I went down to New York earlier this week to attend Liberia's second annual foundations meeting. It was an exciting opportunity for me to meet the leaders of the foundations engaged in Liberia and present the work I did this summer regarding opportunities for philanthropic support for technology.
I'm inspired by the outstanding group of foundations supporting Liberia. Their commitment to the country runs deep, evident in their willingness to engage on myriad initiatives both within and across sectors. Many have visited Liberia multiple times and continue to do so on a regular basis. They believe wholeheartedly in the importance of collaborating with each other to see that their contributions, at all scales, have maximal impact. Importantly, they defer to the Liberian government itself for direction on where their philanthropic dollars are best placed. When the Minister of Agriculture told them the single thing she would do if she had funding, within minutes they committed to over half of the budget for it.
It's an exciting new model for philanthropic engagement. There are a few kinks to iron out with respect to both the concept and the implementation, but I believe this is a significantly more efficient model. Engagement across sectors promotes a broader understanding of the country that will lead to support channeled where it is needed most. Collaboration fosters the sharing of best practices and lessons learned. Most importantly, government-driven instead of donor-driven decision making on where support is placed has the potential to greatly improve the efficiency of aid dollars.
You can learn more about it on the Philanthropy Secretariat's website:
www.supportliberia.com (which was one of my projects this past summer).
