USAID’s Approach to Poverty Reduction
The Case of Mali
EVALUATION BRIEF NUMBER 6
Summary
Mali is a least developed, heavily indebted West African country. The
Government of Mali, democratically elected in 1992, has introduced gov￾ernance reforms to decentralize administration to the local level. Lately, the
government has been focusing on strategies to reduce
poverty within its borders. In 2001, Mali was prepar￾ing a Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP) in
response to the World Bank and International
Monetary Fund’s Heavily Indebted Poor Country
(HIPC) initiative. The PRSP maps out a medium￾term expenditure framework—essentially a
roadmap—for poverty reduction programs. 
In Mali, USAID is nearing the end of a five-year
country strategy (FY1998–2002) that emphasizes
three Strategic Objectives (SOs): 1) improved social
and economic conditions for youth, covering the
health and education accounts; 2) agricultural pro￾grams focused on cereals, livestock and nontradition￾al products, and microenterprise; and 3) support to
grassroots community development organizations,
especially at the decentralized “commune” level. In
addition, USAID has two Special Objectives (SPs):
one supports improved access to the internet and
community radio; the other promotes stability in
Mali’s northern region with local development pro￾grams. About half the mission’s $33-million/year
portfolio is devoted to health and education, a third
to agriculture, and the remaining portion to demo￾cratic governance and the SPs. 
The purpose of this assessment is to view the Mali
portfolio through the lens of the Bureau for Policy
and Program Coordination’s conceptual framework
for comparing USAID’s sustainable development
approach with the poverty reduction paradigm
evolving in other development aid agencies. The
poverty reduction approach first identifies who is
poor, where they live, and what causes their poverty,
Though congressional earmarks limit
USAID’s ability to foster poverty reduc￾tion, its program in Mali is an effective
poverty reduction approach. However,
the Agency needs to do more to enable
economic growth and opportunity. 
In a country where 65 percent of the 
population live below the poverty line,
what is needed more than social service
and community development programs
is economic growth to provide an
expanded range of opportunities for
Malians.
USAID contributes only a small pro￾portion of funds to direct government
budget support and heavily relies on
civil society and the private sector to
implement its programs. This may have
jeopardized the Agency’s participation
in Mali’s national policy dialogue on
broader economic reform issues.
USAID must continue to participate 
in the country’s PRSP process to pre￾serve its influence on the spending of
debt-reduction funds and on such
issues as corruption, accountability, 
and aid effectiveness. 
KEY IDEAS
JANUARY 2003 BUREAU FOR POLICY AND PROGRAM COORDINATION PN-ACR-352
2 Evaluation Brief No. 6
and then gives top priority to interventions that
address improvements in their quality of life.
Poverty reduction is not USAID’s overarching
objective. This assessment asks whether USAID is
nevertheless engaged in poverty reduction program￾ming, whether it has modified its assistance strategy
to be consistent with Mali’s own poverty reduction
approach, and whether there are ways to enhance
the poverty reduction impact of USAID’s portfolio.
The assessment finds that in most respects USAID’s
broad-based sustainable development approach
works effectively as a poverty reduction approach.
More specifically, the assessment team finds the 
following:
■ USAID’s program is generally focused on 
the rural poor and incorporates many 
poverty reduction objectives. Its emphasis on
community-level interventions in health and
education, its focus on women and youth as
chief beneficiaries, and its community organi￾zation empowerment perspective in poor rural
areas all make strong contributions to poverty
reduction. The economic growth program
focuses both on value-added opportunities for
production and export in agriculture, as well as
microfinance initiatives that provide a safety
net to smooth consumption for the poorest of
the poor. 
■ USAID supported the PRSP process. Mission
personnel collaborated with the government in
the drafting of the Malian PRSP, especially
within the macroeconomic and civil society
thematic groups. Moreover, in developing its
new assistance strategy for FY2003, the mission
was clearly mindful of the goals and strategies
outlined in the government’s PRSP. 
■ It is imperative that USAID continue to con￾tribute to the PRSP process. The PRSP process
allows donors collectively to raise important
political economy issues (such as corruption,
accountability, and aid effectiveness) that would
otherwise not get discussed with the govern￾ment. In addition, it presents an important
opportunity to collaborate with the government
in the programming of local currency made
available for social programs under the HIPC
process. Continuous engagement with the 
central government is therefore important.
■ USAID has created an impressive synergy
among programs in different sectors. It employs
a combination of cooperative and grant agree￾ments and private-sector contracts to imple￾ment initiatives in the field. U.S. and Malian
nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) play a
key role, implementing almost half of the port￾folio. They are particularly prominent players in
the health, education, and democratic gover￾nance programs.
■ The USAID program is heavily skewed toward
delivery of direct social services to targeted
groups, with proportionately less allocated to
activities emphasizing broader economic or poli￾cy reforms that have an indirect effect on all of
the poor. Almost half of the USAID portfolio is
implemented by U.S. and Malian private volun￾tary organizations (PVOs), who provide grass￾roots services to poor people across the three
The USAID program is heavily skewed
toward delivery of direct social services to
targeted groups, with proportionately less
allocated to activities emphasizing broader
economic or policy reforms that have an
indirect effect on all of the poor.
Jonathan Sleeper, Team Leader, 
PPC, Evaluation Studies Division
B. Lynn Salinger
Associates for International Resources and Development
Zeric Smith
Management Systems International
Ellen Wertheimer
Management Systems International
PREPARED BY
USAID’s Approach to Poverty Reduction: The Case of Mali 3
main strategic areas. The USAID system of
budget and program earmarks has also ensured
that the portfolio maintains a strong service
delivery emphasis. Finally, the need to report
measurable annual achievements under the
“results framework” system puts pressure on mis￾sion officers to design short-term service delivery
rather than longer-term macro activities.
■ Direct approaches to poverty reduction involve
the delivery of services to poor people, while
indirect approaches help the enabling environ￾ment for poverty reduction. Direct assistance
has immediate, measurable impact on poverty.
Empowerment of the poor through enhanced
governance capacity building at the local level
can increase welfare. However, the question
arises whether there is a good balance between
direct and indirect assistance in the USAID
portfolio, if issues of sustainability and long￾term impact are to remain important considera￾tions. In a country like Mali, where 65 percent
of the population live on less than $1 per day,
direct social services provided by PVOs may be
largely unsustainable over the long run, particu￾larly if the government is not prepared to
assume these services. A greater number of poor
could be helped through broader-based efforts
to address the sources of poverty and the sys￾tems that perpetuate it. Some PVOs acknowl￾edge that their programs have been too focused
on direct service delivery. 
■ Commitment of a large proportion of the port￾folio to PVO projects may reflect a relative lack
of engagement on a regular basis with the gov￾ernment. This may reduce USAID’s visibility
and influence at the national level on key policy
issues, especially those having to do with eco￾nomic growth strategy development. Policy
reform and good governance create the
enabling environment for poverty reduction.
There is a risk of overlooking macroeconomic
policies that aid the poor. Among these are
policies for stimulating growth, including infra￾structure finance, privatization, industry and
service sector development, and nonagricultural
sectors of importance. Good governance and
civil service reform are also important. USAID
actively supports grassroots empowerment of
local villages, but one must ask if there are
missed opportunities at the national level to
support free and fair elections and build the
capacity of political parties and elected assem￾blies. These contribute to the enabling environ￾ment for democratic governance, rule of law,
and accountability of government, which, in
turn, contribute to the enabling environment
for economic growth.
Background
Why Poverty Reduction?
The World Bank, the IMF, UN agencies,
most bilateral donors, and many develop￾ing countries have made poverty reduction
their overarching development objective. In the
most heavily indebted poor countries, debt relief
is linked to the development of a national poverty
reduction strategy, written up in a PRSP. The
multilateral development banks view the PRSP as
the implementing document that the donor com￾munity is expected to “buy into”or support.
Despite international commitments by the U.S.
Government to poverty reduction, USAID’s guid￾ing principle is sustainable development. Poverty
reduction is not an overarching goal, but is,
rather, an important and desirable outcome of 
sustainable development.
What Is a Poverty Reduction
Approach?
A poverty reduction approach makes the reduction
of poverty the explicit, overarching goal of a develop￾ment agency. Conceptual differences exist between 
A greater number of poor could be helped
through broader-based efforts to address the
sources of poverty and the systems that
perpetuate it. Some PVOs acknowledge that
their programs have been too focused on
direct service delivery. 
4 Evaluation Brief No. 6
USAID’s sustainable development approach and
what proponents of the new poverty reduction
approach consider important.1 A poverty reduc￾tion approach
■ has poverty reduction as an overarching 
objective 
■ measures the specific poverty reduction impact
of various interventions
■ gives greater priority to health and education
services targeted by design toward the needs of
the poor 
■ gives a mixed priority to economic growth;
openness to trade, investment, and information
flows; and agriculture 
■ gives greater emphasis to the explicit empower￾ment of the poor
■ is strongly concerned with mitigation of risks
faced by the poor (vulnerability)
■ places renewed emphasis on public-sector 
institutions as partners
■ places greater emphasis on direct intervention
programs that target the poor as immediate
beneficiaries and less emphasis on indirect
approaches that emphasize the broader eco￾nomic or policy environment 
■ is concerned with the coherence between non￾development policies pursued by the U.S. and
other OECD governments and development
policies pursued by USAID 
About This Study
I
n 2001, USAID’s Bureau for Policy and
Program Coordination was asked to assess how
USAID is operating in countries where the
partner government and donor community had
shifted to the new poverty reduction approach.
This report assesses USAID’s experience in Mali.
Other reports examine experience in Uganda,
Honduras, and Romania. The purpose of this
assessment is not to evaluate the USAID program.
Rather, it is to evaluate the extent to which
USAID’s approach is an effective poverty reduction
approach and to provide insights into the Agency’s
development strategy. The evaluation addresses the
following questions:
■ To what extent is the traditional USAID sus￾tainable development approach consistent with
the new poverty reduction approach? 
■ What is USAID’s relationship to the country
PRSP process?
■ How have congressional earmarks affected
budget allocations within the mission and thus
helped or constrained the implementation of a
poverty approach? What would be different if
there were no earmarks? 
This assessment was conducted in December 2001.
The assessment team included a team leader, an
economist, a public health specialist, and a democ￾racy expert. The team interviewed USAID Mali
staff and representatives of the Government of
Mali, other development donor agencies in Mali,
and contractor or cooperating partners of USAID. 
1 See Dirck Stryker and B. Lynn Salinger, Comparing Poverty
Reduction Approaches: USAID and the Evolving Poverty Reduction
Paradigm (Cambridge, MA: AIRD, 2001).
A poverty reduction approach places greater
emphasis on direct intervention programs
that target the poor as immediate
beneficiaries and less emphasis on indirect
approaches that emphasize the broader
economic or policy environment.
USAID’s Approach to Poverty Reduction: The Case of Mali 5
Recent Developments in
Mali
Mali’s Economy Characterized by
Erratic Growth
Mali is a very poor country. Two-thirds of
the populace live on $1 a day or less.
The economy is vulnerable to erratic
rainfall and trade shocks. Growth and diversifica￾tion of the economic base is needed to achieve
more rapid poverty reduction. 
Mali’s economy is small, with a GDP of about $2.4
billion. The value of public sector expenditures is
$600 million, about 25 percent of GDP. Total debt
exceeds GDP by about 10 percent. On a net dis￾bursement basis, annual official development assis￾tance is about $354 million, equivalent to about 50
percent of the national budget and 15 percent of
GDP.
Mali is considered both a least developed and a
heavily indebted poor country. Per capita income in
1998 was $250. For the four decades since inde￾pendence in 1960, average annual economic
growth has been 2.8 percent, but this average con￾ceals extremely high fluctuations due to erratic
rainfall and trade shocks. Price and trade liberaliza￾tion reforms in 1992 and devaluation in 1994
resulted in consistently positive overall annual GNP
growth that averaged 5.3 percent between 1994
and 2000. In per capita terms, this is 2.9 percent
per year (since the population growth rate is 2.4
percent). Poor rainfall in 2000 and a farmer boy￾cott of cotton production were expected to result in
a decline in GNP for 2001. However, a significant
increase in cotton producer prices for the 2001
planting season raises expectations that the real
GNP growth rate will reach 7.0 percent in 2002
(Table 1).
Despite the fairly robust economic growth over this
period, the percentage of the national population
living below the poverty line of $1 a day declined
only slightly—from its peak of almost 72 percent
in 1996 to about 64 percent in 1999 (Table 2).
However, the percentage dropped considerably
more in urban areas, from about 41 to 31 percent.
Another study using data on household assets (not
income) from the USAID-supported Demographic
and Health Surveys found a substantial decrease in
poverty over the 1987–95 period, which saw only
two years of negative growth. 
Agriculture is Mali’s largest single sector, generating
about 45 percent of GDP and employing 80 per￾cent of the nation’s population. The main agricul￾tural subsectors are cereals, livestock, and cotton. 
A small but growing subsector covers “new crop
Table 1. Annual GNP Growth Rates
(Percentage)
1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 est. 2002 est.
GNP 2.7 7.0 4.3 6.7 5.0 6.6 4.7 –1.2 7.0
Source: DNSI, Comptes économiques du Mali.
1994 1995
Source: Republic of Mali
Table 2. Poverty Incidence in Mali
(Percentage of Population under $1/day)
Year Urban Rural National
1994 36.6 75.6 68.8
1996 40.6 78.3 71.6
1998 36.3 76.0 69.0
1999 31.2 71.3 64.2 2 Reported in Idrissa Dante et al, PRSP Institutionalisation Study Final
Report (Paris: Dial, 2001), 2, <www.odi.org.uk/pppg/poverty/publica￾tions/prsp_institution/ch6mali.pdf>.10
6 Evaluation Brief No. 6
opportunities,” such as the production of mangoes
and green beans for export. Changes in agricultural
production account for 90 percent of the variability
of total GDP. Changes in agricultural sector pro￾duction account for 90 percent of the variability of
total GDP. Compared with average GDP growth of
5.3 percent (1994–2000), value added annually in
the production of traditional cereals (millet,
sorghum, maize) increased by 5.6 percent, rice by
9.8 percent, and cotton by 11.6 percent.3 While
most of this increase was due to expanding the area
under cultivation, many crops showed steady
increases in yields. 
Mali’s link to export markets is weak. Ninety per￾cent of the country’s exports are primary prod￾ucts—cotton fiber, gold, and livestock. The first
two are sold on world markets; livestock is exported
mostly to coastal West African markets. Road and
rail linkages to those markets have high risks and
high formal and informal transaction costs. 
Mali has largely untapped potential for exporting
nontraditional, high-value products, including tex￾tiles and leather, wrought iron and furniture, silver
and gold jewelry, and culturally embedded services
such as music and tourism. Experiments with the
export to world markets of horticultural and arti￾sanal products have had only limited success due 
to the lack of reliable air transport. 
Continuing problems retarding economic growth
include poor physical infrastructure, government
mismanagement, and corruption. The government
has been slow to adopt needed structural reforms in
finance, education, and civil service, and privatiza￾tion of state-owned entities has not kept on course.
In 2000, the Malian economy was hit hard by sev￾eral exogenous shocks, including a steep increase
in the price of fuel, a key import; a sharp decline
in the price of cotton, a key export; and poor
rainfall. Poor rainfall resulted in a 17.5 percent
decline in cereals production. Vulnerability to
export markets and weather underlie Mali’s fragile
agricultural sector. 
The potential for increasing productivity in the
production of traditional cereals, rice, livestock, and
horticulture crops is the focus of the new agricul￾tural sector strategy being prepared by USAID’s
Bureau for Economic Growth, Agriculture and
Trade. However, as USAID’s Country Strategy
notes, there is “…clear evidence of the high degree
of fragility and vulnerability within the Malian
economy, as it is largely dependent on primary
agricultural and mineral production, and reinforces
the immediate need for diversifying the economy”
(emphasis added).4 The assessment team believes
that a reform agenda to diversify the economy
would preserve the growth gains realized over the
last decade.
Mali’s Political Situation Is
Democratic but Fragile
Mali’s 10-year-old democracy is fragile. Most of the
country’s postindependence history gave little sign
of its democratic potential. Following independ￾ence from France in 1960, Mali was ruled by a
civilian government with strong socialist leanings.
In 1968, a coup initiated over two decades of mili￾tary rule. Intense pro-democracy agitation in 1991
culminated in a relatively peaceful revolution dur￾ing which a reform-minded faction of the army
established a transitional government of national
unity with a majority of civilians. The new govern￾ment guided the country through a national con￾ference, a constitutional referendum, elections, and
the founding of a multiparty political system. 
Both great hope and deep pessimism colored Mali’s
first decade of democracy. The country succeeded
in preserving democratic institutions while weath￾ering storms of social protest, political intrigue,
The assessment team believes that a reform
agenda to diversify the economy would
preserve the growth gains realized over the
last decade.
3 James Tefft et al, “Linkages Between Agricultural Growth and
Improved Child Nutrition in Mali,” MSU International Development
Working Papers 79 (2000): 15. PN-ACM-467. 4 USAID Mali Strategic Plan: 1996–2002
USAID’s Approach to Poverty Reduction: The Case of Mali 7
party infighting, labor unrest, and a violent sepa￾ratist movement in the north. The surprising suc￾cess of Mali’s democratic experience is credited to a
combination of recent economic growth, social
structures conducive to democracy, a unique politi￾cal culture, a favorable international environment,
and effective leadership.5
One of the most important outcomes of the transi￾tion to democracy was the overwhelming consensus
favoring decentralization. Local elections for newly
created urban communes were held in 1998, and
for rural communes in 1999. Nearly 10,000 local
office holders were elected across the country. In
general, the effectiveness of the new political and
administrative organization remains uneven, and is
hampered in some areas where competencies and
authorities have yet to be clearly defined or imple￾mented. Nonetheless, decentralization in Mali
appears to have given greater voice and empower￾ment to villages, grassroots groups, marginalized
populations, and the poor. Meanwhile, “the
bureaucrats in Bamako” are viewed with suspicion,
and corruption in government is reportedly wide￾spread. The results of the spring 2002 presidential
election will be important to successful completion
of the PRSP and achieving a national consensus to
promote poverty reduction and economic growth.
Mali’s PRSP Process
In 1999, the World Bank and IMF announced
their debt relief initiative on behalf of HIPCs. To
qualify for debt relief, eligible countries must pres￾ent a strategy—the PRSP—for translating fiscal
savings into a medium-term expenditure frame￾work to support poverty reduction. The Malian
government established a coordination unit in the
Ministry of Economy and Finance to draft the
PRSP. In February 2001, it formally launched the
drafting process by creating 11 thematic groups
covering most sectors of the economy. The govern￾ment, civil society, and a broad swath of the donor
community are also represented in these groups. 
A fourth version of the PRSP was finalized by the
government in February 2002 and has been revised
once again since then. A definitive version of the
paper was expected in June 2002.
The PRSP process is viewed differently by different
actors. Some see it as just an exercise—a piece of
paper—being pursued by the Malians in order to
get debt relief from the international financial insti￾tutions. Others believe that the government now
understands that achieving poverty reduction will
require balancing an agenda of economic growth,
social service delivery, and democratic governance.
However, some worry that officials at the highest
levels of the country do not yet understand eco￾nomic growth and still accord highest priority in
public discourse to education and health services.
One donor representative with a long prior experi￾ence working in Uganda observed that Mali’s PRSP
experience lagged behind that of other countries.
Compared with Uganda, the PRSP process has not
been as open or as organized, and articulation of
the national vision, particularly in terms of eco￾nomic growth, is not as clear. 
Other observers found the Malian PRSP process
flawed in specific focus and orientation. For exam￾ple, many felt the government did not appropriate￾ly recognize the effort of the macroeconomic
working group attended by USAID. Noting that
official government press pronouncements on
poverty strategies emphasized redistribution and
5 Zeric Kay Smith, “Mali's Decade of Democracy,” Journal of
Democracy, 12 (July 2001): 73–79.
An outside polling station during the constitutional referendum
in the village of Dara. In spite of many challenges, Mali has
preserved its democratic institutions.
social policies, Malian economists and poverty
planners and other observers stressed that Mali
cannot just focus the PRSP on redistributing the
“pie” in favor of the poor: it must also work to
increase the size of the pie. Several donors frankly
admitted their concern that Mali was not prepared
to take responsibility for its own growth path and
that Mali saw the confluence of the PRSP and its
decentralization program as an opportunity for
encouraging local communities to program directly
with donors for resource needs. This attitude, these
observers fear, would continue aid dependence at
all levels of governance rather than putting Mali
on a growth path toward eventual reduction in
external financing requirements.
USAID’s Role in Mali
As noted above, Mali is highly dependent on
development aid. Two-thirds of official
development assistance comes from bilater￾al sources; multilateral organizations provide the
remainder. Including the World Bank/IDA, the
United States is Mali’s third largest bilateral donor
and its fourth largest overall donor. As a member of
the mixed commission that coordinated donor
assistance, USAID was an active participant in the
drafting of an earlier version of a Malian poverty
reduction strategy in 1997.
This assessment found that USAID made impor￾tant contributions to the PRSP process, particularly
in the area of civil society. Resource constraints did
not permit USAID to hire consultants or cover
some operating expenses involved in PRSP prepara￾tion. Nevertheless, many donors noted the particu￾larly strong and consistent presence of USAID
Mali’s program officer and economist at meetings
of the macroeconomic group. In the area of civil
society, without the input of USAID Mali’s demo￾cratic governance office, the PRSP process would
have been less participatory and less legitimate.
USAID financed a roundtable group of civil society
organizations to facilitate an exchange of views. 
A number of interlocutors outside of USAID
described this as the single most active civil society
group in the process. Although the group’s report
was largely critical of both the process and the con￾tent of the PRSP, government officials described the
group’s participation as both helpful and important.
In addition, USAID Mali’s democratic governance
team leader led one subgroup of the governance
thematic group and drafted the civil society section
of the PRSP. It was at her insistence that a gender
component was placed into the governance section
of the PRSP. Representatives from other USAID
SO offices also attended PRSP meetings, although
not consistently. The coordinator of the PRSP in
the Ministry of Economy and Finance observed,
“The contributions of USAID to the process have
been multifaceted and very valuable.… They have
been one of the most significant contributors to 
the process.”
Why USAID Should Remain Active
In the PRSP Process
USAID should continue to be active in PRSP
process. Mali needs donor assistance to keep the
PRSP process focused on economic growth rather
than income distribution programs. Participation
also gives donors more say on previously “taboo”
issues. Several donors commented on the fact that
participation in the PRSP process gives them a new
voice with which to address the government on
issues such as corruption and aid effectiveness.
Further, the PRSP provides an important opportu￾nity for better coherence among donor programs
because coordination is based on the commonly
agreed goal of poverty reduction. According to one
respondent, “Before, donor coordination was just
sitting around the table and telling each other what
each one was doing. Now, all the donors seem to
be thinking through the consequences of their pro￾grams on poverty reduction.”
Participation in the PRSP process also gives the
Agency a stronger voice in the programming of
HIPC debt relief monies. Government budget
resources that will be freed up as a result of debt
relief—expected to reach about $850 million over
30 years—will be used to finance expanded educa￾tion and health services. Given its very high level of
engagement in civil society, USAID must ensure
that it keeps its position at the government table
when these funds are programmed. Many of Mali’s
donors already provide budget support in these sec￾8 Evaluation Brief No. 6
tors and will be well positioned
to make recommendations on
the programming of the HIPC
funds. On the other hand,
USAID generally does not pro￾vide budget support, although
its project activities are taken
into account in the Malian gov￾ernment’s action plans in many
sectors. This new “political
economy leverage”6 suggests that
regardless of USAID’s approach
(sustainable development or
poverty reduction), it is in
USAID’s interest to participate
as actively as possible in PRSP negotiations.
USAID’s Strategic
Approach in Mali
USAID’s strategic approach over the
FY1998–2002 period was strongly “pro￾poor,”7 even though poverty reduction was
not an explicit, overarching goal. The approach
emphasized services delivered to poor people in
rural areas: health and education; microfinance
loans; agricultural extension to farmers, including
women; and grassroots empowerment. In most
cases, these services were delivered by U.S. and
Malian civil society organizations rather than by
the government. 
Over the last five years, USAID managed programs
of $166 million (Table 3). Half of the programs
were devoted to the health and education of Mali’s
youth, one-third to economic growth, and lesser
amounts to democratic governance, information,
and special development issues in the north.
USAID provided important assistance in the areas
of education policy and economic reform.
However, the mission’s overall program placed sub￾stantially less emphasis on creating an environment
that could enable economic growth and good gov￾ernance. The following sections explore the extent
to which USAID’s approach to poverty reduction
gave adequate attention to broader development
policy concerns. It also discusses how the USAID
program addresses policy coherence, targeting,
measurement, and funding earmarks.
Health and Education Get Highest
Priority 
Over half of USAID portfolio is devoted to health
and education services. This proportion substan￾tially exceeds the UNDP guideline that 20 percent
of donor country assistance be allocated to social
services. However, USAID’s health and education
activities and policies are well aligned with World
Bank and OECD guidelines for pro-poor health
systems, which emphasize primary schooling (espe￾cially for girls), investment in local health and edu￾cation infrastructure, community control and
financing, maternal and child health, and low-cost
health interventions such as immunization and
social marketing of condoms.
USAID’s health and education programs are con￾centrated in rural areas where poverty is the high￾est, and are combined under the youth SO
“improved social and economic behavior among
youth.” The health component emphasizes access
to child survival, family planning, HIV/AIDS 
USAID’s Approach to Poverty Reduction: The Case of Mali 9
6 The political economy dimension of the poverty reduction approach
is recognized in Martha Finnemore, “Redefining Development at the
World Bank,” in F. Cooper and R. Packard, eds., International Develop￾ment and the Social Science (Berkeley: UC Press, 1997): 203–27, and
in Leen Boer's article “Attacking Poverty: Rediscovering the Political
Economy” in Third World Quarterly, 22, 2 (April 2001): 283–89. 
7 “Pro-poor” is defined here as targeted to poor people.
Youth (Health, Education) (SO1) 83,900 51
Sustainable Economic Growth (SO2) 50,785 31
Democratic Governance (SO3) 15,865 10
Information (SP1) 4,150 2
North (SP2) 10,719 6
Total 165,419 100
Table 3. USAID Mali Programs, FY1998–2002
(in thousand $)
Program Allocations Pecentage
Source: USAID Mali
prevention, and reproductive
health services for young peo￾ple ages 15 to 24. The educa￾tion component seeks to
improve access to community
primary schools in underserved
rural areas. Both programs are
implemented largely under
grants and cooperative agree￾ments with major U.S. PVOs
which, with their Malian
NGO counterparts, provide
effective community services—
such as vaccinations and
maternal and child health
care—and primary school 
construction and staffing.
Activities are closely coordinat￾ed with the democratic gover￾nance program. 
The process of decentralizing
social service delivery in Mali
has been underway since the 1991 revolution.
Frustrated by the central government’s ineffective
delivery of health and education services to rural
populations, Malians have insisted on devolving
resource allocation decisions to the local level.
Historically, USAID strongly supported this trend.
However, the pendulum may have swung too far.
For instance, USAID Mali health staff members
raise concerns that decentralization of donor and
PVO social service delivery to the village level may
have allowed the state to abdicate its responsibility
for health and education financing. 
Economic Growth, Agriculture,
and Trade Are Strengthened
Economic growth is the second largest component
of USAID’s FY1998–2002 program in Mali.
Thirty percent of the mission’s program funds is
allocated under this SO, which provides technical
and financial assistance for private-sector growth
and institutional and policy reform. The strong
agriculture sector concentration is appropriate in
view of Mali’s essentially agrarian nature. Programs
focus on cereals, livestock, and horticulture, which
occupy the vast majority of Malian producers.
Using technical assistance from resident U.S. con￾tractors and PVOs, and direct support from the
Ministry of Rural Development’s extension pro￾grams, USAID looks for value-added opportunities
with individuals and with associations of produc￾ers, processors, and traders. Trade is an important
component of Mali’s economic growth strategy.
However, because Mali’s greatest export opportuni￾ties are found in increased regional integration,
trade capacity building is managed by USAID’s
West Africa Regional Program office. 
Empowering the Rural Poor 
USAID’s strategic approach is heavily focused on
grassroots empowerment in poor rural areas. The
democratic governance program promotes rural
community organizations as the agents for com￾munity development and democratic local gover￾nance. The USAID program targets most assis￾tance to rural areas where the large majority of the
poor live, and works closely with the youth SO to
integrate democratic governance into health and
education activities. This is in stark contrast to
many other USAID-supported democratic gover￾10 Evaluation Brief No. 6
Half of USAID Mali’s managed programs have been devoted to the health and education of
the country’s youth.
nance programs around the world, where assistance
to democratic institution-building at the national
and regional levels is given greater emphasis. 
The democratic governance program absorbs about
10 percent of the USAID portfolio, with the major
portion implemented by U.S. PVOs and Malian
NGOs. The bulk of activities focus on direct train￾ing and support to local community organizations
(e.g., neighborhood committees and student-par￾ent associations) and the intermediate NGOs who
provide them with capacity-building and training
programs. 
USAID provides proportionately less support to
strengthening the linkages between the community
organizations and local government, and almost no
support for decentralization of state institutions.
With some exceptions, issues of policy, institutions
of governance (including access to justice), and
national-level politics receive little emphasis in this
portfolio. Other donors—most notably the EU,
France, and Canada—are providing support in
these areas. 
The USAID program supports civil advocacy,
women’s leadership, and election assistance on a
periodic basis. However, as one U.S. PVO noted,
“We lobbied USAID to add some training of gov￾ernment personnel to our work and were told that
this was inconsistent with the current strategy.” 
Some believe that USAID’s emphasis on civil socie￾ty and decentralization and little involvement with
the central government has encouraged the devel￾opment of a new class of petty bureaucrats—some
even refer to themselves as funtionnaires de la société
civile (civil-society bureaucrats)—who may have
different agendas from the communities they claim
to represent. Moreover, anecdotal evidence suggests
that decentralization may not empower the poor as
much as reinforce the power of local elites. 
Reducing Economic Vulnerability 
USAID’s economic growth program helps reduce
the vulnerability of the poor. For example, promot￾ing private investments in irrigation reduces the
impact of climatic variability, one of the greatest
risks faced by Malians—especially poor, rural
Malians. USAID also reduces the vulnerability of
the poor by supporting private microfinance and
group-saving mechanisms, which are appropriate in
Malian society with its strong informal help net￾works.8 The microfinance program carried out by
three U.S. PVOs reached about 60,000 clients, or
15 percent of the estimated 400,000 individuals
receiving microfinance loans in Mali. In accordance
with USAID Washington guidance, staff ensure
that 50 percent of microfinance credits go to the
poorest, defined in Mali as those earning less than
$300 annually.
Mali does not receive direct U.S. food aid. However,
with funds from food monetized elsewhere in
Africa, USAID Mali supports a $5.2 million highly
targeted food security program that monitors the
health and nutritional status of malnourished chil￾dren in the northern region of Timbuktu. Children
are weighed and measured so that only malnour￾ished children and their mothers are assisted. 
Limited Reliance on Government
Institutions
Like many other USAID country programs, USAID
Mali’s program routes few resources through the
national government because of concerns about cor￾ruption and bureaucratic delays. In its response to
the 2001 survey9 on the extent of engagement in the
PRSP process, USAID Mali strongly preferred
working with the private sector and civil society. In
USAID Mali’s view, the government’s lack of relia￾bility and transparency prevent it from using
USAID resources effectively and efficiently. 
Only about 15 percent of USAID’s program activi￾ties directly support Malian government develop￾ment programs (Table 4), and even these are mostly
highly targeted service-delivery programs, including
family planning services, medicine distribution, and
USAID’s Approach to Poverty Reduction: The Case of Mali 11
8 M. Bratton et al.,”Popular Perceptions of Good Governance in
Mali,” Afrobarometer Working Papers, 9 (2001): 6–7.
9 USAID/AFR/DP, Survey of Donor Engagement with National PRSP
Processes for Synthesis and Presentation at SPA (Washington, DC:
USAID, 2001).
agricultural extension services to women. The largest
part of the portfolio—46 percent—is channeled
through U.S. PVOs that provide social services to
targeted local communities. The remaining 35 per￾cent funds U.S. private sector contractors, other U.S.
Government agencies, and other partners. 
Factors shaping USAID Mali’s strong preference
for working with NGOs include their greater
effectiveness in social service delivery and the
greater relevance of private-sector partnerships to
economic growth. USAID Mali also finds working
through government agencies labor intensive and
risky from a financial accountability perspective.
One USAID Mali officer noted that government￾implemented programs accounted for only 20 per￾cent of USAID funds but required 50 percent or
more of USAID Mali staff management time. 
The assessment team found that strong dependence
on NGOs to carry out USAID Mali’s program
raised concerns that the agency may risk losing its
influence with government. Several donor represen￾tatives in Bamako commented on USAID’s absence
from policy discussions with the government and
suggested that, as a result, the United States was no
longer considered an active partner. As one USAID
Mali officer noted, “In the past USAID participat￾ed in public sector reform. Now we separate our￾selves from government and work with beneficiaries
at the grassroots level. Why can’t we get involved in
the public sector any more?” 
Extensive use of U.S. PVOs to provide direct serv￾ice delivery at the grassroots level raised tactical
questions as well. Some observers were concerned
that while direct coordination of development assis￾tance through local NGOs may indicate closeness
to ultimate targeted beneficiaries, it also resulted in
the creation of new rent-seeking organizations
whose representatives tended to become petty
bureaucrats, not agents of social change. Others
noted that USAID Mali’s working relationship with
the government was sometimes diminished when
PVOs did not sufficiently acknowledge USAID’s
financial backing, giving the impression that the
PVOs themselves were funding programs.
Globally, the perception that USAID country assis￾tance programs may be in danger of losing policy
engagement with host country governments is not
limited to Africa. The FY1999 Trends Analysis for
USAID’s Bureau for Latin America and the
12 Evaluation Brief No. 6
Table 4. USAID Mali: Grants and Agreements with U.S. PVOs and 
Direct Support to Government Programs, FY1998-2002
(in thousand $)
SO1: Youth (Health and Education) 83,900 38,790 46.2 12,200 14.5
SO2: Economic Growth 50,785 15,305 30.1 12,800 25.2
SO3: Democratic Governance 15,865 10,840 68.3 0 0.0
SP1: Information 4,150 0 0.0 0 0.0
SP2: Assistance to North 10,719 10,719 100.0 0 0.0
Total 165,419 75,654 45.7 25,000 15.1
Strategic Objectives
Total 
Obligation
Grants and Agreements
with U.S. PVOs
Direct Support to
Government Activities
Obligation Percentage Obligation Percentage
Source: PPC Evaluation Working Paper Number 2, Poverty Reduction in Mali: A Background Paper. PN-ACR-482.
The assessment team found that strong
dependence on NGOs to carry out USAID
Mali’s program raised concerns that the
agency may risk losing its influence with
government. 
Caribbean (LAC) noted the decline in economic
growth resources over the late 1990s and the con￾current increase in programs targeting delivery of
microenterprise and social services to the poor
under the bureau’s poverty strategy.10 It recom￾mended that LAC missions take a more active role
with respect to economic policy and governance
reforms.11 The assessment team believes this point
could equally apply to USAID Mali. 
Giving Priority to Direct
Approaches
Direct approaches to poverty reduction involve the
delivery of services to poor people; indirect
approaches help establish the enabling environment
for economic growth. Direct programs tend to be
government- or PVO-provided services, short￾rather than long-term, and affect fewer people
because they are usually geographically focused.
Examples of direct programs are agricultural exten￾sion activities to small farmers or microenterprise￾lending programs for women. Indirect programs are
generally longer term and affect greater numbers of
people; examples include policies that promote eco￾nomic growth or create a stronger legal and judicial
environment. Nearly two-thirds of USAID Mali’s
portfolio comprises grassroots service delivery pro￾grams directly benefiting poor people (Table 5).
Supporting Health and Education
Although direct assistance is associated with pro￾poor outcomes, a good balance between direct and
indirect assistance is essential to foster sustainability
and long-term impact. In Mali, where poverty is so
prevalent, direct social service delivery via PVOs
may not be financially sustainable in the long run.
Moreover, PVO-implemented programs can only
reach a limited pool of beneficiaries per dollar
spent. A greater number of poor could be helped
through broader-based efforts that address the
sources of poverty and the systems that perpetuate
it. Some PVOs acknowledge that their programs
are too focused on direct service delivery, which
causes large administrative and policy problems. 
USAID, one of Mali’s leading health donors,
spends over half of its health and education
resources on vaccination programs, condom distri￾bution, and the construction of community
schools. The rest of the program supports indirect
activities—such as policy and institutional reform,
curriculum development, personnel training—
and some local cost funding of government pro￾grams. USAID obtained some notable indirect 
educational policy reforms, including the Ministry
of Education’s agreement to provide monthly salary
USAID’s Approach to Poverty Reduction: The Case of Mali 13
Table 5. USAID Mali Programs: Total Five-Year Obligations, FY1998–2002
(in thousand $)
Objectives
Direct Programs Indirect Program
Amount Percent Amount Percent
Education 14,670 52 13,300 48 27,970
Health 36,665 66 19,265 34 55,930
Economic Growth 33,375 66 17,410 34 50,785
Democratic Governance 10,840 68 5,025 32 15,865
Information and North 10,719 72 4,150 28 14,869
Total 106,269 64 59,150 36 165,419
Source: PPC Evaluation Working Paper Number 2, Poverty Reduction in Mali: A Background Paper. PN-ACR-482.
10 USAID Bureau for Latin America and the Caribbean, FY 99 Trends
Analysis: Economic Growth Area (Washington, DC: USAID, June
1999).
11 This point is also made by D. J. Plunkett and B. Lynn Salinger, 
A Case Study of the United States Agency for International
Development (Cambridge, MA: AIRD, 1999).
Amount
Total
support for teachers in 2,500 community schools.
Government recognition that community schools
are a legitimate part of Mali’s educational system
was a significant policy achievement. In health,
USAID supports the government’s health sector
development strategy, which aims to improve
health service delivery by strengthening managerial
and technical capacities.
USAID Mali’s health and education teams recog￾nize the importance of direct and indirect activities.
The teams feel emphasizing policy reform would
make it difficult to track program implementation
and satisfy results-reporting requirements.
“Sometimes we get pushed to use PVOs because
the results framework has to be clear about what to
achieve,” said one USAID officer. “The results have
to be finite, quantifiable, and achievable in yearly
increments. So maybe the mission sort of got lost
in the minutiae of the results framework and forgot
about the macro issues.”
Because low income can be a critical barrier, sever￾al interviewees felt that greater attention to issues
of economic and financial access to social services
throughout Mali would improve delivery of health
and education services. For example, children
failed to receive vaccinations because their mothers
did not have 20 cents to buy a vaccination card. A
recent study found that Malian women who had
some formal education are over twice as likely to
seek prenatal care as uneducated women, and poor
women are less likely to have an assisted delivery
than higher-income women.12 The assessment team
believes such linkages argue in favor of using child
survival funds for expanded education and
income-generating activities rather than health
services delivery.
Promoting Economic Growth
USAID Mali provides substantial support for the
direct delivery of services, including extension assis￾tance to farmers, microfinance lending, business
training for entrepreneurs, and other civil society
training. USAID provides direct support to the
Ministry of Rural Development’s rural development
organizations and the Office du Niger for extension
services to farmers and women’s groups. Improved
natural resource management practices were
extended to almost 2,000 individual smallholders.
USAID Mali also supports direct investment in
model facilities and equipment—
such as stockyards, storage 
warehouses, and grain mills.
While indirect activities comprise
only about a third of the economic
growth program, they enabled sub￾stantial export growth and market
improvement. Particularly notable
were reforms aimed at the removal of
export taxes on livestock products
and support for a national crop price
information system. Program activi￾ties also contributed to the removal
of the ceiling on interest rates and
the development of an improved
legal framework for microenterprises. 
14 Evaluation Brief No. 6
12 A.G. Kelley et al., The Equity Initiative in Mali
(IPE). Reducing Barriers to the Use of Basic Health
Services: Findings on Demand, Supply, and Quality
of Care in Sikasso and Bla (Washington, DC:
Partners for Health Reform, February 2001),
<www.phrproject.com/globali/mali/mali_en.pdf>.
A pregnant woman and mothers engaged in washing clothes in the Niger River.
Poor and uneducated Malian woman often lack prenatal care and assisted
deliveries. Income-generating activities and expanded educational opportunities
would improve their access to health care.
USAID Mali has long history of agricultural policy
reform: there is some sense that “all the big issues
have already been addressed.” USAID played a criti￾cal role in the multidonor, multiyear (1981–99)
effort to reform Mali’s cereals market. USAID’s
bilateral and regional programs also supported other
economic policy reforms, including currency deval￾uation and regional trade integration. USAID’s sup￾port for the development of an agricultural price
information network enhanced market infrastruc￾ture, enabled in part by expanding the reach of rural
radio. USAID also helped train Mali’s world agricul￾tural trade negotiators and taught advocacy tech￾niques to agricultural private-sector representatives.
However, USAID Mali discontinued its participant
training program at the beginning of the
1998–2002 planning period because of difficulties
in the USAID results-management reporting
process (i.e., difficulties of showing specific annual
results for multiyear training programs). 
Nevertheless, there are still outstanding policy
issues in Mali. A 2002 study13 points to continuing
problems in the cotton sector, finance, the business
and investment climate, the legal and regulatory
environment, and physical and human infrastruc￾ture development, among others. Privatization of
state-owned enterprises and civil service reform
remain important. Macroeconomic issues relating
to the regional monetary and economic unions to
which Mali belongs may also need to be addressed
at some point. Some of these issues are handled by
other donors or the USAID West Africa Regional
Program office.
The assessment team believes that disengagement
from the dialogue with government policymakers
may reduce USAID’s visibility on key policy issues,
especially those having to do with economic
growth. Poverty in Mali is widespread, and eco￾nomic growth is the fastest and most efficient way
to reduce poverty.14 USAID is the fourth largest
bilateral donor, yet proportionately little of its
portfolio is directed toward improving the
enabling environment for economic growth. Policy
reform is probably the most important means of
achieving economic growth and reducing poverty
in African countries.15 Therefore, it may not be
appropriate for Mali’s fourth largest donor to leave
policy reform to other donors. Increasing the
importance of USAID Mali’s program economist
office could help strengthen USAID’s participation
in key economic areas. Weak economic growth can
only make Mali’s democracy more vulnerable.16
Economic growth challenges in a desperately poor
country like Mali are enormous and argue for
expansion of programs supporting the enabling
environment for poverty reduction.
Strengthening Democratic
Governance
Fully two-thirds of the democratic governance pro￾gram is direct aid for training and capacity building
of grassroots community groups. Indirect compo￾nents include support for civic education, leader￾ship and advocacy training, and reform of the
cooperative law. Few programs address broader
issues of building the capacity of political parties;
elections and elected assemblies; institutions of gov￾ernance, including the judiciary; and crosssectoral
programs that would support legal institutions nec￾essary for the development of robust markets. More
work could also be done to link community devel￾opment activities to local government. One partic￾ularly enthusiastic interviewee described the need
to increase indirect approaches: 
We have had many direct interventions … take
gender issues for instance [waving program
booklet in the air]. See this, we have trained 30
USAID’s Approach to Poverty Reduction: The Case of Mali 15
13 Wally Tyner et al., Mali Agricultural Sector Assessment (Bethesda:
Abt Associates 2002).
14 David Dollar and Aart Kraay, Growth Is Good for the Poor
(Washington, DC: World Bank, March 2000), <www.worldbank.org/
research/growth/pdfiles/growthgoodforpoor.pdf>.
15 Paul Collier and David Dollar, “Can the World Cut Poverty in Half?
How Policy Reform and Effective Aid Can Meet International
Development Goals,” World Development 29 (2001).
16 Robert J Barro, “Democracy and Growth,” Journal of Economic
Growth, 1(1996): 1–27.
USAID’s support for the development of an
agricultural price information network
enhanced market infrastructure, enabled in
part by expanding the reach of rural radio.
women’s groups for 20 years now. This is fine
… but it is only a drop in the bucket! We could
really make a difference by looking at issues of
advocacy and legal reform, things that could
impact on the lives of all women for a long
period of time.
USAID Programs Generally Target
the Poor
USAID programs are targeted to poor people gen￾erally rather than explicitly. For instance, building
community schools in underserved rural areas
serves the poor because government schools are
located in wealthier areas. Child survival and repro￾ductive health programs focus on women and chil￾dren who tend to be poorer in health and econom￾ic status. Girls are an important target group for
the education program. The economic growth pro￾gram includes a strong emphasis on horticultural
crops, an important source of income for women.
Democratic governance programs focus on women’s
participation in the political process. 
USAID Mali’s program makes no specific effort,
however, to target programs to the very poorest.
Staff and partners alike question the utility of more
directed targeting because the vast majority of
Malians are poor. Some observe that targeted pro￾grams within a community risk stigmatizing the
poor. The health and education program operates
in all five of Mali’s southern regions where 90 
percent of the population resides, though it is not
possible for the program to effectively cover such a
vast area. Instead of choosing where to work on the
basis of poverty incidence, the regions are often
divided up among the donors or chosen by PVOs
on the basis of their expertise or past success in 
certain places. Yet Malians with the poorest health
status tend to live in the most remote areas, where
it is more difficult for PVOs to work. NGOs com￾mitted to equity sometimes choose to implement
health activities in underserved areas, although not
because USAID has requested they do so. 
Analyzing poverty may strengthen the development
impact of some USAID-assisted programs. Such an
analysis would define the causes of poverty, identify
who is poor and how they earn their livelihoods,
and assess the specific poverty reduction impact of
various activities. Areas of intervention could be
more systematically selected using criteria based on
geography, income, or health. Disaggregated social
or political economy analysis needed for pro-poor
targeting may seem unnecessarily complicated in a
country where the overwhelming majority live at or
below the poverty line. However, requiring devel￾opment strategists to consider the dynamics of who
will benefit from a proposed intervention can
improve the impact of development programs on
poor people at the local level. In the absence of
such analysis, local power holders—who tend to
dominate the distribution of assistance at the local
level—are likely to benefit the most from develop￾ment interventions.
USAID Mali’s poverty indicators do not measure
effects on poor groups, although they are usually
disaggregated by gender and by rural or urban resi￾dence. Because poverty is so widespread and deep,
USAID Mali assumes that its indicators are reliable
16 Evaluation Brief No. 6
Women winnowing at a cereal bank. USAID Mali has a long
history of agricultural policy reform and played a critical role in
the effort to reform the country’s cereals market.
measures of poverty reduction. However, poverty
could be tracked more closely through the
Demographic and Health Survey which USAID
Mali helps fund. This survey collects household
data periodically on more than 70 indicators in
rural and urban areas, including fertility, maternal
and child mortality, malnutrition, and educational
attainment. If USAID Mali decided to track pover￾ty more closely, it could recommend that future
surveys disaggregate data by economic quintiles to
show how these indicators vary among poorer and
richer groups. The Demographic and Health
Survey tool is an area of USAID comparative
advantage that could contribute to the poverty
analysis process.
U.S. Policies Lack
Coherence
Lack of policy coherence—consistency of a
donor country’s policy objectives and instru￾ments in their totality—hinders achievement
of USAID’s objectives in Mali. For example, the
World Bank worked hard to reform Mali’s cotton
producer-price policy to link domestic purchase
prices more directly to world market price trends.
Yet Mali’s agricultural exporters are plagued by low
world commodity market prices, which largely
reflect U.S. and European Union policies of provid￾ing large subsidies to their own agricultural produc￾ers. Such developed-country agricultural policies
increase world production and lower world prices
below those that would otherwise prevail.
Another example of policy incoherence is the
Bumpers Amendment to the FY1995 Appropria￾tions Act, i.e., the U.S. directive against providing
assistance to local producers of agricultural com￾modities whose exports may compete with U.S.
agricultural production. Although cotton is Mali’s
single largest export commodity—and despite the
fact that reform of the cotton fiber subsector is
Mali’s most pressing political economy challenge
today—many respondents said that USAID could
not get involved in the cotton sector in Mali
because of the Bumpers Amendment prohibition.
U.S. policy incoherence also limits USAID’s pro￾gramming for export promotion and capacity
building, objectives supported by USAID and most
development agencies. African products are subject
to numerous import restrictions, including U.S.
agricultural sanitary and phytosanitary regulations
and the requirement to use U.S. or African fiber or
fabric in garments to benefit from U.S. duty- and
quota-free import privileges. African exporters per￾ceive these regulations as overly restrictive. 
Earmarks Distort
Assistance Delivery
Congressional budget directives—“earmarks”—
bias Mali programs toward direct service
delivery. Appropriations bills allocate funds
to promote specific social service spending. These
earmarks sometimes act as barriers to effective 
programming. For example, USAID’s health pro￾gram has twice the budget of the education portfo￾lio because of earmarks. This is difficult to justify
in Mali, where the education ministry is better able
to absorb aid than is the health ministry. 
USAID Mali’s health and education staff testify 
to the difficulties that earmarks cause when they
try to direct funds to meet country needs.
Congressional earmarks support basic education,
which is interpreted as a directive against support
for education programs that target illiterate adults
and out-of-school youth who are older than pri￾mary school-age children. Thus, earmarks for pri￾mary education do not allow the health and educa￾tion office to support nonformal education pro￾grams that could serve the vast and vulnerable
majority of Malian youth who are not in school.
Earmarks also inhibit addressing gaps in teacher
USAID’s Approach to Poverty Reduction: The Case of Mali 17
If USAID Mali decided to track poverty
more closely, it could recommend that future
surveys disaggregate data by economic
quintiles to show how these indicators vary
among poorer and richer groups. 
training, textbooks, and materials. USAID Mali
was unable to use child survival and development
monies for new-entry teacher training for commu￾nity schools, a program with an important poverty
reduction impact. 
A former senior USAID Mali officer noted:
USAID Mali’s suggestions to increase funding
for economic growth were regularly frustrated
by the congressional micromanagement practice
of earmarking, which essentially left the mission
with no choice but to fund the social issue.…
Economic growth funds were increasingly rare
and generally reserved for the more advanced
economies. In contrast, basic health and basic
education funds were plentiful and easy to
obtain… Were Congress—and Washington
more generally—to have given Bamako the
authority to shape its own budget, the mission
would clearly have emphasized more strongly
the economic growth issues.
Lessons Learned
USAID’s program is an effective poverty
reduction approach, but it should do more to
enable economic growth and opportunity.
USAID’s Mali program—although not defined as a
poverty reduction program—incorporates many
poverty reduction objectives and makes strong con￾tributions to the government’s overarching poverty
reduction goal. Its community-level interventions in
health and education, direct focus on women and
youth, and support for local organization empower￾ment demonstrate USAID Mali’s strong emphasis
on direct delivery of social services to the poor
through grassroots programs. However, nothing
reduces poverty more rapidly and more widely than
economic growth. Thus, USAID should give more
attention to the enabling environment for poverty
reduction. In a country where 65 percent of the
population live below the poverty line, what is need￾ed more than social service and community devel￾opment programs to help reallocate the existing
“pie” is economic growth—a bigger pie—to provide
an expanded range of opportunities for Malians.
Agriculture is a logical place to stimulate growth,
and USAID has identified numerous opportunities
to do so. 
However, there are other growth-related issues
which cannot be covered under the agriculture
rubric that relate to the creation of the enabling
environment for economic growth, such as econom￾ic policy and governance reform. Increasing the
importance of the program economist office in the
mission could also help strengthen USAID’s atten￾tion to other key economic areas, including infra￾structure, regulatory, and finance reform; privatiza￾tion; and industry and service-sector development. 
However, USAID’s reluctance to work through
public sector offices reduces USAID’s visibility and
impact at the national level on key policy issues,
especially those having to do with economic
growth and governance. USAID Mali may wish to
review whether it is maintaining an appropriate
balance between partnerships which favor the pri￾vate and nongovernmental sectors and direct
involvement with the government, particularly in
policy affairs. Currently, over 60 percent of
USAID Mali’s resources in all program areas are
allocated to activities that provide services directly
to poor people. The remaining 40 percent are allo￾cated to activities emphasizing broader economic
or policy environments that have an indirect effect
on all of the poor.
Participating in the PRSP process gives
donors greater voice at policymaking levels,
provides an opportunity for discussion of
difficult subjects, and strengthens program
coordination and cooperation.
18 Evaluation Brief No. 6
1
2
In a country where 65 percent of the
population live below the poverty line,
what is needed more than social service and
community development programs ... is
economic growth ... to provide an expanded
range of opportunities for Malians. 
Donors highly value their participa￾tion in the PRSP process. Most
donor representatives believe that
donor organizations in Mali now
more than ever speak with one voice
to the government, improving pro￾gram coordination and collaboration.
The PRSP process also provides an
opportunity for donors to address
issues that were once taboo, such as
corruption. USAID contributed
directly to the PRSP process, particu￾larly by encouraging civil society par￾ticipation. USAID’s FY2003–12
assistance strategy was clearly mindful
of the goals and strategies being out￾lined in the government’s PRSP.
USAID needs to stay fully engaged in
the PRSP process to stimulate donor
coordination and leverage on issues
such as corruption, accountability,
and aid effectiveness. USAID should
also be engaged to preserve its influ￾ence on the spending of HIPC debt￾reduction funds. Because USAID
contributes only a small proportion
of its program funds for direct government budget
support—which provides the strongest opportunity
to influence government policy—USAID will
require more voice at policymaking levels to ensure
that its project assistance fits into the individual
sector strategy programs.
USAID could add value to its portfolio by
designing and targeting its poverty reduction
programs more carefully. 
USAID could add value to its portfolio by being
more explicit about how its programs relate to
poverty reduction. Although its PVO partners often
make implicit targeting decisions in their choice of
regions in which to work and with which socioeco￾nomic groups, USAID’s program could be even
better focused on poverty reduction if it was
designed with more explicit attention paid to the
dynamics of socioeconomic relations in the areas of
intervention where USAID works. Data for moni￾toring poverty reduction is weak. USAID’s
Demographic and Health Survey could be 
modified to provide information on household
consumption, in addition to health status and
access to services.
Concentrating on PVO development part￾nerships may jeopardize USAID’s participa￾tion in the national policy dialogue. 
Only 15 percent of USAID Mali programs are
implemented through the government. About 45
percent are implemented through PVOs, some of
whom do not give USAID adequate recognition as
a source of funding. By heavily weighting civil soci￾ety and the private sector, USAID may be losing its
place at the national policy dialogue table and ced￾ing to others the opportunity to participate in
deliberations on broader economic reform issues.
Moreover, USAID’s backing of decentralization and
civil society may be stimulating the proliferation of
petty bureaucrats—rent-seekers in economic
terms—without strong grassroots origins or 
community connections. 
USAID’s Approach to Poverty Reduction: The Case of Mali 19
3
4
A woman in her dry-season garden. Many USAID Mali’s programs center on women’s
health and the education of girls. Its economic growth program emphasizes
horticultural crops, an important source of income for women.
Earmarks limit USAID’s ability to foster
poverty reduction.
Congressional earmarks limit USAID program￾ming flexibility for poverty reduction. Earmarks
for child survival and development funds prevent￾ed greater funding for education programs that
were badly in need. More broadly, the mission has
been constrained by the need for quantifiable
results and by overall funding directives that allo￾cate proportionately more to health and education
than to economic growth. At times, USAID is
unable to take advantage of strong synergistic link￾ages between education, health, and economic
growth because of the current system of program
and budget earmarks.
20 Evaluation Brief No. 6
5
About this publication: IBI–International Business Initiatives furnished editorial and production assistance for this publication. More 
detailed data and analysis are available in the companion piece to this publication, which is listed in the box above. 
To order copies or download: These documents can be ordered from USAID’s Development Experience Clearinghouse (DEC). To download,
go to www.dec.org and enter PN-ACR-352 as the document identification number in the search box. The DEC may also be 
contacted at 1611 N. Kent St., Ste. 200, Arlington, VA 22209; tel 703-351-4006; fax 703-351-4039; email docorder@dec.cdie.org.
Photo credits: Page 7, USAID; Page 10, Kathryn Wolford, Lutheran World Relief; Page 14, Sara A. Holtz; Page 16, Maggie Murray-Lee,
Lutheran World Relief; Page 19, Bill Horn, Lutheran World Relief. Except for the photo on page 7, photographs are courtesy of M/MC
Photoshare, <www.jhuccp.org/mmc>. 
Evaluation Briefs on USAID’s Approach to 
Poverty Reduction 
Honduras (PN-ACR-351)
Mali (PN-ACR-352)
Romania (PN-ACR-353)
Uganda (PN-ACR-354)
PPC Evaluation Working Papers on USAID’s
Approach to Poverty Reduction 
Honduras (PN-ACR-481)
Mali (PN-ACR-482)
Uganda (PN-ACR-483)
Evaluation Briefs provide summaries of key findings. Evaluation Working
Papers provide additional background information and data.
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