Yesterday, 23rd September, Congressman Howard L. Berman, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, joined President Obama in making foreign aid reform a priority in alleviation of poverty.

Berman states that the Policy Directive signed by Obama echoes reforms being made by his committee, including ‘elevating and strengthening the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), underscoring the importance of country ownership and responsibility, improving coordination among U.S. government agencies and between the U.S. and other donors, expanding multilateral capabilities’.

We are pleased that both Obama and Berman are taking a united approach to foreign assistance reform. The coordination of development aid agencies in the U.S. is an essential starting point for making U.S. aid more transparent and effective.

In addition, Obama asked that ‘countries commit to the same transparency that [they] expect from others’ in his address to the UN General Assembly.

Read Berman’s statement.