WATERVILLE, Maine — Spend money to save money. That’s the philosophy Dr. Rajiv Shah uses to direct the U.S. Agency for International Development, which this year will distribute $23 billion or more to war-torn or nature-ravaged countries around the world.
With so many problems on the domestic front, Shah, who was the commencement speaker at Colby College Sunday, acknowledges that some people question the wisdom of sending so much taxpayer money overseas, but he said most of them come around when they recognize the alternative.
“The resources we spend on all of our engagement and diplomacy and development are far, far lower than what we spend on our military involvement,” said Shah during an interview with the Bangor Daily News before his commencement speech and receipt of an honorary degree from Colby. “If we can demonstrate that we’re getting great results at efficient costs, then the American people have a huge willingness to make these investments. They recognize that by expanding the reach of our values we extend the reach of our security and economic opportunities.”
The accomplishment of USAID’s goals are usually central to the U.S. pulling out of military interventions such as the ones in Iraq and Afghanistan, creating what at first blush seems like an unlikely partnership between humanitarian aid and military muscle. But that’s not the way Shah sees it.
“We work to help create the minimum conditions so that the Afghans or Iraqis or our other partners around the world can handle their own destinies,” said Shah.
In addition to his role at the head of USAID, Shah has worked for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and served as the country’s Under Secretary for Research, Education and Economics. He said he learned the business of achieving results from Gates and used South Korea to illustrate his point about the value of investing in other countries. In the 1960s, he said, that country was among the poorest of the poor.
“South Korea used to be a poorer country than most of sub-Saharan Africa is today,” he said. “We now have more U.S. jobs created through our exports and trade relationships with South Korea than we do with France. In many ways that’s the type of success story that we are trying to re-create and build in other parts of the world.”
Shah, 38, was appointed to his USAID post on December 31, 2009. Less than two weeks later a terrible earthquake hit Haiti and Shah found himself in the middle of one of the most terrible humanitarian disasters the world has seen. More than 200,000 people died, and the millions who survived faced weeks and months of deprivation of the most basic human needs.
“To be part of an effort that included the U.S. military and so many different federal agencies as we really mounted what was the largest humanitarian effort ever — feeding more than 4 million people, getting clean water to more than 1.5 million people, doing more surgeries to save people’s lives and limbs than ever before — was really extraordinary,” said Shah.
At Colby’s commencement, Shah urged 486 graduates that whatever skills they possess can be used to the benefit of those in need, no matter what they studied in Waterville.
“Today any career or skill can be put to the service of those in need,” he said, according to the college’s website. “Whether you choose to join development or any other field, your broad and inclusive view of the world will give you insights that allow you to shape a much more interconnected planet.”
Shah, who is the highest ranking Indian-American presidential appointment the United States has ever had, was born from Indian immigrants and grew up around Detroit, a city known for its own economic troubles of late. Asked by the Bangor Daily News if those facts influenced his choice of global humanitarianism as a vocation, Shah stuck to his previous optimism. Detroit’s a great city with a lot going for it, he said.
“That city really does represent something special for me,” he said.
At 38 years old, Shah works amid diplomats, military officers and humanitarian experts whose careers already span longer than Shah’s life. Asked if that’s a challenge, Shah said he has a simple secret.
“I just try to focus on being a very good listener,” he said. “We have people who have been with USAID for decades. My job is really to support them to be as effective as possible and to shorten the distance between their ideas and actions.”
