finance by 2025. And later in the week on Thursday, we’ll host our annual humanitarian & development gathering with Circle. If you’re interested in attending any of the events please email admin@devex.com (or if you know someone who is attending please feel free to forward them this newsletter!) ICYMI: From the editor-in-chief — 3 ways 2023 may define a new development era + Post-Davos, Devex Pro members are invited to join our panel of experts as they discuss the key development finance trends to watch in 2023. Not yet a Pro member? Start your 15-day free trial now. Food fight It’s a farm bill year in Washington D.C., and that means plenty of anxious aid watchers on Capitol Hill. The legislation, which must be approved every five years, governs the U.S. international food assistance programs, support for U.S. farmers, and domestic food assistance programs. My colleague Teresa Welsh has a timely piece on what to watch as negotiations head to the Sept. 30 deadline — or perhaps beyond. • Will the Bill Emerson Humanitarian Trust — an emergency pot of money entirely drawn down last year as the Russian invasion of Ukraine sent food prices soaring — be adequately replenished? • Can the McGovern-Dole school meals program be tweaked to help farmers grow fresh produce, which can then be supplied to schools? • And what’s the overall funding level? Last but not least, the closely related “cargo preference” requirement that 50% of Title II food aid, distributed under USAID's Food for Peace program, be carried on U.S.-flagged vessels, is unlikely to be overturned this year, Teresa reports. NGOs have been arguing for years that cash or local procurement can be more cost effective, but Bill O’Keefe from Catholic Relief Services says “we may not get to nirvana” this year. Read: Uncertainty ahead for US food aid as farm bill negotiations begin E-learning in Afghanistan With Afghanistan now the only country in the world that bans girls from going to school and universities, aid agencies are grappling with how to help women and girls avoid lifelong poverty. In their op-ed this week for Devex, Asim I. Khwaja and Fatema Z. Sumar from the Center for International Development at Harvard University write that the answer lies partly in e-learning. “While women in South Asia often lack mobility and face restrictions in leaving their homes, there is surprisingly more ‘virtual’ mobility for women,” the pair write. “With increasing numbers of mobile connections, as well as rising access to internet and smartphones, South Asian women have digital access to the outside world even while they still face a gender digital divide. For now, societal norms have not been as restrictive in these virtual spaces.” Opinion: E-learning can prevent another lost generation in Afghanistan Uganda ends Ebola outbreak Good news from Uganda, which declared the end of its Ebola outbreak on Wednesday. The outbreak lasted nearly four months and killed at least 55 people, including cases in the capital city of Kampala, my colleague Sara Jerving tells me. A country can declare the end to an outbreak after 42 days with no new cases — which is twice the incubation period of the disease. The outbreak was declared last September for the rare Sudan strain of the virus, which has no approved vaccine, therapeutics, or rapid test. Following the declaration, three vaccine candidates were deployed to the country to undergo trials against the strain. The virus can remain in survivors for years, causing subsequent outbreaks, meaning the impacted areas will need continual monitoring. “With no vaccines and therapeutics, this was one of the most challenging Ebola outbreaks in the past five years," wrote Dr. Matshidiso Moeti, World Health Organization regional director for Africa, in a press release. In other news China has yet to address Africa's new call for a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council, as the country's new foreign minister begins a weeklong trip to Africa. [Al Jazeera] Brazil's President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva announced an official bid for the northeastern city of Belem to host the 30th U.N. Climate Change Conference in 2025. [Reuters] Years of continuous drought in Tunisia have caused its reservoirs to dry up, threatening the country's vital water and food supplies. [Reuters] Sign up to Newswire for an inside look at the biggest stories in global development.