A new aid reform bill, The Foreign Assistance Revitalization and Accountability Act of 2009, introduced by Senator John Kerry, Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations, calls for full US government participation in the International Aid Transparency Initiative.
Publish What You Fund
The Global Campaign for Aid Transparency
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US Chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, John Kerry, has taken an important step towards comprehensive foreign aid reform with the introduction of the Foreign Assistance Revitalization and Accountability Act of 2009.
The introduced bill proposes "to strengthen the capacity, transparency, and accountability of United States foreign assistance programs to effectively adapt and respond to new challenges of the 21st century”.
In an article in the Seattle Times, members of the Initiative for Global Development Leadership Council – Gerald Grinstein and William D. Ruckelshaus – highlighted the need for US foreign assistance to be accountable and transparent.
Information on aid should be published proactively Public bodies engaged in funding and delivering aid, and those who deliver aid on their behalf, should proactively disseminate information on their aid and aid-related activities. They should develop the necessary systems to collect, generate and ensure the automatic and timely disclosure of, at a minimum, information on: […]
The UN Millennium Development Goals 2009 Report has recognised the need to improve the availability of data and the building of a stronger statistical system. The report noted that “reliable, timely and internationally comparable data on the [Millennium Development Goals’] indicators are crucial to holding the international community accountable”.
The Open Development Barcamp, held at the World Bank and attended by over 100 people, focused on how to make aid more transparent.
The event allowed attendees – from organizations and projects to researchers, practitioners and clients in developing countries, to have improved access to aid information, data on outcomes, knowledge, and tools.
