MCC’s partnerships with donors, foundations, businesses, academic institutions, nongovernmental organizations, and other U.S. government agencies are driving innovation and creating meaningful impact in compact and threshold programs. Partnerships are essential to MCC’s mission and integral to its corporate priorities, including the work to address climate resilience, integrate inclusion and gender considerations, and catalyze private investment. MCC and its partner countries are expanding their use of a participatory and collaborative design process, called program co-creation, that enhances outcomes by tapping into the ideas, resources, and energy of people and organizations with a shared interest in solving problems.
Agency-Level Partnerships
Agency-level partnerships, which are partnerships between MCC and one or more partners, afford MCC the opportunity to gain access to capabilities, resources, and expertise not easily procured via contracts. One way MCC forms agency-level partnerships is via an Annual Program Statement (APS), which facilitates open, fair, and transparent competition of partnership opportunities. The APS enables MCC and prospective partners to make the best use of each organization’s distinct knowledge, networks, innovations, investments, personnel, and resources. To date, MCC has awarded 26 partnerships via the APS, each of which required partner co-funding or leverage.
Milestones related to agency-level partnerships in FY 2024 include:
- Awarded two grants for the implementation of the Kiribati Threshold Program. Through a partnership with American Councils for International Education, the $16.6 million Youth Skills Camps and Scholarships Activity will provide student exchange opportunities for I-Kiribati high school students to study in the United States or to attend an immersive camp in Fiji/Kiribati. Through a partnership with the International Labour Organization, the $6.1 million Worker Protection and Family Resilience Activity will support the Kiribati Ministry of Employment and Human Resources with a focus on worker protection and family resilience. Both activities used the partnership co-creation process to design the projects.
- Partnered with the National Institute of Building Sciences, which resulted in a white paper titled “Building Resilience in MCC Compact and Threshold-Eligible Countries.” The paper offers economic models, key goals, and proposed solutions to make MCC-funded buildings more resilient to climate change.
- Concluded a partnership with the University of Massachusetts to improve decision making under deep uncertainty (DMUDU) in economic analyses, which includes guidance focused on assessing uncertainties related to climate and the environment. Through this partnership, MCC incorporated the most up-to-date research and methods from academia and development practice to support cost-benefit analyses, even with limited information. The DMUDU analysis was applied to the Lesotho Health and Horticulture Compact and the Mozambique Connectivity and Coastal Resilience Compact and will be utilized for future project design.
- Continued a partnership with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to improve economic analyses by assessing the economic-biophysical impacts of climate and environmental changes on economic growth at national and sectoral levels. This partnership began in 2022 and will continue until 2025. It aims to integrate climate and biophysical data into MCC’s constraints analysis and root cause analysis processes. The partnership has developed 13 “impact channels” (e.g., water availability, flooding, heat, and labor productivity) to connect biophysical attributes to economic impacts.
- Finalizing a new partnership to enhance infrastructure resilience and sustainability by integrating engineered and natural solutions, with a focus on nature-based solutions (NbS). NbS are the sustainable planning, design, environmental management, and engineering practices that weave natural features or processes into the built environment to promote adaptation and resilience. The initiative seeks to promote incorporation of NbS into MCC compacts and more widely via a comprehensive manual of practice for NbS in civil engineering, fostering standardized, science-based approaches. The partnership includes the World Wildlife Foundation and BMA Engineering, in collaboration with the International Federation of Consulting Engineers and the American Society of Civil Engineers.
- Launched a partnership with the U.S. African Development Foundation (USADF) to drive the growth of successful women entrepreneurs and women-led small and medium enterprises (W-SMEs) in Africa. The collaboration empowers W-SMEs to access information and data, utilize digital tools, and perform business data analysis, which is pivotal to the sustainability, competitiveness, and resilience of their businesses. In 2021, MCC, USAID, and Microsoft, in collaboration with local partners, launched the DigiFemmes program in Côte d’Ivoire. Through this new USADF-MCC partnership, USADF will provide grants to eligible DigiFemmes graduates, empowering them to grow and scale their businesses.
Country-Level Partnerships
Country-level partnerships are led by MCC’s partner country government counterparts for the development and implementation of compact and threshold program projects and activities. MCC’s program partnership mechanism enables MCC’s country counterparts to form partnerships defined by competitive partner selection, co-creation, cost sharing and leverage, and joint governance. Country-level partnerships can increase the sustainability of programs by involving external parties and can increase programmatic resources via partner co-funding and leverage.
Milestones related to country-level partnerships in FY 2024 include:
- In May 2024, Mozambique’s Minister of Finance, the U.S. Ambassador, and over 100 VIP guests and local media gathered in Maputo to celebrate MCA-Moçambique’s launch of the Coastal Livelihoods and Climate Resilience (CLCR) Project. The signing included program partnership agreements with Biofund and ProAzul, both Mozambiquan organizations, and their partners. The CLCR Project is innovative in both its technical design and use of partnerships for core compact project development, implementation, and long-term sustainability. CLCR will restore mangroves and coastal ecosystems, improve the management of fisheries, and boost incomes from fisheries while building coastal communities’ resilience. By engaging communities and local organizations in compact design, MCC has expanded country ownership beyond the government and enlarged the number of local groups involved in defining priorities and programs to address the needs of the people of Zambezia. The partnership agreements total $152 million, including $100 million from the compact and $52 million from partners.
- The Government of Belize is using partnerships through the Equipping Secondary Educators Program Partnership, as part of the Belize Compact. In the fall of 2024, the Government of Belize released a request for concept notes from prospective partners. Shifts in Belize’s economic and employment landscape have increased the demand for workers with higher levels of qualifications and 21st century skills. However, half of Belize’s labor force currently does not have any form of post-primary education. The partnership will strengthen teacher and school leader training, as well as enhance teaching and learning materials. This in turn will bolster the education system, better prepare students for the workforce, and ultimately strengthen the economy of Belize. This partnership is expected to make a significant, sustained impact on the Belizean education system, as it will reach every secondary school leader and teacher in the country.
- MCC’s Digital Collaboratives for Local Impact (DCLI) identifies foundational cross-cutting investments and sector-supporting solutions to enhance MCC partner countries’ readiness to access and benefit from the growing digital economy. Digifemmes is a partnership between USAID, Microsoft, and the Government of Côte d’Ivoire that funded nearly 9,000 W-SMEs through a $5.3 million program. This program has been empowering W-SMEs with vital data and digital literacy and skills to grow their businesses. Digifemmes graduates accessed a total of $523,000 in follow-on funding via a dedicated fund established by USADF. This support enabled them to refine their products, expand their markets, and grow their businesses through digital tools and innovations.
For More
- Read MCC’s Annual Partnership Report, which includes a retrospective on MCC’s partnership activities over the past several years, feature articles on MCC agency and country partnerships, and information on the future of MCC partnerships.
- Learn about how MCC is using co-creation, a participatory co-design process, to enhance compact and threshold program project development by engaging people closest to project needs and opportunities.
- Visit https://www.mcc.gov/work-with-us/partnerships for more information on MCC’s partnership approaches, activities and opportunities.