Number 1, March 2012
Development Works
Bread for the World Institute provides
policy analysis on hunger and strategies to
end it. The Institute educates its network,
opinion leaders, policy makers and the
public about hunger in the United States
and abroad.
Snapshot
Laura Elizabeth Pohl
• Development assistance enables
people in poor countries to build a
better life for themselves and their
children.
Jane Sabbi and her sister-in-law work in their garden in Uganda. Sabbi now cultivates
beans and vegetables to help give her children the nutrients they need.
Effective Development Assistance:
Now Is The Time
Bread for the World and other organizations working to end global hunger
frequently talk about development assistance and how it can help hungry
people overseas. But what exactly is development assistance? And why should
we support funding for it when many Americans are facing hard times?
Development Assistance Means….
Bees and chickens
Most of Alexander Appiah’s friends had left his hometown, Nkwabeng, Ghana, to work in nearby cities. But at 28, Appiah wanted to farm. He had few
resources; he and his wife were just scraping by with a quarter-acre of cassava and
yams and his off-season job as a farm laborer.
1
• In developing countries, investing
small amounts in training,
tools, or start-up costs can
yield significant improvements
because people make good use
of the resources available to
them. Development assistance
helps communities and nations
strengthen their economies and
create better living conditions—
for example, by enabling people to
buy seeds and fertilizers, establish
small businesses, or meet public
needs such as clean water.
• Countries develop successful
strategies against hunger by
using their own resources and
development assistance to
strengthen the essentials, such
as more productive farms and
access to nutritious food and
basic health care, particularly
for vulnerable groups such as
pregnant women and young
children.
• Effective development assistance
saves millions of lives every
year—and this is done through
programs that the United States
can afford. It is both the right
thing and the smart thing to do.