Presented by Tetra Pak
We often report on job losses in the United States precipitated by the closure of USAID. But what about the cadre of local professionals who helped their nations implement those aid programs — who also lost their livelihoods? We delve into their stories.
Also in today’s edition: We also explore how people are moving on from the collapse of USAID with creativity, patience, and perseverance.
+ Join our Devex Pro Briefing today with David Beasley and Roberto Patiño to examine how to reshape Venezuela's development trajectory. Can’t attend live? Register anyway, and we’ll send you a recording. This event is exclusively for Devex Pro members. Not a Pro member yet? Start your 15-day free trial today.
Ripple effects
Like so many cities in the global south, a professional class had sprouted in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, built around the aid ecosystem. In fact, Ethiopia was the largest recipient of USAID funding in sub-Saharan Africa in 2022 and 2023. The result: solid careers, financial stability, and social standing, writes my colleague Ayenat Mersie.
All that evaporated overnight with the stop-work order that led to the dismantling of USAID and subsequent ripple effects around the world. Thousands who had found success and purpose all of a sudden saw both jeopardized. A year later, Ayenat reports, many are still struggling.
“There are a number of people who’ve gotten jobs, but I would say around 70 to 80% are still unemployed,” says Ethiopis Tadesse, an Addis Ababa-based communications professional whose role at Palladium was terminated after the stop-work order. She has since pivoted to freelancing.
Tadesse set up a Telegram group for laid-off workers. It now has about 2,000 members and functions as both a job board and a support network. Indeed, it’s not only professional support that’s needed — it’s personal support as well.
Ayenat talked to Yonas, who lost his job with a USAID contractor and describes those first few months as “very, very disastrous.” He even considered dangerous crossings to migrate to Europe.
Yonas was eventually able to get a job, but others haven’t been as lucky. He spoke of one friend whose house was repossessed, and sometimes texts him for help with transportation fare on the rare days she has an interview downtown.
As Ayenat puts it: For many laid-off Ethiopian aid workers, the question is no longer how to move up or even sideways within humanitarian work, but whether it remains viable at all — financially, socially, or emotionally.
Read: One year after USAID’s shutdown, Ethiopian aid workers are still struggling
Portraits of pivots
It’s been a long, often arduous journey for the thousands of USAID workers who found themselves jobless last year. For some, that journey continues. For others, it’s led to unexpected places.
Brian Pedersen and his husband had for years contemplated running a bed and breakfast. But when Pedersen realized in early 2025 that he was losing his global health career of over 20 years, those plans kicked into high gear. Today, they’re running an inn in Illinois.
But echoes of his global health career have survived. “I’m hoping that [guests] feel cared for, which is the same thing we try to do in global health,” Pedersen says. “That’s how I’m sort of bridging the gap between what I used to do and what I’m doing now.”
Meanwhile, after his USAID-funded position in Accra, Ghana, ended, Munkaila Mohammed spent months in the house, watching everyone around him go to work or school while he applied to job after job unsuccessfully.
By August, he set up a consulting firm using his monitoring-and-evaluation expertise, and then landed full-time work with Medtronic LABS. But the experience left an indelible mark, and today, he’s skeptical of development work after the speed with which USAID funding was stripped from Ghana. He says countries need to create more sustainable systems that aren’t dependent on external funding and can withstand any shocks. “For me, that is the biggest lesson.”
Read: They lost their jobs in 2025. Here’s how they pivoted (Career)
+ Happening on Feb. 18: Have you been forced out of a traditional development role by the 2025 layoffs, and wonder if consulting could be your next step? Learn from experts who launched their consultancies in 2025 and discover what it really takes to succeed independently. Spots are limited, so register now. This event is exclusively for Devex Career Account members. Not a member yet? Start your 15-day free trial today.
Need to know
The development sector is certainly not on a hiring spree, but if you know where to look, opportunities are still around the corner.
One piece of advice is to think outside the box — or rather, outside the usual suspects. Many jobs are not on professionals’ radar because they come from lesser-known organizations, both within and outside the traditional development sector, writes Devex contributor Justin Sablich.
“For every well-known organization, there’s going to be nine to 10 organizations that people don’t know about,” says Dan Perez, director for North America at SRI Executive. Uncovering these organizations requires research and networking, as many don’t post on mainstream job boards as often as household names such as the Gates Foundation and the United Nations.
And certain jobs are plentiful — not surprisingly, those that can help organizations raise money in this new funding landscape.
In fact, a recent Devex job board analysis found that funding roles posted over the first nine months of 2025 rose by a whopping 149%, in stark contrast to the steep declines seen in most other development spaces.
“I think it makes a lot of sense, with so many funding structures that have changed, nonprofits that have lost funding, and organizations that are changing their funding structures as well,” says Radhika Bhatt, a climate and social impact career coach. “If your work is connected to that, or you’ve done anything in that space, I would say, play that up in your applications and see if you can explore that further in terms of job opportunities.”
Read: 3 tips for breaking through a challenging US development jobs market (Careers)
Stop the train
The U.K.’s Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office didn’t suffer the same fate as USAID, but it’s been sliced and diced as well — particularly its shredded development portfolio. Now, U.K. lawmakers have called for a pause to the sweeping reforms to FCDO, warning that rapid staffing cuts and structural changes risk undermining poverty reduction and weakening scrutiny of the country’s shrinking aid budget.
The House of Commons International Development Committee recently said reforms under the department’s FCDO 2030 program — which include staff reductions of between 15% and 25% — could lead to irreversible losses of expertise, writes Devex contributor Susannah Birkwood.
“The brutal cuts we have seen to Official Development Assistance over successive Governments pose pressing questions about how we will keep supporting some of the world’s poorest countries,” committee chair and member of Parliament Sarah Champion said in a statement. “Rather than careering into irreversible changes and losing key experts when we need them most, FCDO should press the pause button now before it is too late.”
Myles Wickstead, a former permanent secretary at the U.K.’s aid department, says the committee’s intervention was well timed: “With the government due to co-host an international development summit in May, this provides a clear opportunity to take stock of future priorities — and the staffing structures needed to deliver them.”
Read: UK aid agency should pause reforms, says parliamentary committee
Backing away
The U.K. government has made a quieter change — right before Christmas, it published an update to its “guiding principles on supporting human rights defenders” that stripped out some prior commitments, such as regular exchanges between defenders and embassies and promoting responsible practice by extractive businesses. Advocates say this amounts to watering down its support for human rights defenders at a time when attacks against them are escalating, writes Devex contributor Amy Fallon. It’s not just the U.K., either — advocates note that it’s a broader trend of European and U.S. development departments taking a weaker stance on human rights.
In the past, the U.K. has provided the “kind of support that does make a difference” and can save lives, says Uganda gay rights activist Frank Mugisha.
“These are exactly the kinds of actions that older UK policy used to encourage,” Mugisha says. “The UK’s shift reflects a broader pattern of retreat on human rights in many parts of the world, where geopolitical priorities increasingly take precedence over human rights commitments.”
Read: Why human rights defenders say the UK’s quiet policy shift matters
In other news
The U.N. is seeking clarity from the U.S. over unpaid dues amounting to nearly $4 billion, as delayed payments add to mounting financial pressure on the global body. [France 24]
A boat carrying migrants capsized off the coast of Libya on Friday, killing 53 passengers. [BBC]
U.N. chief António Guterres has warned that an economic system centered on gross domestic product is pushing the planet toward environmental collapse, urging governments to rethink how progress is measured. [The Guardian]
News whiz
Take our globaldev news quiz and see how well you score!
Sign up to Newswire for an inside look at the biggest stories in global development.
About the author
Anna Gawel
Anna Gawel is the Managing Editor of Devex. She previously worked as the managing editor of The Washington Diplomat, the flagship publication of D.C.’s diplomatic community. She’s had hundreds of articles published on world affairs, U.S. foreign policy, politics, security, trade, travel and the arts on topics ranging from the impact of State Department budget cuts to Caribbean efforts to fight climate change. She was also a broadcast producer and digital editor at WTOP News and host of the Global 360 podcast. She holds a journalism degree from the University of Maryland in College Park.
