WASHINGTON
U.S. officials Tuesday formally unveiled the government’s first comprehensive strategy aimed at integrating water into all U.S. development funding and programmes, a step long urged by advocates and development experts.
Civil society groups here are praising parts of President Barack Obama’s newly unveiled budget proposal, saying it appears to build on momentum gathered in recent years toward a robust overhaul of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), the country’s main foreign aid agency.
Following the devastating 2010 earthquake in Haiti, more than a billion dollars of U.S. aid money has gone to that country with little transparency or accountability on how the money is being used, according to new data released by a watchdog group here.
The United States’ main foreign assistance agency is getting widespread plaudits for new data on a series of internal reforms aimed at aid improvement, but some development experts are pointing to a persistent opaqueness from the agency.
With just a week to go before massive, indiscriminate spending cuts kick in across the U.S. government, policymakers and humanitarian groups are becoming increasingly anxious about the enduring impact the cuts would have on the communities across the globe assisted by U.S.-funded development and aid programmes.
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