No sensationalism, just facts and context. 
Cuts to USAID hurt American agricultural research
Cuts to USAID hurt American agricultural research
There’s another casualty from the Trump administration’s dismantling of the U.S. Agency for International Development: Funding for agriculture research at 17 labs at U.S. universities is now frozen. The labs are laying off workers, and some research is on hold.
David Hughes got the stop work order from USAID at the end of January. Hughes is director of the USAID Innovation Lab on Current and Emerging Threats to Crops at Penn State and was helping farmers in Africa fight a caterpillar that eats corn.
“And that can cause damages and losses to yield between 10% to 40% per year — it depends,” he said. “And we had scaled up an incredibly successful tool.”
The tool? A type of small, parasitic wasp that eats the caterpillars. Hughes’ lab got a grant of up to $39 million from USAID and used part of the money to mass produce and release the caterpillar-killing wasps.
But that money was frozen as part of a 90-day review period. Hughes’ lab had to stop work in five African countries and laid off 40 to 50 local staffers.
Hughes said it’s good to try to root out waste at USAID and thinks too much money is spent on consultants — but he doesn’t want research funding cut. He said more money should go toward science, which can help American farmers. (The same ones who have depended on food purchases from USAID.)
“We need a global surveillance system for problems that could come here — because they always come here — and then respond to them effectively based on training we’ve done in places like Kenya or DRC, etc.,” he said.
In an emailed statement to Marketplace, a State Department spokesperson said the review is aimed at “restructuring assistance to serve U.S. interests.” Programs that serve those interests will continue. Those that don’t will not.
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