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An Urgent Call for Philanthropy to Take a New Tack on Foreign Aid

By  Kristin Lord
June 7, 2018
READ Global collaborates with people who live in the communities where it offers services to create gathering spots that are also hubs for information technology and training sites. An example is this English literacy class in Bhutan.
READ Global
READ Global collaborates with people who live in the communities where it offers services to create gathering spots that are also hubs for information technology and training sites. An example is this English literacy class in Bhutan.

For decades, the world’s most prosperous countries have provided aid to lift people from elsewhere out of poverty and make them more resilient to disasters and crises.

But this long-standing commitment to foreign assistance is now in jeopardy.

The Trump administration initially proposed cutting foreign aid by 30 percent. Even though this funding was largely spared in a budget deal, the effort was part of a broader inclination among developed countries to reduce foreign assistance. Meanwhile, aid devoted to long-term efforts to increase prosperity and social justice is under pressure as the need to manage immediate crises grows.

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For decades, the world’s most prosperous countries have provided aid to lift people from elsewhere out of poverty and make them more resilient to disasters and crises.

But this long-standing commitment to foreign assistance is now in jeopardy.

The Trump administration initially proposed cutting foreign aid by 30 percent. Even though this funding was largely spared in a budget deal, the effort was part of a broader inclination among developed countries to reduce foreign assistance. Meanwhile, aid devoted to long-term efforts to increase prosperity and social justice is under pressure as the need to manage immediate crises grows.

Together, these twin pressures on aid budgets are likely to set back both human well-being and global economic growth.

Even if aid budgets ultimately escape the knife, they are unlikely to grow. That means philanthropists are needed more than ever to step in not just with new resources but also with new solutions. We need to spread approaches that make a difference, are cost-effective, and are led by people in the communities being served so they are more enduring. We need to create an opportunity for liberals and conservatives, philanthropists and governments to band together and find new ways to help communities transition to a point where they don’t need aid at all. We need to explore options that do more with less.

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After all, the need for aid remains urgent and is escalating due to interlocking crises:

  • The world is now witnessing the highest levels of displacement on record, with an unprecedented 65.6 million people forced from their homes.
  • An estimated 76 million people are expected to require emergency food assistance this year.
  • The number of natural disasters has more than quadrupled since 1970 to about 400 a year, leading insurers to expect a record $135 billion payout to cover losses in 2017.
  • Persistent conflict has reduced the level of peace in 83 countries.

Altogether this global surge of suffering means a bigger and bigger share of aid budgets will be devoted to these far-reaching emergencies — an understandable response to dire humanitarian suffering.

Regrettably, this may reinforce a cycle of dependency. By devoting fewer resources to helping communities become more prosperous and more resilient to crises, we plant the seeds for more poverty and suffering, not to mention more expense. Communities that are poor and undereducated and that lack social cohesion are that much more vulnerable when disaster strikes, whether it’s created by nature or people. There is another way.

Help to Begin

Poor communities are — right now — improving their own circumstances with resources they generate themselves. They are empowering women, educating children, and improving prosperity.

All they need is help getting started, and hope.

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For example, an organization called READ Global (READ stands for Rural Education and Development) has an impressive track record of collaborating with people in the communities where it works to create centers that serve as information-technology hubs, community gathering spots, and training sites.

They are run by local people, and they generate revenue through fee-for-service training programs, handicraft sales, day care centers, ambulance services, and other self-sustaining efforts. They offer a host of services ranging from livelihoods training (such as beekeeping or poultry farming), adult literacy and numeracy education, technology skills, and trade skills like hair styling and cosmetology, agriculture and health support services, and women’s microfinance. They are also safe spaces where everybody can gather and children can get access to books, toys, games, and computers.

READ operates 104 centers in Bhutan, India, and Nepal that provide services to roughly 2 million people at a fraction of the price of traditional aid projects. A typical center costs about $300,000 to start. After that, the communities themselves largely cover their own day-to-day costs, in perpetuity.

More intangibly, but equally important, READ centers transform how individuals and whole communities see themselves, building a sense of hope and self-confidence so that when disaster strikes, as it did after two massive earthquakes in Nepal in 2015, the communities themselves lead the response. They develop dignity.

In a nutshell, the approach transforms mind-sets as well as circumstances.

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For these reasons, my own organization — a much larger, nonprofit education and development organization that works closely with traditional foreign-assistance providers — has formed a joint venture with READ to double the number of centers it runs in the next five years and bring the approach to new countries in Africa, Asia, and elsewhere.

Part of the Solution

READ is not alone. Many effective locally driven solutions exist around the world. They need resources and advice on how to earn their own revenue for the long-term, whether self-generated or from a sustainable source like local government dollars. They need a path to succeed without expecting philanthropy or foreign aid to provide help forever.

Expanding projects like READ’s will not end global poverty, but those projects should be a part of the solution that people right, left, and center can support: by liberals who want to invest in community development and empower women; by conservatives who want to alleviate human suffering without creating dependency; by next-generation philanthropists who want to invest in social entrepreneurship, not just traditional charity; by businesses that want to elevate the communities where their employees and customers work and live; and by Mark Green, the new head of the U.S. Agency for International Development, who has called for efforts that foster “self-reliance and resilience” that graduate communities from the need for aid.

A world with less poverty, more cohesive communities, greater opportunities, and a sense of hope about the future is a vision all of us can get behind. And if we need a global aid crisis as the spark we need to get us there, unfortunately, one may be coming.

Kristin Lord is chief executive of IREX, a global education and development nonprofit organization.

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