Welcome to our final Money Matters of 2024. Next week, all of Devex will be taking a well-earned break; Money Matters will resume on Monday, Jan. 6.
We’re not finishing the year quietly, though. Instead, we’ve got a bumper issue with a whole host of end-of-year analyses — as well as the conclusion to a long-running overpayments battle between Chemonics and the U.S. government.
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What did the donors do?
It’s not a great time for international development funding, with many of the big donors cutting back. But where are they putting their money right now?
My colleague Miguel Antonio Tamonan investigated what’s happening at each of the biggest funders, and identified their largest projects of the year.
Read: The largest donors in 2024 — and how they spent their aid (Pro)
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Funding activity
We publish tenders, grants, and other funding announcements on our Funding Platform. Here are some of the ones which have been viewed the most in the past 10 days.
• The African Development Bank has approved a $150 million senior loan to strengthen the mining sector in Mauritania.
• The Asian Development Bank is seeking a consulting firm that will provide institutional strengthening and capacity development services for the water and sanitation sector in Laos.
• The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development has announced a project that will add renewable generation capacity to the national energy system in Ukraine.
• The International Finance Corporation, an arm of the World Bank, invested $20 million to support solar financing and a sustainable energy future in Brazil.
• Japanese aid agency JICA signed a $9.5 million (1.503 billion Japanese yen) grant agreement to improve maternal and child health equipment in flood-affected areas in Pakistan.
• The United Nations invites firms to provide an assessment of the UNDP-led women's economic empowerment project in Afghanistan.
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A look back at 2024
The past year has been an eventful one for the aid sector, and it’s fair to say there were some trends that took many observers by surprise.
There were European aid cuts, for one — reflecting a shift to a “my country first” approach, according to one speaker at a Devex roundtable looking back over the year — accompanied by cutbacks at some international nongovernmental organizations.
The worldwide humanitarian situation remained extremely challenging, with more than 700 million people facing hunger and around 300 million people displaced and in need of emergency aid. However, despite all that, there was some evidence that things may be getting slightly better, with total humanitarian funding requirements reduced somewhat compared to last year, and the year before.
And there were some other good news stories too — including exciting progress against malaria and a Marburg epidemic that never happened.
I took a look back over the data and picked out 10 key numbers that defined the year.
Read the year in data: 10 numbers that defined development in 2024 (Pro)
Read more: 6 good news stories from 2024
Watch: The trends that shaped global development in 2024 (Pro)
Overbilling battle over
USAID’s largest for-profit partner, Chemonics International, will pay the U.S. government $3.1 million in a settlement agreement related to fraudulent billing by a Nigerian subcontractor on USAID’s global health supply chain project.
It’s a dispute that dates back many years. The subcontractor Zenith Carex was hired to provide delivery services in Nigeria from 2017 to 2020, but Chemonics disclosed that it had overbilled for those services, and the charges had been passed on to USAID.
Chemonics told Devex that it has not admitted liability.
Read: Chemonics settles with Justice Department over subcontractor fraud
Just the job
If, like many of our readers, you’ll be searching for a new job in the new year, now is the perfect time to get ahead of the pack by signing up to a Devex Career Account membership. My colleagues on our jobs board have not just got thousands of exclusive opportunities for you to apply for, but also a huge amount of guidance and support to find the right position.
My colleague Justin Sablich has put together a comprehensive guide to the main development sectors, helping you understand the most popular roles, the best locations, salary insights, and main recruiters. It’s a superb piece of work and an invaluable bible for a job seeker.
Right now, it’s available as part of the Devex Career Account membership, at a discounted rate of $8.99 a month or $89.99 a year. Sign up now.
Download: Your ultimate guide to development’s top sectors (Career)
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About the author
David Ainsworth@daveainsworth4
David Ainsworth is business editor at Devex, where he writes about finance and funding issues for development institutions. He was previously a senior writer and editor for magazines specializing in nonprofits in the U.K. and worked as a policy and communications specialist in the nonprofit sector for a number of years. His team specializes in understanding reports and data and what it teaches us about how development functions.
