Ex-USAID employees connect donors with vital aid projects

Ex-USAID employees connect donors with vital aid projects

At a warehouse in northeastern Nigeria, emergency relief organization Action Against Hunger (ACF) is running low on supplies to treat malnourished children and pregnant women. The organization runs a project to combat malnutrition that relied on funding from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) to purchase urgently needed therapeutic food packages. However, the project was temporarily suspended, preventing ACF from procuring sufficient nutritious food during the peak malnutrition season.

Initiatives to combat malnutrition

This is one of many urgent, life-saving ones Aid projects, which is due to the Disbanding USAID by the Trump Administration are in limbo and urgently need additional resources. A group of former USAID employees have come together to connect major donors with cost-effective projects like this one that desperately need money to carry out the work already being planned.

The goal of the resource optimization project

“The main goal is to save as many lives as possible,” said Robert Rosenbaum, a former USAID portfolio manager and one of the initiators of the project Project Resource Optimization (PRO). “At this point, people are dying because of these (budget) decisions and the cancellation of the work.”

A new direction for private donations

Rosenbaum explained that he was concerned about cuts to US programs that address things like malnutrition, extreme poverty and Disease prevention fight, deprived of sleep after losing his job earlier this year. He and other laid-off USAID employees decided to take action and began reviewing projects run by USAID partner organizations that were abruptly cut off from funding.

Networking projects with donors

Gradually, they created an Excel list – the Urgent & Vetted Projects list – and began matching important and cost-effective programs with donors who wanted to help but didn't know where to start. Originally inspired by small family foundations looking for expert guidance, the list quickly grew into something larger.

Rosenbaum realized there was an opportunity to “expand the overall pool of private philanthropy” and attract donations from people who might not have invested in international aid projects until this year. "We've had some people reach out to us and literally email us saying they had $100,000, $200,000, a million dollars set aside... and they wanted to think about donating that way. So help us figure out how we can do that," he said.

Crowdfunding for important aid projects

Earlier this week the PRO team also had one Tool for smaller donors launched to help support some of the most urgent relief projects online. Now anyone can make a one-time or monthly contribution to the team's Rapid Response Fund to support verified projects in Sudan, Haiti, Nigeria and other countries.

The challenge for humanitarian projects

“For most of the humanitarian projects we have spoken to, if funding is not made available, the lights will go out over the summer and it will be very difficult to get back on track,” Rosenbaum warned. "Part of what we offer donors is that the fixed costs for these projects have already been covered by the U.S. government. The people are already hired, trained and on site. The goods have been procured in many cases and are sitting in a warehouse. So there are a lot of efficiencies."

A ray of hope for medical care in Mali

In Mali, an organization called the Alliance for International Medical Action (ALIMA) was at risk of shutting down a project providing medical care for children under five, pregnant women and nursing mothers, and mobile health facilities for internally displaced people. “We were forced to suspend and reduce activities at different times,” explained Carlota Ruiz, the organization’s head of grant management. “One of our primary concerns regarding navigating suspensions or project shutdowns has been the risk to our credibility and relationships with the Department of Health and the communities we work with.”

New hope through grants

A few weeks ago, the organization faced the prospect of having to suspend essential services. But now a new grant will enable ALIMA to provide 70,000 medical consultations to those in need and treat more than 5,000 children with severe acute malnutrition. "We had a foundation that reached out to us and said they were interested in funding our project in Mali, and that decision was due in large part to the analysis that PRO did," Ruiz told CNN. “It was a great relief and a new glimmer of hope for all of us.”

Pushing forward for ACF in Nigeria

In Nigeria, ACF reports that it is close to securing funding to continue a project to combat malnutrition after coordinating with the PRO team. The funding will be used to procure more immediate use therapeutic foods (RUTF). The time is “extremely critical,” according to an ACF employee on site. “June, July and August, including part of September, are the months with the highest rates of malnutrition and food insecurity in Nigeria,” said the employee, who wished to remain anonymous. “Therefore, providing these supplies in a situation where other funding mechanisms are stalling will make a huge difference to the continuity of life-saving activities.”

More than just a project

But the funding will only be available for this one project. ACF also supports programs in northern Nigeria that provide food assistance, clean water and sanitation, and support hundreds of health clinics. “It will be very significant and it will be really very useful in ensuring the continuity of activities and saving the lives of thousands of children,” said the ACF official about the soon-to-be-finalized grant. “But this project cannot cover all other aspects of our work.”