A CGD blog. The World Bank has issued a new procurement rule mandating that, for Bank-financed civil works contracting, bidders must allocate 30 percent or more of the total labor cost under the contract to employ local staff, unless otherwise agreed in project negotiations. The rule isn’t likely to have much e…

A CGD blog. The current picture of US foreign assistance suggests that the status of operations is in even worse shape than expected from the scale of the cancellation of awards announced in March and the rescissions package passed in July. Not least, obligations and payments are running considerably behind whe…

A CGD blog. The House Appropriations Committee has advanced a spending bill that suggests bipartisan support for continuing a similar level of global health funding next fiscal year. If realized that could help preserve the great majority of the million lives potentially at stake from the administration’s budge…

A CGD blog. Last week, Congress passed a rescissions package clawing back nearly $8 billion in funding for foreign assistance approved by lawmakers earlier this year. But looking at the size of the cuts alone underestimates the scale of the crisis facing US foreign assistance, where the immediate challenge is d…

A CGD blog. There is bipartisan concern-shared across the administration and Congress-in ensuring the US continues supporting highly effective lifesaving programs worldwide. The available evidence suggests that these programs were cut considerably less than other elements of USAID’s portfolio in the last few mo…

A CGD blog. The process of procuring goods and services to deliver US development assistance remains shut down. June 17th marked 259 days into the 2025 fiscal year. At an equal daily rate, you’d expect cumulative new obligations across the US government at that point to be running at about 70 percent of the tot…

A CGD blog. China’s relationship with multilateral development institutions, including the World Bank, is of great interest to US lawmakers. In particular, there is concern over the fact that the World Bank lends to China and sometimes finances Chinese contractors to work on projects in its member countries, ev…

A CGD blog. Haiti finds itself on the list of countries facing a Trump administration travel ban for the second time in two terms. The official reasons are that Haitians often overstay their visas and that there is a risk of the “establishment of criminal networks, and other national security threats.” But Hait…

A CGD blog with Justin Sandefur. The White House has presented further details of its FY 2026 budget request. It includes a proposed two-thirds cut to global health and humanitarian funding. Such a reduction is impossible to reconcile with assurances from the administration that it is preserving life-saving assistance. A rough esti…

A CGD blog. FEWS NET, the US-financed famine early warning system, was one of the casualties of the US foreign assistance “pause.” The good news is that it has resumed operations. But what it has to report is deeply concerning.