‘We called ourselves the lifeboat crew’: how fired USAID workers launched a rescue project ‘to save as many babies as we can’ | USAID
THey, call yourself “the rescue team”. After losing their jobs suddenly when the Trump administration reduced Uverseas Aid earlier this year, a group of dedicated workers decided to launch their own rescue package.
By refusing to “wallow in misery”, Rob Rosenbaum, a former USAID economist, and a group of former agency employees with similar views have started to save some of the vital programs that have been faced with closure after the cuts.
Now, nearly 80 projects have been saved by a matchmaking service managed by Rosenbaum and other former USAID staff, who found them $ 110 million (82 million pounds sterling) new funds. The team behind the initiative to optimize project resources (Pro) estimates that it will benefit 40 million people, including many children under the age of five.
After closing the USAID, expenses were frozen, thousands of employees were dismissed and projects worldwide have stopped or have been left to get to what Rosenbaum “falling dates”.
Rosenbaum and some of his colleagues were approached by a foundation which “wanted to understand how they could make the best use of their limited resources”.
They created a menu from the list of canceled projects, identifying those which “provide the most rescue aid by dollar” and where a new funder could be useful and maintain things.
They quickly realized that demand was wider than this initial foundation and began to approach other potential donors.
“We called ourselves the rescue team at the start,” explains Rosenbaum. “The ship has flowed, and there are not enough rescue canoes so that each project is carried out, and we are therefore trying to literally save as many babies as possible, to obtain as much life hats as possible, via projects that provide help.”
Pro, now working within the framework of the Center for Global Development Thinktank, has obtained funding for 79 projects on its list in more than 30 countries. Three re -established funding from the USAID. Nine could not be saved in time.
Funding came from a mixture of philanthropic foundations and rich individuals. Most want to remain anonymous.
“They come from very different reasons and perspectives, but the common thread that we have heard is:” I feel horrified by what is happening. I really want to find a way to intervene, ”explains Rosenbaum.
“I think there was a” AHA ”moment for all of us when we started working on it, that it created an opportunity to rotate from the ice on the sofa, wallowed in the misery of everything that was going on around us, to have something productive to really sink.”
A project that has found funding through Pro is the work of the Alliance for International Medical Action (Alima) to provide services, including treatment for severe acute malnutrition, maternity services and vital infant vaccines in Mali.
It is essential to maintain such programs, explains Rosenbaum, not only because the restarting of operations if they stopped would be extremely expensive, but also because of the quantity of confidence in areas ravaged by conflicts if Alima was withdrawn.
“Alima told us […] “We are very worried that if we are moving away, we may never be invited.” “”
Projects with longer -term objectives, such as strengthening health systems, or in other areas such as education, have not been part of Pro work. He also does not try to save projects indefinitely but to “buy time for organizations and, frankly, the wider ecosystem, to find a longer term solution”.
After finding funding for all projects on his initial list, Pro said that he will now focus on achieving more people with “proven and profitable interventions”.
