Since Donald Trump entered the White House, the world has seen chaotic changes to the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), the biggest global development donor with critical programmes across the world. This was followed by the UK’s announcement of a planned reduction in Official Development Aid (ODA) to bolster defence funding amid the changing geopolitical and security situation in Europe.
The reports of the impacts of the dramatic changes to US overseas aid make grim reading. There have been reports of people being stranded with medical equipment in their bodies; a Myanmar refugee dying from the lack of access to critical medical care and women with sexually transmitted diseases in South Africa left stranded for medical support. This is outrageous: the world’s richest and most powerful people are taking resources and opportunities away from the world’s poorest and most vulnerable people.
As much as the picture of cuts is bleak, we should not ignore the vision and dynamism of those striving for change, with or without Western aid, what they need, and what they have already achieved.
Bangladesh provides a model for resilience
Concerns arising from foreign aid cuts dominated our conversations during my visit to Bangladesh for the UKRI-funded Zoonotic Influenza Preparedness (ZIP) project. Our Bangladesh partners have been championing the One Health research for the last 10-15 years, and USAID has been a major contributor to their success. The future of these programmes and further support from the US remain uncertain, with implications on staff employment, capacity building, and the overall One Health movements in Bangladesh.
And yet there was some optimism. Bangladesh and countries across Asia have had impressive rates of economic growth over the last decade and their cities have rapidly urbanised. Bangladesh has a long history of government and non-governmental organisation (NGO) led economic and social development.
Colleagues in Bangladesh are clear that it is time to re-think the relationship with foreign aid. Rather than relying on long-term aid, countries can utilise short-term foreign aid to create an ecosystem that works toward the development and improvement of agricultural and food industries.
In the poultry sector, for instance, there are many government institutions, private sector actors and citizens’ associations that shape the industry. Given that Bangladesh’s poultry sector is dominated by small-scale producers and informal supply chains, commercial actors – both large and small – have been driving the intensification of the sector. This is a trend across South and Southeast Asia where private companies – mostly based in Asia – are playing a vital role in intensifying livestock production systems. In addition to the corporate sector, our colleagues based at the Chittagong Veterinary and Animal Science University (CVASU) are one of the many research and academic players who have contributed to understanding the public health implications of the intensifying poultry production systems.
Beyond poultry, there are rich experiences of industry development through working with, agricultural and farming insurance companies, the government’s research and extension departments, and technology-based companies that can provide vital platforms (e.g. through mobile apps) to connect these different actors. I was inspired by the experience of our partner, Innovision, in contributing to the development of the furniture sector through linking different actors that can support producers. They are now taking this experience to fish farming in Bangladesh, and their activities will not be stopped because of USAID or UK aid cuts.
Global South ramping up investments to fill the gaps
Non-Western investors are already active in countries like Bangladesh. Chinese companies have brought engineers to support construction of buildings, etc. and they can be seen across major cities such as Chittagong and Dhaka. Bangladeshi engineers have been trained in China, highlighting the vital role that China is playing for local capacity building. Similarly in Vietnam, our second study country for ZIP, economic development in rural areas have long been driven by Chinese, Korean, Thai and Vietnamese investment that provide livelihoods in industrial zones.
While we can argue the pros and cons of increased Chinese presence in the global development landscape as well as the workers’ rights in industrial production sites, we need to recognise that there is already active collaboration among non-western countries and they are contributing to local development.
This is not to say that western aid is not currently critical to development – especially in tackling issues that know no boundaries such as epidemic diseases. However, dynamic and capable countries like Bangladesh are already shaping their own development agenda with the help of foreign aid and investment from diverse sources. What we, development practitioners based in the West, should do now is to support these local visions and initiatives, and learn from their experiences of development.
Tackling inequality is one such issue. Our preliminary research visits highlight the precarious nature of poultry farming across our three study sites – Vietnam, Bangladesh and UK – and how issues of inequality in livelihood outcomes and poverty among citizens are shaping the poultry industry. UK, and other so-called industrial countries, can learn so much from countries like Vietnam and Bangladesh.
South-South collaboration is key, and it is embedded in our ZIP project where we actively seek opportunities to learn across Global South countries, and South-North collaboration is an important opportunity to think about our paths of economic and social development. Perhaps the sudden reduction of foreign aid is an opportunity toward a new era of development.
