Millennium Challenge Corporation Working with Peru to Improve Immunization Rates, Combat Corruption

Fact Sheet

Washington, D.C. — The Millennium Challenge Corporation today announced the approval of a two-year, $35.6 million Threshold program to help the Government of Peru improve its performance on MCC’s “Control of Corruption” and “Immunization Rate” indicators.

Specifically, the program will help Peru combat corruption by improving administrative systems and procedures, strengthening enforcement and increasing public awareness about corruption. It will target activities within the judicial branch, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Office of the Comptroller General and the Office of the Ombudsman and will work with civil society organizations to reduce instances of bribery, raise awareness of anticorruption efforts and increase public accountability.

The program will also focus on increasing immunization rates by improving supply chain systems at the Ministry of Health, enhancing immunization of rural children, strengthening immunization management and logistical systems and upgrading information systems at national and local levels.

“This program reflects Peru’s serious commitment to improve the health of its children and reduce public corruption,” said MCC’s CEO, Ambassador John Danilovich “The government of Peru has made combating corruption one of its top priorities by making government institutions more transparent, accountable and ethical.”

MCC’s threshold program is designed to assist countries that are on the “threshold” of eligibility for Millennium Challenge Account Compacts. Threshold Program assistance is used to help countries address the specific policy weaknesses indicated by their scores on 17 policy indicators in three categories—Ruling Justly, Investing in People, and Encouraging Economic Freedom. These policy indicators are central to the criteria and methodology for compact eligibility and are products of respected international institutions and national data. Each indicator was selected based on its relationship to growth and poverty reduction, the number of countries it covers, its transparency and availability, its analytical rigor, and its objectivity.

The United States Agency for International Development will be the U.S. government agency responsible for administering the Peru Threshold program.

MCC’s Threshold Program assistance approved to date totals nearly $400 million in eighteen countries: Albania, Burkina Faso, Guyana, Indonesia, Jordan, Kenya, Kyrgyz Republic, Malawi, Moldova, Paraguay, Peru, Philippines, São Tomé and Príncipe, Tanzania, Uganda, Ukraine, Yemen and Zambia.

###