Russian Officials Study U.S. Development Assistance
FrontLines: March 2008
Ten officials from Russia’s government,
which is considering creating
a Russian foreign aid agency, visited USAID in February to study the U.S. experience in providing
development assistance.
With Russia’s improving economy, it could become an active player in the world’s donor community—a role the Soviet Union once played building giant dams, power plants, and factories across the Third World.
The Russian officials were from the ministries of foreign affairs, finance, economic development and trade, and the emergency response agency, EMERCOM.
They received briefings during
their Feb. 27–29 visit from senior Agency officials in management,
disaster assistance, budgets, work force, and other topics. They also met officials from the departments of State, Justice, Treasury, and the Office of Management and Budget.
“Russia is in the process of building a national development assistance system,” said Mikhail Savostiyanov, deputy director of the foreign ministry’s department of international organizations, and the leader of the delegation.
During market reforms of
the 1990s, Russia experienced difficult economic times. It was only after 2000 that the economy began improving, in part due to rising oil income, and “now we are in a position to be more active and increase our contribution to the common efforts in the field
of international development assistance,” said Savostiyanov. “As far as institutional capacity
is concerned, we are at the very beginning. In 1990s, Russian development assistance was quite limited. Now we have to start
from a blank slate partly due to the lack of experienced aid staff which we had in 1970s to 1980s.”
In addition to USAID, the Russians are looking at other approaches, such as the British and German government aid systems, as potential models.
Since 2000, Russia has cancelled
or committed to cancel $30 billion in debts owed by developing
countries. Besides debt relief, Russia is currently contributing to multilateral aid programs, in particular at the U.N. and the World Bank. Russian aid has steadily increased from $50 million
in 2004, to $215 million in 2007, and should reach $500 million
in the next few years, said Savostiyanov.
Over the next three to five years, Russia intends to “develop bilateral mechanisms for aid delivery,” said Savostiyanov in an interview with FrontLines.
“As Russian bilateral assistance
increases, we plan to establish a government entity, maybe even named RUSAID. The experience of USAID and other similar aid agencies will be duly taken into account.”
“Development assistance is
not charity—it is in our common interest,” said a member of the delegation. At the first stage, the Russian aid program will focus on “our three main priorities—health, education, and energy.” The Russians may require recipients to meet certain “MCC-like” criteria, such as fighting corruption and promoting
sound economic policies, to qualify for aid, he added. “We can’t afford assistance to be wasted.”
Denis Korepanov, a senior Foreign Service National with USAID/Russia who accompanied the delegation to Washington, said the Agency has been working with the Russian government counterparts
for three years to help “think about” how to become an aid donor.
“USAID in Russia organized
an open house—15 people from different ministries came in 2007 to hear about the principles of delivering technical assistance
and how field missions operate,” he said.
Russia has the funds to carry out foreign aid but needs implementers. USAID/Russia introduced the Russians to selected USAID
partners—Russian NGOs that
have already worked in developing countries on aid projects and can help jump start the Russian aid delivery system, Korepanov said.
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