Remarks by USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah at the Bread for the World Conference

The following is an excerpt from USAID Administrator Shah’s remarks at the Bread for the World conference in November 2012. Read his full remarks on the USAID website. 

It is hard to believe that just three years ago, President Obama first introduced the global food security initiative Feed the Future. It all felt so new at the time, because it was new.

It represented a new model of development, which has, in many ways, come to define the way we work around the world today. A model that advances a far deeper focus on science, technology, and innovation to dramatically expand the realm of what is possible in development. A model that engages far more broadly with private sector partners—putting behind us an old reluctance to work together and engaging companies not as wellsprings of corporate charity, but as real partners with an interest in serving the needs of the most vulnerable. And a model that delivers more for our partners, but demands far more as well. 

Today, we see this model at work across our efforts in food security. We see it in our new emphasis on developing cutting-edge agricultural technologies that are sowing economies with the seeds they need to grow.

In Bangladesh, an innovation in fertilizer called deep urea placement has transformed over 600,000 hectares of land and led to the first-ever rice surplus in the country’s poorest state.

And in East Africa, vitamin A-rich orange-fleshed sweet potatoes are reaching tens of thousands of households, protecting kids from diseases and improving nutrition.