Post Tagged with: "economic reform"

Change in the Air

I feel like I’m getting spoiled taking all these helicopter rides. Aerial footage is definitely worth the effort if you can take the wind burn and the pilot’s bill that comes along with it. Drones work well too, yes – just not when you have 200 square kilometers to cover. Here I document the Millennium Challenge Corporation‘s Senegal Compact, which has rehabilitated highways and markets in the north and south and brought renewed farming abilities to the Senegal River Valley through an irrigation infrastructure overhaul. MCC is a foreign aid agency established by the US Congress that applies new philosophies to the implementation of development assistance with the aim of increasing economic growth. Rogue states and kleptocracies need not apply. Countries must pass a number of indicators including control of corruption, civil liberties, and trade policy to be eligible for a compact. Senegal, being one of Africa’s most stable democracies, had[…]

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The Big Picture

This is big-picture stuff.  No, I’m not talking about the number of megapixels on my Canon 5D Mark III, I’m talking about the work of US development organization, MCC.  The Millennium Challenge Corporation works to impact developing nations and their economies on a macro scale.  Part of this work means renovating the infrastructure on which a nation operates.  While certainly not the most emotionally gripping topic, infrastructure is key to any country’s economic development.  Build a solid enough foundation, and a nation will have the tools it needs to provide for its own citizens. Above, a main artery stretches through the city of Nampula, in Mozambique, where MCC is rehabilitating roads and renovating the city’s municipal water system.  The country’s grueling civil war ended in 1992, but much of its infrastructure has yet to recover, even now.  Below, workers construct the Nacala Dam in northern Mozambique, which will supply water[…]

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