Third, the agency continues to do more to work directly with people in the developing world. Sustainable development is driven from the ground up. Foreign assistance has always worked with governments in efforts to get policy right and create an institutional framework for growth. Whether it is microenterprise, immunization campaigns, encouraging democracy or teaching children, the agency is increasingly harnessing the best of America's know-how to directly improve the lives of people in the developing world. Just as the world has changed dramatically since the end of the Cold War, so has the role of America's foreign assistance program.
Foreign assistance is more central than ever before.
The United States is assisting nations around the world in starting stock markets, helping the innocent victims of famine and conflict and working to increase human capacity. Under the Administrator's leadership, the agency's talented and dedicated staff has produced impressive results. The Greater Horn of Africa Initiative is a model for regional and intergovernmental teamwork, as is the related African Food Security Initiative. The agency's work in helping privatize the economies of the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe will have a great historical legacy. At times, I think the agency has been something like a family emerging from a protracted series of traumas.