Today, we bring you the priorities for the new boss of USAID’s main procurement office.
Also in today’s edition: Questions over the U.K.’s climate finance pledge, and more scrutiny on Europe’s funding for the Organisation of African, Caribbean and Pacific States.
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Aid’s main man
It’s one of the U.S. Agency for International Development’s most important jobs. The director of the Office of Acquisitions and Assistance leads contracting officers in one of the agency’s core functions: designing, awarding, and overseeing contracts and grants for development projects in lower-income countries. That was a $38 billion undertaking last year. And since December there’s a new boss in Jami Rodgers, who is returning to USAID after leading NASA’s Procurement Strategic Operations Division.
So, amid a “staffing crisis,” and with ever increasing pressure to work with local players in low-income countries, what does Rodgers want to do?
The amount of money the agency spends is up, but the number of people responsible for approving and overseeing the use of that money has not kept pace. Proper resources is part of the answer, Rodgers says, but so too is allowing contract officers to be flexible in how they exercise their authority.
Another issue on his radar is greater use of artificial intelligence: “It could be things as small as automating checklists, using AI to help generate documents in the procurement and financial systems process, using AI and data analytics to help see what we're buying and are we buying it in a smart way,” Rodgers tells Devex Senior Reporter Michael Igoe.
Read: Can Jami Rodgers fix USAID's contracting crisis? (Pro)
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OACPS, they did it again
We’ve been asking the European Commission for years about its rationale for financing the Organisation of African, Caribbean and Pacific States, or OACPS, and whether it has concerns over how its multimillion-euro annual contributions to the 79-member group are being spent.
We’ve been reporting too:
• On an OACPS staff member traveling from Brussels with €81,556 in undeclared cash — which the group said was meant to cover participants’ daily allowances at a conference in Niger — that was confiscated by France and as yet never returned.
• On €5.1 million of European Union funding for a renovation that never happened at OACPS’ headquarters in the Belgian capital.
• On the group’s funding crisis as members fail to pay their dues, and on South Africa leaving the group.
Now it turns out the commission is concerned, or at least worried enough to spend almost $300,000 this year to pay two consultants to help the OACPS finance department lift its game.
According to the terms of reference, seen by Devex, for now, OACPS documents sent to the commission “usually fall short in EU’s minimal requirements, resulting in poor financial management, poor quality documents, regular delays in the submission of the documents and the inability to reply efficiently to queries from the Commission.”
Despite those worries, the commission recently inked a new partnership agreement with the OACPS, including a commitment to maintain its funding (which is now essentially keeping the group afloat) for another 20 years.
Do you know more? Write to me at vince.chadwick@devex.com.
Scoop: EU probes finances at African, Caribbean and Pacific group
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UK climate pledge taking on water
The United Kingdom’s pledge to spend £11.6 billion ($14.7 billion) over five years to 2026 on helping lower-income countries adapt to the climate crisis is in trouble — with only around £1.5 billion handed over in each of the first two years.
In response, last October, “clarifications” were made to what counts as climate finance to include higher proportions of both humanitarian aid and funds funneled through multilateral development banks and British International Investment, the U.K.’s development finance body.
Andrew Mitchell, the international development minister, argued the rebadging was in line with international practice and rejected any suggestion of “sleight of hand.”
Unfortunately, my colleague Rob Merrick reports, the U.K. aid watchdog ICAI does not agree. Its new report, out today, accuses the government of moving the goalposts while “not increasing the amounts which actually reach countries in need.” Abracadabra! Suddenly, an extra £1.7 billion of existing aid is “climate finance.”
ICAI says it was unable to understand the methodology used when programs were “scrubbed” for evidence of links to climate help — “notably adjustments made by BII” — and is also alarmed that the changes mean more of the finance comes from loans rather than grants.
By “altering its accounting methods” rather than providing new money, the U.K. is “offering less additional assistance than was originally promised,” says ICAI Chief Commissioner Tamsyn Barton.
She adds: “It may also not be as suited to the needs of the most vulnerable countries at risk from climate change, notably the least developed, conflict-affected and small island developing states.”
Find out more from Rob today at our event on the future of U.K. aid, which you can sign up for here. Can’t attend live? Register anyway and we’ll send you a recording.
Editor’s picks
Happy leap day! At the end of a fairly bleak February, we’re looking back on favorite stories from the month — and bringing you a selection.
• What's stopping USAID from localizing?
It's the question on everyone's mind, as the world's biggest bilateral donor goes through another tortuous attempt to localize its work. Business Editor David Ainsworth maps out exactly what's getting in the way.
• Everything you need to know about the World Bank's reform plans
You know it's important, but you haven't kept up with the twists and turns. Never fear — our World Bank expert, Devex contributor Sophie Edwards, has got you covered.
• Why the Gates Foundation isn't shifting to trust-based grantmaking
Everybody's talking about the revolutionary approach to giving popularized by MacKenzie Scott. But the world's biggest global development foundation isn't planning a shift anytime soon. Here's why.
• How Germany is cutting billions from foreign aid
The world's second-largest bilateral donor — responsible for more than €30 billion a year in aid — is tightening its belt. Here's where the cuts are falling.
+ Get ahead in your career and enhance your impact with inside insights on the biggest stories in global development. Start your free trial of Devex Pro today to access these stories and more.
Breathing room
After nine years as prime minister of New Zealand, Helen Clark knows a little something about elections.
This year, with voters in 80 countries going to the polls, Clark, the co-chair of a new global commission set up to tackle air pollution, argues that world leaders should be reminded of the promise made by 161 countries in 2022 to provide their people the right to a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment.
The state of play is bleak.
“People on the lowest incomes are most likely to live and work in areas that are badly polluted, and they pay the heaviest price,” Clark writes in an opinion piece for Devex. “Children under 5 who live in a lower-income country are 60 times more likely to die from air pollution.”
And not only is there little global development funding (just 1% of the total) going to fight air pollution, but just 5% of that went to Africa – despite the fact that it is home to half of the world’s top 10 most polluted countries.
Opinion: Voters should hold leaders accountable for toxic air in 2024
In other news
Ghana’s Parliament has passed a new bill that imposes a prison sentence on anyone identifying as LGBTQ+ while also penalizing the formation or funding of LGBTQ+ groups. [BBC]
African scientists secured $7.2 million from LifeArc and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to develop drugs targeting malaria and tuberculosis. [Bloomberg]
Corporate sustainability EU rules are in doubt after Germany and Italy appear to have blocked them in a secret vote by diplomats. [Euronews]
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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.
