Millennium Challenge Account — Activity Summary

On July 23rd, IRIS assisted PPC with organizing an interagency workshop, which it co-hosted along with the Department of State and the Department of the Treasury, to consider how country competitiveness might be supported through the Millennium Challenge Account (MCA). Undersecretary John B. Taylor, Assistant Secretary of State Anthony Wayne, and Assistant Administrator of PPC (USAID) Patrick Cronin, opened the session with remarks regarding the vision and direction of the MCA. Distinguished competitiveness experts Michael E. Porter(Harvard Business School), Jose Maria Figueres, (World Economic Forum), and Michael Klein (World Bank) presented their views on this subject.

Among the topics discussed were the following: the use of competitiveness as an organizing principle for assistance through the MCA, the selection of recipients, targeting of programs, the importance of monitoring and evaluation for the program, avoiding fragmentation of US assistance efforts, and promotion of broad coordination among donors.

Over 55 representatives from the private sector, think tanks and academia, the World Bank, and various federal agencies involved in US foreign assistance efforts, as well as the newly selected members of the MCA Working Group, participated. IRIS made workshop information and background materials available through its web site. A final report was oroduced for PPC and made available to USAID personnel through IRIS’ PPC/IDEAS intranet.