Andy Karas, Acting Mission Director of USAID Ghana (with microphone) on the field
One flourishing evidence of US presence in Ghana is the operations of the United States Aid for International Development (USAID) which has been a partner in Ghana’s development for the past five decades and counting.
With its headquarters in Washington DC, USAID is present across the world where the US Government runs an embassy. The agency is very visible in Africa and Ghana is one of the largest beneficiary of USAID program on the continent says Andy Karas, Acting Mission Director of USAID Ghana, in an exclusive interview with Diplomatic Call.
USAID Ghana.
Mr. Karas describes USAID Ghana as the assistance of the people of the United States to the people of Ghana. The agency recently celebrated 50 years of work in Ghana which indicates a long standing and historical relationship with the people of Ghana.
The US government very much appreciates Ghana’s rapid and remarkable progress in economic growth, coupled with significant improvement in various sectors as well as the country’s democratic credentials.
With Ghana’s current status as a middle income country, the operations of USAID in Ghana is skewed towards supporting different objectives and aspirations of the people of Ghana for social, economic and political development.
Priority & Focal Areas.
The agency’s effort in adding up to the development of Ghana is seen in four major focal and priority areas including
Health: Ghana’s health sector forms the largest of the component of work of USAID with devotion to maternal child health, malaria programming, HIV Aids, weather and sanitation as well as the system strengthening and capacity enhancement of the Ministry of Health, Ghana Health Service and the various Regional and District Health Directorate to deliver improved quality health at all levels to the people of Ghana.
Economic Growth: The US Government’s global hunger and food security initiative “Feed the Future” committed to develop comprehensive food security plan for the continent has been in full swing in the country as USAID’s agricultural targets in Ghana is to increase crop yield, increase production, ensuring household food security and improving nutritional outcomes particularly in Northern Ghana. Thus, agriculture forms a key part of USAID economic operations in Ghana bearing in mind quite a huge number of Ghanaians derive their livelihood and income through agriculture.
Private Sector Development: as well as US Presidential Initiative “Power Africa” which aims at improving energy supply and transmission within the country also forms part of the work of the agency under the its Economic Growth agenda.
Education: According to Andy Karas, efforts on primary school education in improving educational outcome particularly reading and writing (literacy) is the main focus of USAID in Ghana. In this regard, the agency works hand in hand with the Ministry of Education and Ghana Education Service in arriving at this goal.
Democracy, Rights and Governance: The fourth focal area of USAID on Democracy, Rights and Governance deals with accountability and transparency of governmental institutions with a link to a robust participation of citizens in the governance process. This sector is very critical to the work of USAID in that, it cuts across each of the other sectors if a headway is to be achieved.
Milestone & Progress.
“We believe in all our focal areas, there is work to be done, there are challenges and important opportunities, but we are pleased with the progress made so far” says Mr. Karas.
Agriculture: Mr. Karas indicated that with the introduction of improved agricultural inputs, seeds, fertilizer, land preparation among others, significant increase in yields and productions have been realized, for instance, in maize and other value chains especially in the Northern part of the country where farmers have adopted improved practices USAID is promoting in collaboration with the Ministry of Agriculture. USAID is pleased to see those improvements.
Health: Also, with the Universal Distribution of Bed nets initiative under the agency’s malaria programming, it is worthy to note that communities have taken up indoor residual spraying to reduce the incidence of malaria particularly during the rainy season.
Andy Karas sounded very proud of the agency’s work in relation to Ghana’s Health Insurance scheme. “I will like to commend Ghana for being a bold leader on health insurance and a goal of having a universal health insurance on the continent. We know there are challenges just like any public health scheme as in the US as well and we will continue to support NHIA in the interest of all Ghanaians to provide quality health care for the people of Ghana” he ended.
The USAID has also been keen in social mobilization and education around HIV AIDs and other public health issues in Ghana.
Education: USAID has been working at all levels of education particularly in primary schools to improve results in reading. The agency is very much aware of the shortcomings in Basic Education Certificate Examinations and Mr. Karas indicates, “we will be tracking results to see improvements made”.
With the fore knowledge of sufficient educational infrastructure being a key component of making strides in education, a lot of investments have been pumped around the country into the building primary school blocks and district education offices to improve the conditions of education administrators, teachers and students and “we are proud of the work done in association with the AMA” says Andy Karas.
Governance: USAID is pleased to have worked with organizations like the Electoral Commission on previous general elections, local elections and hopefully in the 2016 general elections. Significant work has also be done at local levels with citizens to effectively monitor the delivery of social services in education, health etc.
The agency has also worked with local partners such as the Ghana Integrity initiative, Transparency International and the Centre for Democratic Governance to improve accountability and to see the citizen receiving support in education, health and infrastructure that they rightly deserve.
Investments So Far.
USAID has roughly programmed about 150 million USD on the average in the past recent years in all the four focal areas of the agency.
Impact on Ghana’s Socio Economic Growth.
The Acting Mission Director of USAID Ghana, Andy Karas mentions the work of USAID is about impacting on Ghana’s growth. He continues that, the ultimate of the work is to improve the quality of life and that is “Impact”. He posited that “we can often say maize production has increased from one percentage to other, but how has that really translating to improving the quality of life in a household for instance in Navrongo”.
In this regard, the USAID undertakes a lot of work in what the agency describes as outputs and outcomes which are both Impact Level Assessment.
The agency puts premium on impact level evaluations by looking at overall impacts. This, Andy Kara mentions is a very important part of the process. He concluded that “Impacts are long term proposed but we are seeing the pendulum swinging in the right directions and we are pleased with the impact level outcomes”.
What Lies Ahead.
With prevailing conditions of peace and security, which is an unparalleled hallmark of Ghana in the sub region, USAID’s strategic mission in Ghana will continue to support the people of Ghana and the Government of Ghana to accelerate the transition in establishing a solid lower middle country and beyond and to accelerate the pace of that transformation.
Andy Karas and his team at USAID enjoys working in Ghana due to conditions of peace and security which in his opinion “enables development to occur without a doubt”. According to him, Ghana is seen as a leader in many important ways not only on the continent but around the world, thus USAID’s objective is to support Ghana’s important leadership and realization of its goals and aspirations as a country.
Working in Ghana.
It is also important to note, a lot of the work of USAID has been around Northern Ghana which has historically been for many years neglected. USAID acknowledges efforts by the government through partnerships such as SADA and others in bridging the gap between the Northern and Southern parts of the country. So is the USAID in adding up to the government’s effort to the extent that a USAID sub office has been set up in Northern Ghana housed within the Regional Coordination Council.
This in all aspects and understanding can be regarded and recognized as a demonstration of the support of USAID to Northern Region.
For Andy Karas, the great joy of his work in Ghana is getting out to the field and the opportunity to sit on farms with farmers, getting into classroom with teachers, meeting with women and kids receiving healthcare services, meeting with district assemblies and organizations as well as interacting with every day Ghanaians “to really talk and see with my eyes whats happening on farms, coastal fishing areas, schools etc. “This helps us validate the impact of our work”. To him, these have been the most rewarding times in seeing USAID investments make a difference in Ghana.
Source: Diplomatic Call
