MFAN - Modernize Aid / Our Issues

Our Issues

MFAN supports a model of development that prioritizes accountability and evidence of impact and that gives greater voice, resources, and power over decision-making to local actors, who are best placed to deliver sustained results from U.S.taxpayer investments.

Accountability

Good information is key to ensuring that U.S. foreign assistance has maximum positive and sustainable impact. If policymakers, taxpayers, and intended partners of U.S. foreign assistance do not know how much is being spent, what it is being used for, who is getting the funds, and what the intended and actual results are, how can they be assured that money is well spent?

Budgeting for Effective Foreign Assistance

U.S. global development and humanitarian assistance professionals constantly confront shifting challenges and emerging opportunities in their work to fight poverty, enhance food security, improve health care capacity, respond to international emergencies, among many other formidable tasks.

Innovations in Development

Innovation is an integral part of modernizing foreign assistance and strengthening the effectiveness of development programs. As the global landscape continues to change and development needs evolve, new technologies and approaches are helping enhance the impact of programs in all sectors - from agriculture and health to finance and education.

Locally Led Development

Since its inception in 2008, MFAN has viewed aid reform through two primary pillars: Accountability and Locally Led Development (LLD),formerly conceptualized as “country ownership.” While this concept takes on many names – including localization, LLD, country or local ownership, community-led development – it means that the people closest to development and humanitarian challenges should drive how foreign assistance is utilized in their communities.

Private Sector

MFAN recognizes the important role that private sector organizations, including social enterprises, play in accelerating development and economic growth in communities. We believe that just as in the U.S. where small businesses serve as the economic engines of our communities, they toowill serve as the accelerators of their developing economies.

U.S. International Development Finance Corporation

‍MFAN is a strong proponent of development finance as a powerful and cost-effective tool to drive private investment and catalyze economic growth in the developing world. We were an early leader in 2016 calling for the creation of the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation (DFC) and a strong supporter of the bipartisan legislation -- the Better Utilization of Investments Leading to Development Act (BUILD) Act of 2018 -- that created the new agency.

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