United States lawmakers unblocking funding to Ukraine may have gotten most of the headlines this week, but the new $95 billion national security bill has big implications for the rest of the world too.
Also in today’s edition: The latest on the pandemic treaty negotiations, alarming new hunger numbers, and what a more religious world means for development.
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U.S. President Joe Biden has now signed a $95 billion national security bill into law, and Devex reporter Elissa Miolene has been looking at the fine print to see what it means for U.S. development efforts.
• $5.6 billion will be funneled to USAID to provide general humanitarian assistance worldwide.
• $3.5 billion will go toward the State Department’s Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration.
“Relief” and “gratitude” is how Jenny Marron from InterAction, an alliance of U.S.-based aid organizations, sums up her reaction, while noting that the reliance on supplemental funding to help meet rising needs around the world also underscores the inadequacy of base funding.
Without the $5.6 billion, USAID Administrator Samantha Power told lawmakers earlier this month that USAID’s program funds for humanitarian response would drop by 35% compared to the last fiscal year — the equivalent, she said, of “falling off a cliff.”
That’s now been averted, yet questions remain over where the money will go. It’s not earmarked to any particular region, however, USAID documents indicated its support to Gaza, Afghanistan, Democratic Republic of Congo, Sudan, Myanmar, and the regional Venezuelan migration crisis could all suffer without it. So, pretty much everywhere.
Read: USAID has received a multibillion cash injection. What next? (Pro)
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The secret of Nims
Matthew Nims, a 24-year USAID veteran who currently serves as deputy assistant to the administrator in the Bureau for Humanitarian Assistance, informed staff Tuesday that he is leaving the agency in the “next few weeks” to take over as head of the World Food Programme’s Washington, D.C. office. In an email to colleagues seen by my colleague Michael Igoe, Nims wrote that he believes the bureau is “better prepared than ever to take on the challenges of today and what comes next.” He noted that in the lead-up to his departure, he will recuse himself from any issues involving WFP.
Nims' news comes after Michael reported (and USAID subsequently confirmed) that the agency's second-in-command, Paloma Adams Allen, will be stepping down at the end of this month.
ICYMI: USAID deputy administrator to leave agency (Pro)
Negotiate another day
The topic on everyone’s lips at the World Health Summit in Melbourne, Australia, this week was the fraught negotiations over a pandemic treaty, designed to better respond to future health emergencies.
To understand what’s at stake heading into the next round of talks beginning next week, Devex Senior Reporter Jenny Lei Ravelo has you covered with this rundown for Devex Pro members.
From calls for a surge funding mechanism on day zero of the next pandemic to governance arrangements for sustained political commitment, it appears wealthier and lower-income countries are still far apart on their priorities.
And the clock is ticking to capitalize on the momentum from the COVID-19 pandemic. This May’s World Health Assembly is seen as the deadline to agree on … at least something.
“A house built on sand will never be stable. [But] no one is suggesting that this full, complete mechanism house can be built in the next six weeks,” says Dr. Michael Ryan, executive director of WHO’s health emergencies program. “We're asking our member states to create the starting line.”
Read: Experts warn about deferring hard parts of pandemic treaty for later (Pro)
ICYMI: What is the pandemic treaty and what would it do?
+ Devex will once again be on the ground at next month's World Health Assembly. Join our programming on May 28 and 29 for a series of conversations with experts and stakeholders to get more insights into the treaty negotiations.
Hunger on the rise (again)
Global hunger levels have increased for the fifth year in a row: More than 280 million people in 59 countries and territories faced high levels of acute hunger last year.
The 2024 Global Report on Food Crises, out Wednesday, attributed the increase to climate and economic shocks, together with the lingering effect of the COVID-19 pandemic, plus the wars in Ukraine, Gaza, and Sudan.
In Gaza, half the territory’s entire population of 2.2 million is facing high levels of acute food insecurity. Gian Carlo Cirri, director of the World Food Programme’s Geneva office, told journalists on Wednesday that the only way to avoid famine is to boost food supplies “in a very short time.”
“We've mentioned the necessity to rebuild livelihoods, to address root causes and so on,” he said. “But, in the immediate time, like tomorrow, we really need to significantly increase our food supplies. This means rolling out massive and consistent food assistance in conditions that allow humanitarian staff and supplies to move freely and (for) affected people to access safely the assistance.”
Read: Global hunger levels 'bleak' amid spikes due to wars in Gaza and Sudan
Listen here
Need something to chew over on your lunch break today? We have a special podcast series where my colleague Adva Saldinger asks those who should know what to make of this month’s Spring Meetings of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund.
As Rachel Kyte, professor of practice in climate policy at the University of Oxford, tells Adva in one of the episodes, one persistent question is whether development finance institutions, including the major multilateral development banks, can work together on a given country’s priorities.
“Sounds obvious; doesn’t exist at the moment,” Kyte notes. “We’ve seen extraordinary fragmentation in development aid over the last 20 years. Private sector finance gets leveraged deal by deal, rather than being pooled. And so it is a good idea. But where is the radical collaboration?”
Can the MDBs work off one term sheet? Can they do just one set of due diligence that would operate for all of them?
Some of the major banks have taken steps toward better collaboration — for instance on harmonizing procurement in Ukraine — but Kyte says, “There is a lot further to go.”
Listen: World Bank-IMF takeaways — Unpacking the Spring Meetings
+ You can also listen on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or search “Devex” in your favorite podcast app to find more episodes of the podcast series on the Spring Meetings.
Keeping the faith
A conference took place in London this week on faith and development. Why?
As the heads of Islamic Relief Worldwide and Christian Aid, which organized the event with the University of Leeds and the Joint Learning Initiative, write in an opinion piece for Devex, “among many global development groups, faith is a force that is either marginalized or ignored.”
And yet, the pair write, “As the demographic weight of the global south increases, the world is arguably becoming more, rather than less religious.”
They want to see a “faith-literate approach to development” from organizations in the global north, in order to ensure aid work is effective and accepted in deeply religious communities.
They acknowledge the challenges:
• Some religious beliefs and practices foster inequality and marginalization.
• Faith groups’ local action means they sometimes operate on a small scale.
• And their work in health and education can come at the expense of state capacity and accountability.
Still, the authors say, governments and policymakers “need to integrate faith better into their work, if the Sustainable Development Goals are to be achieved.”
Opinion: The world is becoming more religious. That matters for development
In other news
Germany announced it will resume funding the operations of UNRWA, the main United Nations agency in Gaza, after an independent review debunked Israel's allegations of UNRWA employees' ties to terrorist groups. [The Guardian]
Two U.N. agencies, along with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, launched a campaign to expand lifesaving programs, kicking off World Immunization Week. [UN News]
An Amnesty International report found that advancements in technology and artificial intelligence are hastening the breakdown of international rule of law, posing a risk of “supercharging” human rights violations. [VOA]
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About the author
Vince Chadwickvchadw
Vince Chadwick is a contributing reporter at Devex. A law graduate from Melbourne, Australia, he was social affairs reporter for The Age newspaper, before covering breaking news, the arts, and public policy across Europe, including as a reporter and editor at POLITICO Europe. He was long-listed for International Journalist of the Year at the 2023 One World Media Awards.
