Executive

Waste of the Day: USAID Offers $1.5 Million to Study ‘Gender and Climate Change’ in Pakistan

The U.S. Agency for International Development will grant $1.5 million to American universities for gender and climate studies in Pakistan.

Published

2 months ago

February 23, 2024

Adam Andrzejewski

Waste of the Day: USAID Offers $1.5 Million to Study 'Gender and Climate Change' in Pakistan

Topline: The United States Agency for International Development plans to give up to $1.5 million in grants to U.S. universities to study the relationship between “gender and climate change” in Pakistan.

Key facts: USAID is asking universities to submit three-page research proposals that will set guidelines for a new Water, Climate and Gender Activity fund for Pakistan.

The fund will potentially be used to make climate and water management policies more “gender-sensitive” and to address the “gendered impacts of natural disasters,” among other objectives.

The project is part of the U.S.-Pakistan Green Alliance, a new partnership formed early last year. The agreement recently helped complete a $150 million dam refurbishment and a $4.5 million project to improve fertilizer efficiency.

Background: USAID has already tackled similar issues by contributing more than $5 million to the Climate Gender Equity Fund, a partnership with private companies such as Amazon that pushes for “gender equity in climate finance” in Africa. The fund’s goal is to raise $60 million combined from the public and private sectors.

USAID also boasts a massive payroll. The agency had 4,364 employees in 2022 and nearly all of them made at least $100,000, according to public records that OpenTheBooks.com analyzed. Over 1,500 employees made more than $150,000.

OpenTheBooks also previously reported that USAID is among the top foreign aid spenders in the federal government. Almost half of the $47 billion the U.S. spent in foreign aid in 2018 came from USAID. The agency sent out another $41.5 billion in aid in 2022, according to its website.

Supporting quote: “The impacts of climate change are not gender neutral,” USAID Administrator Samantha Power said of the issue in general.

“Together, we can break apart these silos between gender and climate, recognize the crucial role women have to play in mitigating and adapting to climate change, empower them to lead, and by doing so, ensure our fight against this crisis is more effective. Climate change is sexist; our response shouldn’t be.”

Summary: Individually, gender inequality in developing countries and climate change could be among the world’s most pressing issues. But perhaps there’s a better use of grant money than studying the relationship between the two, especially given the funds that have already been spent on it.

The #WasteOfTheDay is brought to you by the forensic auditors at OpenTheBooks.com.

This article was originally published by RealClearInvestigations and made available via RealClearWire.

Adam Andrzejewski

CEO at OpenTheBooks.com | Website | + posts

Adam Andrzejewski (say: Angie-eff-ski) is the CEO/founder of OpenTheBooks.com. Before dedicating his life to public service, Adam co-founded HomePages Directories, a $20 million publishing company (1997-2007). His works have been featured on the BBC, Good Morning America, ABC World News Tonight, C-SPAN, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, USA Today, FOX News, CNN, National Public Radio (NPR), Forbes, Newsweek, and many other national media.

Today, OpenTheBooks.com is the largest private repository of U.S. public-sector spending. Mission: post "every dime, online, in real time." In 2022, OpenTheBooks.com captured nearly all public expenditures in the country, including nearly all disclosed federal government spending; 50 of 50 state checkbooks; and 25 million public employee salary and pension records from 50,000 public bodies across America.

The group's aggressive transparency and forensic auditing of government spending has led to the assembly of grand juries, indictments, and successful prosecutions; congressional briefings, hearings, and subpoenas; Government Accountability Office (GAO) audits; Congressional Research Service (CRS) reports; federal legislation; and much more.

Our Honorary Chairman - In Memoriam is U.S. Senator Tom Coburn, MD.

Andrzejewski's federal oversight work was included in the President's Budget To Congress FY2021. The budget cited his organization by name, bullet-pointed their findings, and footnoted/hyperlinked to their report.

Posted on YouTube, Andrzejewski's presentation, The Depth of the Swamp, at the Hillsdale College National Leadership Seminar 2020 in Naples, Florida received 3.8 million views.

Andrzejewski has spoken at the Columbia School of Journalism, Harvard Law School and the law schools at Georgetown and George Washington regarding big data journalism. As a senior policy contributor at Forbes, Adam had nearly 20 million pageviews on 206 published investigations. In 2022, investigative fact-finding on Dr. Fauci's finances led to his cancellation at Forbes.

In 2022, Andrzejewski did 473 live television and radio interviews across broadcast, major cable platforms, and radio shows. Andrzejewski is the author of The Waste of the Day column at Real Clear Policy. The column is syndicated by Sinclair Broadcast Group, owners of nearly 200 ABC, NBC, CBS, and FOX affiliates across USA.

Andrzejewski lives in Hinsdale, Illinois with his wife Kerry and three daughters. He is a lector at St. Isaac Jogues Catholic Church and has finished the Chicago Marathon eight times (PR 3:58.49 in 2022).