USAID Development Experience Clearinghouse

Large collection of documents relating to aid activities undertaken by USAID.

The Development Experience Clearinghouse (DEC) is the largest online resource for USAID funded, international development documentation. The purpose of the DEC is to strengthen USAID's development projects, activities, and programs by making these development experience documents available to USAID offices and mission staff, PVO's, NGO's, universities and research institutions, developing countries, and the public worldwide.

About USAID

The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) is an independent federal government agency that provides economic, development and humanitarian assistance around the world in support of the foreign policy goals of the United States.

On September 4, 1961, the Congress passed the Foreign Assistance Act, which reorganized the U.S. foreign assistance programs including separating military and non-military aid. The Act mandated the creation of an agency to administer economic assistance programs, and on November 3, 1961, President John F. Kennedy established the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). USAID became the first U.S. foreign assistance organization whose primary emphasis was on long-range economic and social development assistance efforts. Freed from political and military functions that plagued its predecessor organizations, USAID was able to offer direct support to the developing nations of the world. The agency unified already existing U.S. aid efforts, combining the economic and technical assistance operations of the International Cooperation Agency, the loan activities of the Development Loan Fund, the local currency functions of the Export-Import Bank, and the agricultural surplus distribution activities of the Food for Peace program of the Department of Agriculture.