Blog Archives

Why US foreign assistance data must stay public: The case for aid transparency

By Sally Paxton and George Ingram | Feb 23, 2025 | Blog

Aid transparency is the law. The 2016 Foreign Aid Accountability Act and 2018 Evidence-Based Policymaking Act mandate public access to U.S. foreign assistance data. The removal of key USAID data sets and websites limits the ability to assess program effectiveness and spending. Without transparency, accountability weakens. The solution isn’t less data, but better data. Expanding subcontractor details and evaluations would strengthen oversight—not erase it.

How transparent is UK aid in 2025?

By Elma Jenkins and Alex Tilley | Feb 11, 2025 | Blog

What is UK aid being spent on, how much of it is being channelled through non-FCDO departments , how is the UK’s aid changing, and what impact is it having? In order to answer these questions we need detailed, transparent data about UK aid. Over the coming eight months Publish What You Fund will review the availability, accessibility and quality of information published by eight of the largest (non-FCDO) UK aid-spending departments, plus the Integrated Security Fund.

USAID’s localization progress: encouraging steps, but measurement challenges remain

By Gary Forster and Sally Paxton | Jan 22, 2025 | Blog

We’ve been tracking USAID’s localization journey since Administrator Samantha Power first announced the agency’s intention to provide 25% of its funding to local organizations in 2021. Our work has focused on the issue of how much money is actually channelled directly to local organizations. In this article, we reflect on USAID’s new FY 2024 localization progress report, highlighting where USAID is leading the way, identifying areas that still need attention, and looking ahead to what’s next.

Most donors are not matching their local funding pledges with action

By Henry Lewis | Dec 17, 2024 | Blog, News

Many bilateral donors have signed up to international agreements to take a more locally led approach and transfer a greater share of resources to local partners. But our new study finds that many of the same donors are not sharing any practical evidence of increased local funding. Commitments Without Accountability highlights that four out of five donors do not have localisation strategies or clear definitions, targets, or methods for measuring progress in funding shifts.

A common thread for scaling development finance: transparency

By Sally Paxton and Guest | Nov 13, 2024 | Blog

Following the World Bank Annual Meetings, and amidst negotiations for the replenishment of the International Development Association, Sally Paxton and Nancy Lee sift through some of the issues holding back the scaling of public and private resources. They find a common thread – transparency – and argue that multilateral development banks should be using the power of their own data to help fill the information gaps that stand in the way of progress.

Transforming our understanding of what works to mobilise private investors

By Sally Paxton and Gary Forster | Oct 16, 2024 | Blog

Ahead of next week’s World Bank Annual Meetings, Sally Paxton discusses the critical role of development banks in mobilising private capital to meet global development goals, and why we still don’t understand what is working. She presents new recommendations from Publish What You Fund to fill the current knowledge gap by improving the measurement and disclosure of private capital mobilisation, and stresses why action is urgently needed.

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