USAID’s staff – our colleagues and friends – builds self-reliance in partner countries, projects American values globally, and advances our foreign-policy and national-security priorities.

USAID’s development and humanitarian assistance is key to achieving prosperity and stability for our partner countries, as well as the United States. The President’s Fiscal Year (FY) 2020 budget request for USAID’s development assistance in South Asia is $332.3 million, which represents a 73 percent increase over FY 2019’s request. This request supports USAID’s programs in Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Sri Lanka, and the Maldives.

Last month, I traveled to eastern DRC and saw the scale of this outbreak and the response firsthand. I have traveled extensively in my career, from my three decades with the U.S. Navy and in the roles I’ve held since. This trip to the DRC was one of the most important trips I have ever taken. I heard directly from local traditional and religious leaders, as well as our partners, about the challenges communities and response actors are facing. There continues to be ongoing violence and community distrust towards the response driven by years of political and humanitarian failures in the region. The U.S. Government has been working closely with the Government of the DRC, the World Health Organization (WHO), and other international partners to control the spread of disease since the outbreak began, and we’re taking the concerns of our partners into account as we adapt our response. Bringing an end to this devastating outbreak is a top priority for the U.S. Government, because we are committed to reducing the suffering of those affected by Ebola, and because effective efforts to contain and end the outbreak can prevent it from reaching the broader region, as well as our borders.

The FY 2020 request for USAID fully and partially managed accounts is approximately $19.2 billion, an increase of $2.4 billion, or 14 percent, over last year’s request. It requests $6.3 billion for global health and $5.2 billion for the Economic Support and Development Fund. In terms of USAID’s humanitarian assistance, it requests $6 billion for the new International Humanitarian Assistance Account, which, combined with all available resources, will allow us to maintain the highest level ever of U.S. humanitarian assistance programming

USAID remains focused on our core day-to-day work: helping support the world’s most-vulnerable populations affected by humanitarian crises; promoting human rights, democracy, and citizen-responsive governance; and improving development outcomes in the areas of economic growth, education, environment, and health worldwide. Every day, our highly professional and dedicated staff work diligently to deliver sustainable development solutions and build self-reliance in partner countries, project American values globally, and advance our foreign-policy and national-security objectives.