Partnerships and leveraging public-private capital are powerful multipliers of development impact and an effective way to bring the core strengths and capabilities of the public sector, private sector and civil society together to solve problems that no one organization or entity can solve on its own. MCC’s partnerships with donors, foundations, businesses, academic institutions, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) and other U.S. Government agencies are driving innovation and creating meaningful impact in compact (both ‘traditional’ and regional) and threshold programs. Partnerships are core to how MCC achieves its mission. In FY 2023 MCC intensified its efforts to form partnerships for the development and implementation of compact and threshold programs and continued to utilize partnerships to enhance the agency’s analytic and diagnostic methods and tools. MCC is partnering with country-based, regional, and global NGOs and nonprofit organizations, an international financial institution, and a United Nations agency for the design and implementation of the Solomon Islands and Kiribati Threshold Programs and for the Mozambique Compact’s Coastal Livelihoods and Climate Resilience Project. Partnerships are also integral to MCC’s corporate strategies, including MCC’s work to address climate change, integrate inclusion and gender considerations, and catalyze private investment. MCC and our partner countries expanded use of program co-creation, a participatory and collaborative design process that enhances outcomes by tapping into the ideas, resources and energy of people and organizations that share a stake in solving a problem. In March 2023, MCC issued the latest MCC Annual Partnerships Report, which provides more detail about ways MCC is using partnerships to promote economic growth, reduce poverty and strengthen institutions.
Agency-Level Partnerships
Agency-level partnerships(that is, partnerships between MCC and one or more partners) afford MCC the opportunity to gain access to knowledge, data, resources, expertise and visibility that is not easily procured via contracts. Partnerships also increase the sustainability of programs by involving external parties, thereby increasing the funding leveraged via partner co-funding. These partnerships are between MCC and one or more partners to actively share knowledge, technical expertise, and other resources that can expand the impact of our programs and achieve mutual objectives. One way that MCC forms agency-level partnerships is via an Annual Program Statement (APS), which facilitates open, fair and transparent competition of partnership opportunities and fosters collaboration and partnership co-creation among MCC and potential partners. The APS enables MCC and prospective partners to co-create partnerships that make best use of each organization’s distinct knowledge, networks, innovations, investments, personnel and resources. To date, MCC has awarded 26 partnerships via the APS using cooperative agreements, each of which required cost-sharing. Milestones related to agency-level partnerships in FY 2023 include:
- Launching a new partnership with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change in February 2023. The partnership focuses on estimating the economy-wide impacts of environmental changes using an economic-biophysical modeling framework that will bring more rigorous insights regarding climate and environmental factors into MCC’s constraints analysis and root cause analysis, informing future MCC program development.
- Finalizing trail bridge needs assessment work in Côte d’Ivoire via a partnership with Bridges to Prosperity (B2P) that was separate from but complementary to the Skills for Employability and Productivity Project of the Cote d’Ivoire Compact. The partnership examined how leading-edge application of remote sensing, machine learning and spatial data analytics could address poverty by closing the “first mile” gap in the rural context. B2P leverages publicly available data to predict the location, potential impact and cost to address rural transportation barriers and create new, safe access by working with government partners to build trail bridges connecting rural communities to existing destinations and resources.
- Finalizing climate-informed project assessment guidance, which is incorporating climate change considerations into project development and economic analysis by enabling MCC to undertake iterative assessments during the compact development process to develop projects that perform well across many climate scenarios. The detailed guidance and a Lesotho demonstration case study were designed via a partnership with a consortium led by the University of Massachusetts.
Country-Level Partnerships
Country-level partnerships are led by MCC’s partner country government counterparts and enable partnerships to be used to develop and implement projects and activities within compact and threshold programs. MCC launched a Program Partnership Solicitation mechanism to enable MCC’s country counterparts to competitively form partnerships that are defined by competitive partner selection, co-creation, cost sharing and joint governance during implementation.
MCC and the Government of Kiribati leveraged partnerships and co-creation methods for the design of Kiribati Threshold Program activities to facilitate decent and inclusive employment. In September 2023, MCC and the government concluded co-creation with the International Labour Organization (ILO) to develop an activity to strengthen worker protections and family resilience, and with American Councils for International Education (American Councils) to establish skills camps and academic scholarships for high school youth. MCC expects to finalize grant agreements in December 2023 and initiate in-country implementation with ILO and American Councils in early FY 2024.
On September 21, 2023, MCC and the Government of Mozambique signed the Mozambique Connectivity and Coastal Resilience Compact, which includes the Coastal Livelihoods and Climate Resilience (CLCR) Project. The CLCR Project will use nature-based and youth- and gender-inclusive solutions to restore mangroves and coastal ecosystems, improve the management of fisheries, and boost incomes from fisheries while building coastal communities’ resilience to climate change. The project will focus its investments in Zambezia province, the second most-populous province in Mozambique, and is being developed and implemented via partnerships. MCC and the Government of Mozambique co-created CLCR with Biofund and ProAzul, both Mozambiquan organizations, and their partners. Biofund (Biodiversity Conservation Foundation) is a nonprofit fund that mobilizes and manages financial resources for the defense and conservation of biodiversity in Mozambique; ProAzul (The Blue Economy Development Fund) works to promote blue economy activities in Mozambique. Both organizations have strong ties to coastal community groups in Zambezia province.
For More
- Visit https://www.mcc.gov/work-with-us/partnerships for more information on MCC’s partnership approaches, activities and opportunities.
- Review MCC’s Annual Partnership Report for more highlights of MCC’s partnerships with the private sector, academic institutions, NGOs, and government and multi-national organizations.