WASHINGTON, Feb 4: The Trump administration's attempt to fold the USAID humanitarian agency into the State Department calls into question the future of tens of billions of dollars in financial support to some of the world's poorest countries.
The United States is the world's largest provider of official development assistance, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).
Most of its support is channeled through the United States Agency for International Development, an independent government agency established by Congress in 1961.
USAID is by far the largest humanitarian and development arm of the US government, with a workforce of approximately 10,000 people around the world and an annual budget of tens of billions of dollars.
Congress approves USAID's funding each year. The humanitarian agency then works with Congress and the White House to set its investment priorities, while the State Department provides it with foreign policy guidance.
The money is paid out through grants, contracts and "cooperative agreements," according to USAID.
In the 2023 fiscal year, USAID managed more than $40 billion in combined appropriations, a recent report from the Congressional Research Service (CRS) noted.
That was more than a third of the overall budget approved for the State Department, foreign operations and related programs.
Nevertheless, it only represented around 0.7 percent of the US government's $6.1 trillion in spending during that period.
USAID had projects in around 130 countries in 2023, the most recent year for which full data was available, according to CRS. �AFP
