How much do USAID primes spend on subawards?

The U.S. Agency for International Development has pushed hard to achieve its goal of channeling a quarter of eligible funding toward localization. Even though it is not even halfway to its target, USAID has made significant moves and initiatives that aim to improve local partnerships. To cap off our analysis of USAID’s assistance and acquisition, or A&A, spending in the fiscal year ending September 2024, we turned our attention to the portion of the money transferred from prime awardees to smaller organizations through subawards. The Office of Management and Budget defines a subaward as “an award provided by a pass-through entity to a subrecipient for the subrecipient to carry out part of a Federal award received by the pass-through entity.” For prime grantees, it’s usually for the implementation of a grant component, while for prime contractors, it is to procure goods and services from another organization. As we have observed in previous analyses, a higher percentage of subawards tend to go to local partners, compared to the percentage of direct funding from USAID, with prime awardees allocating a relatively large portion of the funding they received to local organizations in low- and middle-income countries. We looked into these in detail down below. How accurate is the subawards data? As we mentioned in our previous analyses, there are cases of duplicate entries in the subawards data. In previous correspondence, USASpending — the U.S. government’s official repository of spending data — told us that "if the prime awardee deviates from the intended reporting process, it can lead to duplicates." We identified duplicates by looking into those with identical reference numbers, awarded dates, and recipients. We found around 50 entries that have been added multiple times. They have a combined worth of $20.5 million, which is significantly less than the over 400 duplicates, worth $268.7 million, we found in the previous fiscal year. Overall, USASpending data shows that $2.9 billion was spent by prime recipients for subgrants. These came from prime awards made between 2011 and 2023, with a total maximum value of $16.1 billion. Meanwhile, $928.2 million was spent by prime contractors for subcontracts made between 2013 and 2023, with a total maximum value of $19.2 billion. Who were the biggest spenders on subgrants among prime awardees? Many of the top prime grantees and contractors were also the largest sources of subawards in 2023. Among the prime grantees, Save the Children USA spent the most on subgrants, worth $469.5 million. This came from $592.3 million worth of prime awards. Of the total, $461.5 million went to Save the Children International, which was likely channeled further to Save the Children country offices. The remaining went to a few other organizations, including TANGO International, Johns Hopkins University, and UK-Med. FHI 360 ranked next, with $323.3 million out of the $2.2 billion prime awards. Its top recipients include Helen Keller Intl, with $124. 1 million, Clinton Health Access Initiative, with $36.3 million, and Health and Development International, with $13.4 million. Then the Consortium for Elections and Political Process Strengthening, or CEPPS, with $177.3 million, which came from $427 million of prime awards. The amount was divided among three subgrantees: the National Democratic Institute, with $66.7 million, the International Foundation for Electoral Systems, with $62.9 million, and the International Republican Institute, with $47.5 million. The other prime grantees spending the most significant sum on subgrants were Project HOPE Namibia, with $168.6 million, Catholic Relief Services, with $159.7 million, and Mercy Corps, with $100 million. Another $313.9 million came from undisclosed prime grantees, which USASpending labels as “miscellaneous foreign contractors.” Who spent the most on subcontracts? Meanwhile, USAID’s leading contractor Chemonics topped the list among prime recipients engaging in subcontracting, spending $186.6 million in total. This came from $9.4 billion of prime awards. Chemonics’ top recipients were Bolloré Transport & Logistics Zambia, with $43.1 million, National Medical Stores, with $31.3 million, and Taurus Partners Group, with $22.9 million. DAI Global, another major contractor to USAID, ranked next, with $83.1 million. This came from $1.6 billion of prime awards. Its top recipients included CrossBoundary, with $6.4 million, Environmental Incentives, with $3.6 million, and FreeBalance, with $2.8 million. Then Deloitte Consulting, with $58.2 million out of $544.1 million prime awards. The top recipients among subcontractors were IT2 Solutions, with $9.4 million, Deloitte Côte d'Ivoire, with $7.6 million, and Nextier Capital, with $5.2 million. The other prime recipients spending the most on subcontracts were Abt Global, with $39.1 million, RTI International, with $36.7 million, and the American Institutes for Research, with $27.8 million. Another $231.8 million came from undisclosed prime contractors, which USASpending labels as “domestic awardees.” Are subawards going local? As we have observed in our previous analysis, subawarding tends to promote a higher rate of local partnership compared to direct funding from USAID. This could be because smaller organizations find it more difficult to access USAID funding through competitive bidding and open calls. Again, we define local as any organization in low- and middle-income countries implementing activities in the same location as their headquarters. Of the subgrants awarded in 2023, $935 million, or 32.7% of the total, went to local organizations. Meanwhile, more than half of the subcontracts in 2023, worth $468.9 million, went to local recipients. Both figures are higher than the portion of subawards that went to local recipients in the previous year. In 2022, both subgrants and subcontracts had around a third of the total going to local recipients in LMICs. Who received the money among local subgrantees? The largest share of local subgrants, worth $416.8 million, went to organizations in lower-middle-income countries. Another $310 million went to upper-middle-income countries, while the remaining $208.1 million went to low-income countries. Namibia was the top recipient of local subgrants, with local organizations receiving $150.3 million. Then Nigeria, with $94.6 million, Ethiopia, with $74 million, and India, with $53.2 million. Star for Life Namibia was the top local subgrantee, with $133 million. The entire amount came from Project Hope Namibia. Then Green Concern for Development, with $85.6 million, all of which came from Action Against Hunger France. YRGCARE ranked next, with $20 million, which came from Johns Hopkins University, which awarded $19.7 million, and the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative, which awarded $226,000. The other top local subgrantees were the Relief Society of Tigray, with $19.1 million, CareWorks South Africa and the Ethiopian Catholic Church Social and Development Commission Branch Office of Harar, with $17.1 million each, Grey Philippines, with $15.1 million, and the Organisation for Rehabilitation and Development in Amhara $12.8 million. Who received the money among local subcontractors? Recipients from lower-middle-income countries received the largest share of local subcontracts, worth $202.4 million. Their counterparts from upper-middle-income countries got $186.2 million, while those from low-income countries were given $80.4 million. Ukraine was the top recipient of local subcontracts among LMICs, worth $124.6 million. Nigeria followed, with $52.1 million, Zambia, with $49.1 million, then Uganda, with $37.4 million. Chemonics’ top recipients, Bolloré Transport & Logistics Zambia and National Medical Stores, also led the list of top local subcontractors. Deloitte Ukraine also received a significant sum of local subcontracts, worth $35.5 million, which came from undisclosed sources. The other top local subcontractors were Adiamat Trading, with $19.9 million, Zaporozhtransformator, with $17.3 million, and Astor Enerji, with $10.7 million. Try out Devex Pro Funding today with a free five-day trial, and explore funding opportunities from over 850 sources in addition to our analysis and news content.