Development Co-operation Profiles

United States

Introduction

As the world’s largest provider of official development assistance (ODA), the United States has substantial development programmes in all sectors and regions. Foreign assistance priorities include global health and security, tackling the climate crisis, promoting democracy and good governance while countering authoritarianism, and addressing discrimination and inequality. The United States’ total ODA (USD 66 billion, preliminary data) increased in 2023, representing 0.24% of gross national income (GNI).

Find the methodological notes behind the profile here.

Policy

The Biden-Harris administration has renewed the United States’ commitment to global development and international co-operation as a key instrument of American foreign policy. The role of development co-operation is articulated in the 2022 National Security Strategy. The Department of State and United States Agency for International Development’s (USAID) Joint Strategic Plan FY 2022-2026 spells out the United States’ development co-operation goals. Integrated country strategies set objectives for development co-operation and the full range of bilateral relations. Cross-cutting aspects of bilateral co-operation are localisation of its assistance; stronger engagement with the private sector; digitalisation; an emphasis on diversity and inclusion; and the humanitarian, development and peace nexus. Through an executive order, it aims to tackle the climate crisis at home and abroad and address domestic, transboundary and long-term impacts.

Although it provides most of its ODA bilaterally, the United States is also the world’s largest financial contributor to multilateral organisations. In governing bodies, it advocates, in particular, for organisational effectiveness. To facilitate the shift to localisation, the Locally Led Development and Humanitarian Response Act was enacted in March 2024 and includes provisions to allow proposals in languages other than English, increase the minimum indirect cost rate and change some procurement rules.

Poverty and inequality reductions

The United States’ approach to reducing poverty and inequality focuses on promoting inclusive development and diversity, equity, inclusivity and accessibility as a cross-cutting agenda. The United States’ Joint Strategic Plan FY 2022-2026 outlines that recent international crises have reinforced the attention to poverty reduction as a strategic objective. USAID has dedicated strategies on a wide range of horizontal inequalities, including gender equality and women’s empowerment, youth, indigenous peoples, LGBTQI+ inclusion, and children in adversity. With the 2023 updated Equity Action Plan, there has also been a push towards advancing racial equity, justice and equal opportunities. To embed inequality considerations in its programme cycle, USAID requires all programmes to undertake gender and youth analyses, but also recommends inclusive development analyses.

Findings from OECD-DAC reviews

The 2022 OECD-DAC peer review praised the United States for the overall magnitude of its foreign assistance, including in global health; its commitment to diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility in its programming and human resources; and its strong political commitment to locally led development and USAID’s internal system reform. The review found opportunities to build on bipartisan political support to forge an effective whole-of-government approach; work closely with Congress so that appropriated funds better align with partner countries’ needs; diversify development finance instruments and their uptake; and keep conflict prevention at the core of programming across all countries. The peer review found that of the 18 recommendations in the 2016 peer review, the United States had fully implemented 3 and partially implemented 12. Learn more about the United States’ 2022 DAC peer review and its management response [DCD/DAC/AR(2024)5/7].

ODA allocation overview

The United States provided USD 66 billion (preliminary data) of ODA in 2023 (USD 63.6 billion in constant terms), representing 0.24% of GNI (grant-equivalent methodology).1 This was an increase of 5.2% in real terms in volume and an increase in the share of GNI from 2022. The United States’ ODA has steadily increased since 2020, although the FY2024 US foreign assistance bill includes a 6% cut overall, with humanitarian assistance increasing by 10%. The United States has not committed to the 0.7% ODA/GNI target. It provided all of its ODA as grants in 2022.2

In 2023, the United States ranked 25th among Development Assistance Committee (DAC) member countries when ODA is taken as a share of GNI and is the top DAC provider in terms of total ODA volume. The United States is the largest humanitarian partner, providing the highest volume of humanitarian assistance in 2022 (USD 16.6 billion in bilateral ODA commitments). It also provided the largest volume of gross bilateral ODA disbursements to Africa (USD 13.2 billion).

 

Notes: Data on official development assistance (ODA) volumes (figure above) are in constant 2022 prices. Data for 2023 are preliminary. See the methodological notes for further details.

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The United States is committed to several international targets and Development Assistance Committee standards and recommendations. Learn more about DAC recommendations.

Performance against commitments and DAC recommendations

Description	Target	2021	2022	2023, preliminary
ODA as a share of GNI (%)	0.7	0.20	0.23	0.24
Total ODA to least developed countries as a share of GNI (%)	0.15-0.20	0.07	0.06
Share of untied ODA covered by the DAC Recommendation	100	73.6	71.9
Share of untied ODA (All sectors and countries beyond the scope of the Untying Recommendation) (%)		53.8	63.6
Grant element of total ODA (%)	>86	100	100

Note: ODA: official development assistance; GNI: gross national income; DAC: Development Assistance Committee. This table only includes information about ODA data-related DAC recommendations.

The United States provided a higher share of its ODA bilaterally in 2022. Gross bilateral ODA was 86.3% of total ODA disbursements. Thirty-five per cent of gross bilateral ODA was channelled through multilateral organisations (earmarked contributions). The United States allocated 13.7% of the total ODA as core contributions to multilateral organisations.

 

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ODA for Ukraine

In 2023, the United States provided USD 11.9 billion (preliminary data) of net bilateral ODA to Ukraine to respond to the impacts of Russia’s war of aggression, a 23.7% increase from 2022 in real terms. USD 1.1 billion of the amount was allocated to humanitarian assistance, a 197.3% increase from 2022.

 

Note: The amount reported in 2023 is an estimate, based on preliminary figures reported to the OECD and published in April 2024.

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ODA to and through the multilateral system

In 2022, the United States provided USD 27 billion of gross ODA to the multilateral system, an increase of 36.0% in real terms from 2021. Of this, USD 8.4 billion was core multilateral ODA, while USD 18.6 billion was non-core contributions earmarked for a specific country, region, theme or purpose. Project-type funding earmarked for a specific theme and/or country accounted for 82.3% of the United States’ non-core contributions, and 17.7% was programmatic funding (to pooled funds and specific-purpose programmes and funds).

 

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Eighty-one per cent of the United States’ total contributions to multilateral organisations in 2022 were allocated to the World Bank and the UN system.

 

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The United Nations (UN) system received 42.2% of the United States’ multilateral contributions, of which USD 9.3 billion (81.3%) represented earmarked contributions. Out of a total volume of USD 11.4 billion to the UN system, the top three UN recipients of the United States’ support (core and earmarked contributions) were the WFP (USD 4.1 billion), UNHCR (USD 2.1 billion) and UNICEF (USD 917.1 million).

 

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See the section Geographic, sectoral and thematic focus of ODA for the breakdown of bilateral allocations, including ODA earmarked through the multilateral development system. Learn more about multilateral development finance.

Bilateral ODA

In 2022, the United States’ bilateral spending increased compared to the previous year. It provided USD 52.8 billion of gross bilateral ODA (which includes earmarked contributions to multilateral organisations). This represented an increase of 26.6% in real terms from 2021.

In 2022, country programmable aid was 39.5% of the United States’ gross bilateral ODA, compared to the DAC country average of 42%. In-donor refugee costs were USD 7.8 billion in 2022, an increase of 51.9% in real terms over 2021, and represented 14.7% of the United States’ total gross bilateral ODA.

 

Note: NGO: non-governmental organisation.

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In 2022, the United States channelled bilateral ODA mainly through multilateral organisations as earmarked funding and the public sector. Technical co-operation made up 0.8% of gross ODA in 2022.

 

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Civil society organisations

In 2022, civil society organisations (CSOs) received USD 8.9 billion of gross bilateral ODA, of which 12.3% was directed to developing country-based CSOs. Overall, 0% of gross bilateral ODA was allocated to CSOs as core contributions and 16.9% was channelled through CSOs to implement projects initiated by the donor (earmarked funding). From 2021 to 2022, the combined core and earmarked contributions for CSOs decreased as a share of bilateral ODA, from 21.1% to 16.9%. Learn more about the DAC Recommendation on Enabling Civil Society in Development Co-operation and Humanitarian Aid.

 

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Geographic, sectoral and thematic focus of ODA

In 2022, the United States’ bilateral ODA was primarily focused on Africa. USD 13.2 billion was allocated to Africa and USD 10 billion to ODA-eligible countries in Europe (of which 92.6% for Ukraine), accounting respectively for 25% and 18.9% of gross bilateral ODA. USD 3.9 billion was allocated to Asia (excluding the Middle East). Europe was the main regional recipient of the United States’ earmarked contributions to multilateral organisations.

Bilateral ODA by recipient country

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In 2022, 32.7% of gross bilateral ODA went to the United States’ top 10 recipients. Its top recipient was Ukraine, which received six times as much ODA as the second largest recipient, Ethiopia. Other top recipients were in Central Asia, the Middle East, and sub-Saharan Africa. The share of gross bilateral ODA not allocated by country was 43.1%, of which 34.2% consisted of expenditures for processing and hosting refugees in provider countries.

 

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In 2022, the United States allocated 0.06% of its GNI to the least developed countries (LDCs). The United States allocated the highest share of gross bilateral ODA (25.7%) to lower middle income countries in 2022, noting that 43.1% was unallocated by income group. Least developed countries (LDCs) received 22.5% of the United States’ gross bilateral ODA (USD 11.9 billion). Additionally, the United States allocated 13.6% of gross bilateral ODA to land-locked developing countries in 2022, equal to USD 7.2 billion. The United States allocated 1.3% of gross bilateral ODA to small island developing states (SIDS) in 2022, equal to USD 683.2 million.

 

Note: LDC: least developed country; LIC: low-income country; LMIC: lower middle-income country; UMIC: upper middle-income country; MADCTs: more advanced developing countries and territories.

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Fragile contexts

Support to fragile contexts was USD 15.2 billion in 2022, representing 28.8% of the United States’ gross bilateral ODA. Forty-two per cent of this ODA was provided in the form of humanitarian assistance, decreasing only slightly from 42.9% in 2021, while 5.7% was allocated to peace, decreasing slightly from 7.6% in 2021. Two per cent went to conflict prevention, a subset of contributions to peace, representing a slight decrease from 2.8% in 2021. Learn more about support to fragile contexts on the States of Fragility platform.

 

Note: HDP: humanitarian-development-peace. The chart represents only gross bilateral official development assistance that is allocated by country.

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Sectors

In 2022, the largest focus of the United States’ bilateral ODA was social infrastructure and services. Investments in this area accounted for 40.2% of bilateral ODA commitments (USD 21.6 billion) with a strong focus on support to government and civil society (USD 12 billion), health and population (USD 7.6 billion, 14.1% of gross bilateral ODA, and a 10.4% increase from 2019 in real terms) and education (USD 1.3 billion). ODA for humanitarian assistance was 30.8% of bilateral ODA commitments (USD 16.6 billion), primarily for emergency response (USD 16.3 billion). ODA for other sectors amounted to USD 13.2 billion (24.6% of bilateral ODA), with a significant portion (USD 8.4 billion) for refugee costs. Earmarked contributions to multilateral organisations also focused on humanitarian assistance and social sectors in 2022.

 

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ODA for COVID-19

In 2022, the United States disbursed USD 3.1 billion in ODA for the COVID-19 response, down from USD 5.2 billion in 2021. The United States did not report donations of vaccines from its domestic supply in its ODA in 2021 or 2022.

Gender equality

In the period 2021-22, the United States committed 14.8% of its screened bilateral allocable aid to gender equality and women’s empowerment as either a principal or significant objective (down from 22.4% in 2019-20), compared with the 2021-22 DAC average of 43.3%. This is equal to USD 5.7 billion of bilateral ODA in support of gender equality. Unpacking the gender equality data further:

• The share of screened bilateral allocable aid committed to gender equality and women’s empowerment as a principal objective was 1.5% in 2021-22, compared with the DAC average of 3.9%.

• The United States includes gender equality objectives in 1.1% of its ODA for humanitarian aid, below the 2021-22 DAC average of 17%.

• The United States screens virtually all their bilateral allocable aid activities against the DAC gender equality policy marker (100% in 2021-22).

• The United States committed USD 16.4 million of ODA to end violence against women and girls and USD 1.1 million to support women’s rights organisations and movements and government institutions in 2021-22.

Learn more about Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women and Girls: DAC Guidance for Development Partners and the DAC Recommendation on Ending Sexual Exploitation in Development Co-operation.

 

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Environment

In 2021-22, the United States committed 10% of its total bilateral allocable aid (USD 4.1 billion) in support of the environment and the Rio Conventions (the DAC average was 35.1%), up from 9% in 2019-20. Unpacking the environmental data further:

• Three per cent of screened bilateral allocable aid focused on environmental issues as a principal objective, compared with the DAC average of 11%.

• Seven per cent of total bilateral allocable aid (USD 2.7 billion) focused on climate change overall, up from 3.2% in 2019-20 (the DAC average was 30.5%). The United States had a greater focus on adaptation (5.6%) than on mitigation (3.3%) in 2021-22.

• Two per cent of screened bilateral allocable aid (USD 736.8 million) focused on biodiversity overall, down from 2.6% in 2019-20 (the DAC average was 7.2%).

Learn more about the DAC Declaration on Aligning Development Co-operation with the Goals of the Paris Agreement on Climate Change [DAC/CHAIR(2021)1/FINAL].

 

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Performance against environment and Rio Markers, 2021-2022

Marker	Constant 2022 USD billion	% of bilateral allocable
Environment	4.1	10
Rio markers:
Biodiversity	0.7	1.8
Desertification	0	0
Climate change mitigation only	0.4	1
Climate change adaptation only	1.4	3.3
Both climate change mitigation and adaptation	1	2.3

Note: Individual Rio Markers should not be added up as this can result in double counting.

The OECD initiative Sustainable Oceans for All shows that the United States committed USD 127.1 million in support of the conservation and sustainable use of the ocean in 2022, USD 6.6 million more than in 2021. The 2022 value is equivalent to 0.3% of the United States’ bilateral allocable aid.

Other cross-cutting sectors and themes

In 2022, the United States also:

• Committed USD 26.3 million of bilateral ODA to the mobilisation of domestic resources in developing countries, amounting to 0.1% of its bilateral allocable aid. Regarding the payment of local tax and customs duties for ODA-funded goods and services, the United States generally requests exemptions and makes this information available on the OECD Digital Transparency Hub on the Tax Treatment of ODA.

• Committed USD 2.3 billion (5.5% of its bilateral allocable aid) to promote aid for trade and improve developing countries’ trade performance and integration into the world economy in 2022. The United States is among the top 10 official providers of aid for trade globally.

• Committed USD 9.8 billion (23% of its bilateral allocable aid) to address the immediate or underlying determinants of malnutrition in developing countries across a variety of sectors, such as emergency response, health and population policies/programmes & reproductive health.

Mobilised private finance

The United States uses leveraging mechanisms to mobilise private finance for sustainable development. In 2022, USAID, the International Development Finance Corporation (DFC) and the State Department mobilised USD 5.9 billion from the private sector through guarantees, shares in collective investment vehicles, simple co-financing and direct investment in companies and special purpose vehicles. This constituted a 13.8% increase compared to 2021.

 

Note: CIV: collective investment vehicle; SPV: special purpose vehicle.

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A share of 61.4% targeted middle-income countries, while 6.7% went to LDCs and other low-income countries (LICs) in 2021-22, noting that 31.9% was unallocated by income.

 

Note: LDC: least developed country; LIC: low-income country; LMIC: lower middle-income country; UMIC: upper middle-income country; MADCTs: more advanced developing countries and territories.

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Mobilised private finance by the United States in 2021-22 related mainly to activities in banking and financial services (58.6%) as its top sector. Furthermore, over this period, 36% of the United States’ total mobilised private finance was for climate action.

Private sector instruments

In 2022, DFC extended USD 2.1 billion in the form of loans to the private sector. These loans to the private sector were reported as other official flows, not under ODA.

 

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In 2022, USD 104.3 million (4.9%) of the United States’ private sector instruments were allocated to the LDCs and other LICs, while a majority (76.2%) went to middle-income countries and LMICs in particular (56%). Moreover, USD 398.5 million were unallocated by income. The United States’ private sector instruments primarily supported projects in banking and financial services (78.6%) and energy (11.9%).

 

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Effectiveness of development co-operation

The Global Partnership for Effective Development Co-operation monitoring exercise tracks the implementation of the effectiveness commitments. Following the reform of the exercise over 2020-22, the 4th global monitoring round (2023-26) is underway. Information on partner countries’ participation in the exercise, as well as their progress, is available at the Global Dashboard. The United States’ results from the 2016 and 2018 monitoring rounds can be found here.

To help improve the transparency of development co-operation, the OECD provides regular feedback to members on the overall quality of their statistical reporting and works with each member to ensure the data meet high-quality standards before they are published. Regarding DAC/CRS reporting to the OECD, the United States’ reporting in 2022 was late but complete, with some areas to improve in terms of the accuracy of the data.

Total official support for sustainable development

Total official support for sustainable development (TOSSD) is an international statistical standard that monitors all official and officially supported resources for financing the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in developing countries, as well as for addressing global challenges. It provides a broad measure of development finance with the objective of increasing transparency and accountability of all external support that developing countries receive. In 2022, activities reported by the United States as TOSSD totalled USD 67.4 billion, up from USD 55.2 billion in 2021. Activity-level data on TOSSD by recipient are available at https://tossd.online.

Institutional set-up

USAID is an independent agency of the US government that manages the majority of ODA. It works closely with the State Department and receives overall foreign policy guidance from the Secretary of State. The Department of the Treasury has decision-making authority for multilateral development banks and key global funds. In 2019, the Overseas Private Investment Corporation and USAID’s Development Credit Authority, Office of Private Capital and Microenterprise, enterprise funds, and sovereign loan guarantees portfolio were consolidated under the DFC, which has expanded authorities under the BUILD Act of 2018. A smaller percentage of ODA is managed by the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), an innovative US foreign assistance agency whose mission is to reduce poverty through economic growth. In total, 21 US government agencies manage foreign assistance.

In 2023, USAID had a total staff of over 13 700, with nearly 7000 posted in partner countries (of which approximately 70% were locally hired). The MCC directly employs a total of around 340 staff, with 309 in headquarters and 33 in partner countries. The DFC employs approximately 663 staff, with 15 employed overseas (direct hires, contractors and locally employed staff).

 

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The Advisory Committee on Voluntary Foreign Aid is a formal multi-stakeholder mechanism which links the US government and private voluntary organisations active in humanitarian assistance and development work overseas. CSOs active in development co-operation, humanitarian assistance and global citizenship education co-ordinate under the umbrella body InterAction.

Quality and oversight

Internal systems and processes help ensure the effective delivery of the United States’ development co-operation. Select features are shown in the table below.

Features of the United States’ systems for quality and oversight

Quality assurance	All US agencies implementing foreign assistance are required to meet the monitoring and evaluation requirements of the Foreign Aid Transparency and Accountability Act, the Foundations for Evidence-based Policymaking Act, and the White House Office of Management and Budget’s monitoring guidelines. The Offices of the Inspector General review the integrity of programmes and operations.
Risk management	Managing risk is fundamental to the United States Agency for International Development’s (USAID) core mission. Enterprise risk management and internal controls are considered key to achieving its goals and objectives, identifying and improving the effectiveness and efficiency of operations, providing reliable reporting, and ensuring compliance with relevant laws and regulations. USAID revised its Risk Appetite Statement in August 2022.
Innovation and adaptation	USAID’s Innovation, Technology, and Research Hub has divisions dedicated to emerging technologies, digitalisation, innovation and scientific research. Other innovation divisions within USAID include the Center for Innovation and Impact in the Global Health Bureau. USAID flagship programmes include the Development Innovation Ventures initiative and the Women in the Digital Economy Fund, a joint effort between USAID and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
Results management	USAID has a solid policy framework and organisational set-up to deliver results, adapt and learn. Meanwhile, accountability is a strong driver of reporting results and managing evidence. New measurement approaches and results-based methods for locally led development are being explored.
Evaluation	Four US government agencies – the US Department of State, USAID, the Development Finance Corporation (DFC) and the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) – manage and evaluate a significant share of US foreign assistance, each with a dedicated service overseeing and supporting implementation. The DFC uses a performance management tool called Impact Quotient to evaluate projects across three key indicators for growth, inclusion and innovation. Learn more about the United States’ evaluation system, including the US Department of State’s Office of Foreign Assistance; USAID’s Office of Learning, Evaluation and Research; the DFC; and the MCC’s Department of Policy and Evaluation. Visit the DAC Evaluation Resource Centre for evaluations of the United States’ development co-operation.
Knowledge management and learning	USAID established an agency-level knowledge management and organisational learning officer and function in 2019. An Agency Learning Agenda articulates priorities and focuses resources on critical knowledge gaps related to policy priorities. USAID is developing a knowledge management policy and establishing an agency-wide process and toolkit for knowledge handover when staff move positions.
Communication and transparency	USAID and the Department of State jointly manage and publish foreign assistance data on the ForeignAssistance.gov website. The United States encourages decision-makers to use this publicly available data for programme planning, including the platform’s Development Cooperation Landscape tool, to base decisions on what other development actors are doing.

Additional resources

2022 OECD-DAC peer review of the United States: https://www.oecd.org/dac/oecd-development-co-operation-peer-reviews-united-states-2022-6da3a74e-en.htm

United States Agency for International Development (USAID): http://www.usaid.gov

Millennium Challenge Corporation: https://www.mcc.gov

US International Development Finance Corporation: https://www.dfc.gov

CSO umbrella organisation InterAction: https://www.interaction.org

United States’ practices on the Development Co-operation TIPs: Tools Insights Practices learning platform: https://www.oecd.org/development-cooperation-learning?tag-key+partner=united+states#search

Member of the OECD Development Assistance Committee (DAC) since 1961.

The methodological notes provide further details on the definitions and statistical methodologies applied, including the grant-equivalent methodology, core and earmarked contributions to multilateral organisations, country programmable aid, channels of delivery, bilateral ODA unspecified/unallocated, bilateral allocable aid, the gender equality policy marker, and the environment markers.

Notes

← 1.  DAC members adopted the grant-equivalent methodology starting from their reporting of 2018 data as a more accurate way to count the donor effort in development loans. See the methodological notes for further details.

← 2.  Other providers also provide non-grants, which include sovereign loans, multilateral loans, equity investment and loans to the private sector.