And good afternoon everybody. It has been a wonderful day and i was energized by the panel and the networking so thank you all for hanging in with us through a long and very full day. To reduce myself to those of you who may have been here this morning my name is wade warren and im the chief Strategy Officer for development in the chair of the u. S. Chapter of the society for International Development. I am very excited about the panel we are about to have. You cannot come in. Where is alice . I was more excited that the panelists were here. Let me tell you a little bit about this panel. We wanted to have an important plenary here at the end of the day to feature the Millennial Corporation which we have not a lot of time talking about today and will have a fireside chat with Alice Albright who is the ceo. Let me tell you a little bit about them. Ill start with chizi igwe. Chizi igwe is a heartbreaking much appreciated member of the westport she started out leading in our Youth Working Group and became a member of the board and the chair of the Programs Committee so we are so delighted for everything you do. She is also [applause] she is also a senior associate for Corporate Social Responsibility at Jpmorgan Chase where she helps to develop programs that produce Economic Growth and neighborhoods in cities and countries word j. C. Morgan chase sirs. Before that t she worked on the gates foundation. She is a proud immigrant parent and has a masters degree in International Business from the university of International Business and economics. So thank you. Alice you dont need my trip an introduction. People know who you are and its great you are with us today if you dont know Alice Albright is the ceo of the Millennium Challenge Corporation working in her field of International Development for more than 30 years in the privatesector. She is, has been the lead of the a Global Partnership for education and executive Vice President and chief operating officer of the bank and by happenstance works there. You have that in common. Ill turn the microphone over to you. Thank you. Thank you. So i think you wait. Can all here is . [applause] at afternoon i hopee you all have enjoyed the conference so far. I had a chance to walk around and pop in on some sessions in the lot of energy and hopefully will bring that energy to our conversations with imax excited to share the stage with alice. Will spend 20 or 30 minutes talking about mcc legacy and history and where the agency is going in h the future. Ill start things off on a celebratory note. Happy 20th anniversary to your agency. It was signed into law two decades ago. Its a unique model to address global poverty through Economic Development and since then and correct me if im wrong has invested over 17 billion projects in upwards of 47 countries. Is that right quick can we give a round of applause. That is no small feat. [applause] and weighed youve been on the nvisible world tour giving speeches talking about history and im wondering as you have reflected and thought about the last 20 years in the 20 years to comment beyond to talk about the challenges and triumphs and what excites you most about the next 20 years. Thank you for the question before i give if you thought let me thank everybody. Its wonderful to be here. We have 15 people here in 1500 people on line and its the first time we have outgrown i should say the Ronald Reagan building so congratulations. Even though im sure everyone in the room is facing challenges of various kinds its an enormous moment of joy to be with all of you and talking about all the things we all care so much about. So yes you got that right and we celebrated our actual birthday january 23 and 24 with a great party. Ty its a very important moment for us and we have been spending time looking backwards at whats really made the Agency Special but also particularly given the challenges that we are facing now are always asking ourselves what is the value that we happen why does it matter so much right now click the things that are really special is that we are highly selective. We work with countries that are emerging democracies. We are a grant maker. We cannot give loans. When we work with the country that has become eligible to go big and we go deep. The size of the brands we give them the countries we are entering into its 300, 400 sometimes 500 million. Very few agencies in the world are providing Grant Funding of that magnitude. What is that our heart is that we are compact. We are an agreement, we are an arrangement between ourselves and the United States with a partner nation around the concept of reform, testing and bringing down the barriers to growth and creating opportunity for people in looking at where particular parts of society are not included. That whole construct of the compact in behalf of big compact and a smaller program called the threshold that stood the test of time. You are very right inciting your figures. We have deployed over 17 billion in 78 compacts and 47tr countries and in multiple sectors and multiple, multiple sectors. We are very proud of the track record thatt the Agency Working closely with our partners in countries that put together. Very interesting is asking the question how is the model importance being the answer is very pink grant maker is a difference. We call it locally led development. We are working very much on localization. Our Business Model is premised on working closely with countries. Countries are involved from the very beginning in our analytical processes and we set up an entity in the country to implement the work. We have been working very much in a locally led way since the very beginning and we are also very adaptable. If you look at the range of things we are working on at any one time it is a reflection of what the countries need to overcome their particular challenges towards Economic Growth. We continuously adapt in the sectors that we are we are working on. We are very wellsuited in addressing issues of climate issues are prepared to send issues of 20th century skillss for example. These are some of the things we know will be very hot topics moving forward. You mention a localization which is a hot topic across our breakouts and our sessions. Im curious at 20 years above Going Forward we think about innovations in how you work with partners to deepen partner led engagement. With a pretty strong Business Model around this already. Its at the core of what we have going on but we continue to refineo it and we have a group right now that internally is working on making sure we are leaning into this. There are lot of questions on how we operated and are we doing this enough . One of the things we are working on in streamlining in the internal about procurement and who has responsibility for what. One of the things i know is we have a reputation for perhaps being a bit hard to work with. We know the challenges so we are trying, i know challenges in the middle lane. He can be challenging sometimes that we are trying to streamline some of the procurement efforts to make it easier to work with. There are innovations of all kinds to make us fit for the moment that we are in. Thats helpful in talking about the middleman politically in this country we are at a very interesting moment in particular when it comes to our views on the u. S. Role in foreign aid and how much and what to give. I know mcc has recently opposed leftist propose legislation that wouldeg help expand the school. Im curious and i think members of our audience are curious about that legislation also our strategy about working with congress, congress who may not understand the need for foreign aid and the Critical Role that mcc plays. Can you talk about the strategy to work with congress around mcc around the world . Let me back up for a second and ask the question what is the rationale behind the legislation we are seeking a reform at the heart candidates and right now we work with using the world bank classification, low income or lower middle Income Countries and we are seeking to add the lower range of the upper middle Income Countries to take us up to about 112. The reason for that is poverty and inequity within poverty the first piece of the discussions around need and we all know we have an enormous amount of work ahead of us. Thats the driver for us. We are making Good Progress with congress and having discussions about it and that is very gratifying to us. But we have to keep doing is forging the consensus politically. Its a difficult political environment from when we were created around leadership. This gets back to our Business Model. We are all about helping marquis to thrive in helping democracies delivering doing it in a very transparent datadriven and accountable way working closely with countries and working on Critical Issues of institutional reform butut also helping countries with Critical Infrastructure and the need to pay half. That need is eschewing now as it was 20 years ago. The more that we talk to people up on the hill they absolutely agree with that. On the budget and this wont be a surprise to anybody i think the overall amount of money, you all know better than i do that there is a misperception that 25, 20 to 30 of u. S. Budget goes into foreign aid foreign assistance etc. And you know just as well as i do its around one is not less than 1 so its tiny. All the wonderful things we could be working on with countries we should be leaning into that so there are many examples of great countries more technology, healthcare and different ways solutions, the list goes on and on. I couldnt agree more understand the need for engagement. When we think about landscape outside of our borders the partners we work with our potential partners, who makes the u. S. Differently or who are now faced with a greater number of opportunities or avenues to Fund Projects back home, how do we think about that evolving nature of our partners their contacts, how does mcc become more plentiful. Countries have options. One of the reasons why countries are increasingly indebted is a lot of those options tend to be debt. Its one of the distinguishing features of mcc as i have said we are a granted. Countries also want very much to be in the drivers seat about choosing the produce they were gone. That is one thing about our Business Modelng we think is vey appealing. Once a countrys selective start with something called a constraint to growth analysis which is what it sounds like its working with countries very closely as a partners to dig into what are the main challenges on the road toward prosperity and Economic Growth . And then countries choose of the things that emerge the countries choose what they want to work with. Break from the very beginning of how we work with countries, they have the ability to choose what they want to do and determine what they want to invest in using funding. Long term sustainable country owned development. Is something absolute the right way to go in terms of the relationships our agency is looking to build with countries. Also against u. S. Leadership. As we think about potential expansion of the countries in which we can work with much of the success in your 20 years. How does that change and evolve as you renew countries into the fold . It is that legislation has passed. It will be fingers crossed. It will add more countries from whom we could select if they pass our scorecard. More countries would be scored by our scorecard it in of itself is strongly incentivizing aspect of how we work. The core aspect of how we work every country will be scored. Who will pay a lot of attention to the court features of what constitutes eligibility. To fight corruption. Very intuitive linear Business Model constraint to growth you figure out and chooses what it is. What are the root causes of the constraints what are the challenges designing programs. We then worked to set up the local entities and they become responsible for implementation but once we start implementing everything has to be done within five years. We do of a lot of evaluation work to see what we can learn to do better next time. That will not change, what i iljust said, that will not chane her but will changes will have more countries to score will then start to get into the discussions what areas of reform working to ncc. Will broaden our footprint central and latin america. There will be some additional countries in Eastern Europe and the few more in Southern Africa and a few more in the pacific. Confident im in a position to do some terrific work there. The u. S. Strategically. I want to turn things a bi, education is one that works in. Also effects thats important to you. If you think about your work and education, and the work across a section of 20 years one of the trends and outlooks focused on in education in the next 20 years and beyond. Is a great question. Right now we have got really interesting Education Programs that are sort of our works in progress as a like to say. First of all education is absolute a driver of Economic Growth. Better educated people, literacy, digital skills. But also the b skill sets that e private sector is asking of it workforce in order to fulfill job opportunities. Theres lots of linkages at Different Levels of education and Economic Growth. We are increasingly getting asked to work on things that will help countries prepare for the 21st century. Its digital Digital Literacy and the skills based approach. It is a slightly different focus countries are really interested in making sure theyve got a workforce thats prepared for the future. Many of the countries that we work and in all of you will who are here as well have rapid population growth. Countries are getting younger and younger and younger in terms of demographics of the population. Education is a pressing need for many countries we are now meeting with. I could not agree more. As we think about both the countries you work with your agency and the potential expansion, one question that comes to mind is as you approach these countries from the bread and better. How do you think about mcc role in advancing equity with the pole and you work with . And even before that how would you define h equity when you tak about global Poverty Reduction we talk about develop me and what that means. What is the agencys role in furthering that . Quickset is a great question. One that touches on a lot of what we just talked about. Very simply put for us, equity means not leaving people out. You think about what is the connection between that and Economic Growth . You cannot foresee a country successfully growing leaving huge parts of the population out. Continue to refine for us the gender and social inclusion strategy and policy. With this process ive outlined at the very beginning of it we started starting where are the issues of exclusion . Is it certain Rural Communities . Is it certain ethnic minorities we focus assumedly coat. Whypl are people being excluded deceptive geography . The Legal Framework . What is it exactly . And then we start figuring out how can we work . We do a lot of consultation with different groups locally to make sure we are really understanding it well w. Its a critical part of how it work that we start weaving in these systemic solutions. Let me make it real by giving a very real recent example. Couple weeks ago we signed threatened milliondollar contact to work in the horticulture sector. And working with the country in understanding at all what became clear was the fact women could not inherit land from their deceased husband was really going to stand in theta way of women being able to own the land and use it to its collateral to finance the scaling up of the horticulture business. A lot of close work with local parties, people from the traditional communities after a lot of work a lot of people locally the laws have now been changed. Women can inherit land that will be a fundamental change for giving them a better opportunity in this critical part of the economy. That is an example of how we take a systems based approach to looking at issues of gender and social inclusion. Its the right thing to do for so many reasons. It matters what the rationale of equity. Also it matters for democracy. More people able to vote and participate and understand and contribute to the dialogue. It certainly matters for Economic Growth. Absolutely want to close out the one question you mention at the top of your remarks and seats see main vehicle for investment of the compact working in partnership with partner countries to figure out the pressing needs of how to address them. We look at 20 years forward jp morgan we talk about the full force of the bank bringing in our different parts that addressed our customers needs. What we think about the u. S. Government and bring the full force of our government to support povertyio reduction . When did they think about as they move forward working alongside other agencies to help partner c