Who cares about foreign aid: Stories about development from the pages of Canadian Affairs

  Millions of people around the world have been negatively affected by the U.S. government’s decision to freeze foreign aid through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).  While most of those affected live in the developing world, it is also hurting another group: American farmers.  The agency, which has an annual budget of about $40 billion USD, typically spends about $2 billion of that total buying crops from U.S. farmers for aid through its Food for Peace program—what’s called “tied aid.”  Republican officials in states such as Kansas, North Dakota and Arkansas are asking President Donald Trump for an exemption to the cuts, saying they will affect farmers in their states — many of which voted for Trump in the election.  In Canada, farmers do not face a similar worry, even if a future federal government were to cut foreign aid spending, as Conservative Party Leader Pierre Poilievre has pledged to do. That’s because the Canadian...

  In February 2025,   Canadian Affairs   launched an international relief and development beat.  The goal of the beat is to provide coverage to this topic, which is mostly ignored by the mainstream media unless there is a significant disaster in the developing world that affects millions of people.  This fits with the overall goal of  Canadian Affairs,  which was founded in 2023 to provide quality journalism on under-covered topics that matter to Canadians.  This blog was created to help share that coverage with Canadians via F***b**k, which otherwise prevents users from linking to stories in Canadian media outlets. (But doesn’t prevent people from linking to blogs like this—so far, at least.) Direct links will be provided to stories on the  Canadian Affairs  website via other platforms such as BlueSky and X.     Three stories have already been published (and are free to read):  Aid groups respond to Poilievre’s ...