USAID is pumping more investments in deprived regions in Upper Egypt. Mohamed El-Sayed looks at the recent projects Living in a poor house in the Upper Egyptian village of Abu Qurqas, Minya, Mona Kamal's husband can barely bring in a meagre income by working in the field. Therefore, she decided to take out a LE200 loan from the USAID-funded micro-finance programme which is managed by the Assiut Businessmen Association. "I bought primitive tools to produce dairy products," Kamal told Al-Ahram Weekly. "Today, I can make LE35 daily by selling cheese and butter, which enables me to send all of my four children to school." She now intends to take a LE3,000 loan from the micro-finance programme to buy her own buffalo to produce milk, instead of buying it from other people. The success stories of people who had access to micro-finance loans in Minya are many, ranging from making bricks to producing dairy products. In fact, the micro-finance programme enabled scores of underprivileged families to make a reasonable income which helped them change their lives, allowing them to send their children to school instead of forcing them to drop out to work in the fields. USAID's impact is especially palpable in the governorate of Minya, where it helped build and upgrade many schools, potable water treatment plants and networks, as well as health clinics. Having spent $100 million on water and sanitation projects in the impoverished governorate since 1983, USAID last week signed a new $9.2 million agreement with the governorate of Minya to build three water treatment facilities in the villages of Bertebat, Tookh Al-Kheil, and Bani Hassan. "These projects will serve existing residents whose number exceeds 205,000," stated Minya Governor Ahmed Diaaeddin, following the signing of the agreement with the head of USAID Egypt's mission Hilda M Arellano. "The grants offered by USAID are different from those of other donors," Diaaeddin explained, "since they come in the form of cash money which is wisely spent according to a well-studied plan covering many aspects of development. The aid is always translated into improving services for the deprived." He continued that the projects implemented by USAID in Minya have become a model for other donating agencies. "We look forward to more cooperation with USAID in different projects in Minya," the governor noted. USAID is also taking part in the Education Development Programme through funding many projects. During her visit to Minya, Arellano inspected Al-Nahda Girl's Preparatory School in Touna Al-Gabal, which was built under USAID's New School Programme. Other recent projects in Minya included Abu Qurqas Education Resource Centre, designed to train teachers on state-of-the-art teaching techniques; and the funding of Saft Al-Sharqiya Health Clinic as part of the Communications for Healthy Living Project designed to educate local women on basic health requirements. Arellano told the Weekly that USAID has focussed on Upper Egypt, as well as governorates with the highest population living in poverty and extreme poverty. "This was part of a strategy the mission started four years ago," she explained, "and Minya is one of the main governorates targeted." But what are USAID's priorities in the future in light of a budget cut from $415 million to $200 starting in 2010? "Our current budget and strategy, which covers programmes of economic growth like micro-finance, education, healthcare, democracy, infrastructure and environment, will continue through to 2010," stated Arellano. "We are currently negotiating with the government [on future priorities]. Starting 2011, we will probably be phasing out of infrastructure and health [projects], except for some specific fields like Avian Flu. We will focus on education, economic issues, investment promotion and job creation." She revealed that her agency is currently in discussions with the Egyptian government on what will happen after the cuts. "USAID is adopting a new direction [in its projects], which will be focussed on capacity building and training, and looking ahead to [supporting] modern educational techniques, which the Ministry of Education is trying to introduce within the context of the Education Reform Programme," said Arellano . "USAID is keen on guaranteeing sustainability in the newly established projects." According to Arellano, USAID will begin withdrawing from infrastructure projects in 2011 because the Egyptian government said it wanted to undertake such projects by itself. "Last year, the government put more funds into infrastructure projects," revealed Arellano. "However, we provided the government with an additional $75 million in funds for [future] infrastructure projects." Nonetheless, the agency intends to continue with ongoing projects in the coming few years. "After that, some of the areas we used to focus on will phase down, and the funds pumped into these projects will be [smaller]," said Arellano. Meanwhile, USAID is currently working extensively in the areas of administration of justice and decentralisation. "We also work on a grants programme for civil society," she added. USAID's contribution to the Education Development Programme, conducted in conjunction with the Ministry of Education, has always been a controversial issue. Detractors argue that American experts intervene in the content of school syllabuses. "The majority of the experts employed in educational projects are Egyptians, who constitute around 95 per cent," stressed Arellano. "American experts only come to assume technical assistance management in such areas as teacher training methodology, the use of information technology in classrooms, teacher material production, and planning curricula," she explained. As more donating institutions come to Egypt, USAID is being asked to provide technical assistance rather than undertaking direct projects, according to Arellano. "USAID is always backed into doing this role because we are one of the few donors who are willing to do that," she said. "We don't necessarily like it, but the government knows we will provide technical assistance, so they ask us to do it." In water projects, the agency focuses on institution building, sustainability and training, where Egyptian engineers and technicians are equipped to run these institutions. "Focussing on technical assistance is more boring, and less visible [to the public]," stated Arellano. "I think it is a good thing to be less visible than we were before; our job is to work ourselves out of the job."
