frieden and we've worked very closely to try to improve our coordination in countries to make sure we're getting to a much more efficient approach to the provision of services and to ensuring more country ownership and more local responsibility for seeing program through. it's been hard and challenging work but i think we're seeing results. in kenya, where we didn't expand resources we expanded service by bringing the platforms together and be more integrated about delivering are services to effected populations. >> is that the program where you isolated the 17 novel antibodies that -- >> that's with an outside partner, international aids vaccine initiative that's help to identify novel antibodies

that we think will be a important breakthrough to get a hiv/aids vaccine. >> i'm not a scientific guy nor a doctor of medicine but it seems to me that's sort of a cdc role not a usaid role. how much collaboration do y'all do to make sure you're not working at either cross-purposes or duplicating good purposes? >> we do quite a lot of collaboration. you know, back perfectly honest, joining the u.s. government from a different entity, i was struck by the coordination that we do do and i think it was necessary because there are areas of overlap and partnership, but at the end of the day, especially on the research and development and technology efforts of which that is a part. we work with cdc and also, the nih. they are the sort of hub within the federal government for supporting those types of activities. when we do work against that

goal we do it with complete joint review of programs and against and aligned strategy and i think that's why you're seeing some of the efficiencies in the programs and our health efforts create new opportunities for the level of patient coverage and the level of impact we believe we can chooef with constant budgets. >> i commend you and dr. frieden both because we're getting more bang for the buck and a lot of that is because of the countries that are receiving the help are doing more of the delivery and our cost is down to the retrovirals and the testing on the case. >> i think your programs provide a great service and help open the door for the united states in some places where we're not as popular as we should be. >> thank you, senator. >> senator kuntz. >> thank you, senator carden and i'll follow on with a line of

questions as senator isakson was hitting on there. you can see we have a great partn partnership on the africa subcommittee and i'll join senator carden and lugar by express my regret of the passing of congressman donald payne who was deeply knowledgeable and a advocate for all of this work in terms of meeting basic needs in africa. and i thiadministrator shah, i' have you've brought real progress and procurement and i think in the number of areas of initiative i've been able to see in africa where it's feed the future or the global health initiative as senator isakson has referenced, you've lowered the cost of delivery and

improved the outcomes so you're saving the lives of women and children and aimproving transitions. if i could, i want to know how we're going to continue the meet the challenges of global development in these difficult budget times and what particularly we can do to apply science and technology solutions to the complex challenges of development. in february, at a white house events, innovation and science and technology you announced our higher education solution's network and it's my understanding this is part of a larger initiative to harness cutting-edge innovation and science and technology to universities to implement new solutions to development challenges. senator lugar mentioned the dramatic increases in agriculture production and output on his farm in a few decades. i think we're seeing comparable advances, potentially in africa in farming. can you describe how this rfa will further help usaid

innovation agenda and helping universities here at home and how this particular budget request advances science technology and innovation at usaid? sorry the long question. i know you can handle it. >> thank you, senator kuntz and thank you for your extraordinary leadership and council on this range of issues. i think the basic premise around your question about, how do we drive the most significant transformational results in an environment where budgets are tight is we have to lower the cost structure of doing our work and we have to literally invent new solutions that make extraordinary things possible. that happened a couple of times in our history, in the '60s and the '70s, the green revolution, as senator lugar has talked to me about, happened in part because of great new technology s created by scientists. in that case, dr. forman borelock.

oral rehydration solution which since then has saved 11 million children because of it basically took the power to save a life out of the hands of a doctor and put it in the hands of a mother and it turns out that's a much more effective way to save children's lives. we believe we're on the cusp of an era of a whole new range of technological, scientific breakthroughs and innovations that will do it again. whether it's orange flesh, sweet potatoes that help kids avoid river blindness because us has more vitamin a or new seeds that yoois appropriate technology and have more yield and resistance to climate shock. or things that come straight out of u.s. universities. one of my favorite examples a cpap device, a continue positive airway pressure device that would normally cost thousands of dollars. a group of students at rice university invented one that cost $160. that will save countless kids lives in the first 48 hours

after birth in very difficult environments around the world. with that as our motivation we launched the request for partnerships with u.s. universities and institutions and we did it it saying -- we want to find more dramatic game-changing cost-reducing technologies and innovations and approaches that will help us achieve outcoming we said we would, with the investment of taxpayer dollars. we've seen on three webinars we've had more than a thousand people express interest. every time i go to a u.s. college and university i'm struck by the passion that students have. i was at bethel university outside of minneapolis a few weeks ago and the students had read the entire trafficking in personless program. they had student ngo had already gone out to their partner country in uganda and had all these ideas. we're not going to fund every idea but we want to engage the power of american innovation and the power of american research

institutions and universities to really change what's possible in development. something the president and secretary feel strongly about. we've done it before in our history and we can do it again in a way that's responsible, cost reducing and hopefully, inspiring to students across this country. >> if i could, thank you. and i'm eager to work with you in carrying that forward and hopefully, that will be a part of this budget submission that will not just be sustained but kris contributed to our development efforts. you worked along many, not the least of dr. jill biden, drawing attention to the real humanitarian crisis in the horn of africa. it's been down graded from a famine, largely due to u.s. and other multinational aid. i would be interested in the update on the current status of the humanitarian efforts are going on and what additional assistance is needed and how the learnings from this particular famine are going to be

implemented and how these ongoing human tear needs are reflected in your budget request. >> thank you. as you point out more than 13 million people were affected because of the worst drought in more than six decades. when i travelled with dr. byden and senator frisk, we met a young woman had to make a harrowing choice she had to walk with her two children to 0 kilometers to the safety of the refugee carp. she had to choice because she couldn't carry both. it's extraordinary the stories we heard and the conditions people were under. in that context, the united states, and i think americans can be proud, we're nearly 60% of the global response. we put in place efforts that were both informed by prior experience, targeting children that are most vulnerable and at a time when the u.n. was

estimating up to several hundred thousand people may die we were able with our international partners to do some innovative things, some of which i can talk about and some i can't, to make sure we had access in very difficult environments and i'm convinced those efforts continued to save tens of thousands of lives. we'll get specific evaluations done and we'll know very soon. what we learned from that is we put in place something called "famine early-warning system" that allows us to from district where these disasters might happen. we learned we need to be more aggressive about taking the predictions and creating an international consensus to plan ahead to get in front of the disasters before they strike. that's what we're doing. later this month we'rer organizing the entire international community in nairobi. we know many are at risk and we expect because the current estimates are the rains will be

poor again. we expect things get worse before they get better. we want to see as much burden-sharing across the international community as possible and learn rigorously from the things we did that worked and the things we did that didn't work so we can be more effective at saving lives this year. i also think noels of this work is reflect in testify international assistance accounts and i thank the committee for its smort of those budgets. i would conclude on that point by saying, at the same time we saw that extraordinary disaster, that afternoon we had a chance to see some of our "feed the future" programs working. we saw kids receiving orange flesh sweet potato and the impact it made on their health and livelihood. we heard of farmers at a research station working with skrooin tilss that were mp doubling and tripling their yield of maze and in kenya alone, about 4.5 million people didn't need assistance because

of improvements in their agriculture over the last few years. and that's the trend we really want to see on consistent way. >> thank you, dr. shah. >> you mentioned about specific evaluations which i think are very important as it related to our famine relief but also as it relates to all of our programs. feed the future is an issuive of the obama administration. you've mentioned it several times in your testimony just recently on dealing with nutrition and life and also dealing with gender issues and women. i think it would be helpful for us if you could give us how we can evaluate progress made on feed the future, what your objectives are. i note you've done this but if you could provide that to the committee as to the progress you believe m we can make in the short term and long term, it would be helpful for us to have

that information and i would encourage you to provide as much specifics as the results of usaid as you can because it's important not just for us to feel good, but it helps provide the type of support we need here in the united states for these programs. but also, i believe, encourages stronger partnerships. not just with other governments but with private entities when we know that what we do has real consequences. for a mother to make a decision as to which child should take is heart break so we should all do better so the more specifics the better we'll be. i have one or two more questions. afghanistan, we haven't talked a lot about afghanistan here. i'm concerned about the safety of our workers in afghanistan. we see daily reports about the afghan people expressing lack of interest in what the united

states is doing, but the fact that even though we're the largest donor of aid, they don't believe we're doing anything to help them. i don't know how we continue a program without the support of the people of the country. so i just really want you to be able to comment with us as to the safety of our workers and those working was in afghanistan. and that needs to be our highest priority, protecting their safety. >> thank you, senator, i appreciate you expressing such a strong commitment to the safety of our personnel. as you know we've pulled our personnel from specific technical assistance roles where we felt they were exposed to undue risk given the current situation environment and we'll only be putting them back in after ambassador crocker is convinced on a case-by-case basis that that is an appropriate situation from the perspective of their safety.

we also note that later this month, there will be the implementation of the decree around the afghan public protection force. we have worked hard over the last 18 months to make sure we reduced our need for private security contractors. today, more than 75% of u.s. aid programs do not require private security contractors. but 25% do. and we've been working actively with our partners to make sure they have a path way to safety as they work to complete the programs and transition them to afghan host country institutions. we'll stay very focused on the safety of our u.s. direct staff and our foreign service nationals, the afghan nationals that really do take incredible rin risks to carry out this mission and do it in a visible and transparent manner. i'm also glad in your opening statement you made reference to some soft accomplishments of the

program. it's my belief that weave done a better job over the past two years or so of aggressively communicating some of the specific advantages these programs have had to the afghan people. the fact that longevity has increased for afghan women by nearly two decades. the fact that health services have gone from 7% to 64%. that there are 7 million kids in school. 35% of whom are girls, compared to when we started that work it was u just a few hundred thousand. we've built out 800 kilometers of road and seen year-on-year annual growth rates of nearly 10%. we know this situation needs to focus on and we've been very aggressive about making it more sustainable and have a number of approaches we've been taking over the past two years to enhance the sustainability including working with the afghanistan government to increase their own revenue collection which has gone up

fourfold. and these are important results. and they're the results that have accrued because our team has been there, has taken risks and has focused on delivering those outcomes. >> our involvement in haiti pretty much parallels your leadership in usaid. since the -- while we were involved before, but since the tragedies occurred. can you just give us a brief update as to the capacity of the haitians civilian authority to take on responsibility to maintain the progress that's been made through international assistance? >> sure. we've seen steady and now, accelerating progress in areas like agriculture, access to financial services through mobile phones. improvements in health. the cholera epidemic which was so devastating is now down well below the international norms and standards and we've been working aggressively to help the new president build the capacity

to assume greater responsibility. they've gone through a long process that had an effective democratic election of a new president and parliament. but it has been a slow process of building the institutional capacity in the haitian government to effectively take on all these responsibilities so that's why we'll continue to work with them as a partner consulting and taking their guy dance on when they'll really want to do activities and programs together and when the priority needs to be as it's been with efforts to get people out of settlements and tents and into homes, a more directed effort to get the job done as quickly as possible in discussion dialogue and partnership. i'd also say in that context, the role of the private sector, i think underdiscussed in the with haiti. our partnership with coca-cola to create the mango juice value

chain, that's so effective. we're seeing new announcements by marriott to build a hotel in port-au-prince and the opening of an industrial park in the north that can create nearly 60,000 jobs. those are the kinds of partnerships we've been eager to build together with our asian counterparts. >> thank you for a very informative testimony. i have no more questions. only commendations for the hearing. >> and let me join, again, senator lugar and the compliment to our witness and the work that you're doing and that your agency is doing. in furtherance of the u.s. tobtives in a very difficult environment. the record will remain opened for one week from questions by members of the committee. i would ask that you respond as promptly as possible if questions are propounded and with that, the hearing will stand adjourned. thank you.

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will it will program news stories. use your laptop or your ipad on our special web page. cspan.org/screen two. i believe it we'll come to admire this country not simply because we were born here, but because of the kind of great and good land that you and i want it to be and that together we have made it. that is my hope. that is my reason for seeking the presidency of the united states. >> past candidates campaign for president this year, we look back at 14 men who ran for the office and lost. go to our website, cspan.org/the contenders to see video of the contenders who had a lasting impact on american politics. >> the leadership of this nation has a clear and immediate challenge to go to work effectively and go to work

immediately to restore proper respect pore law and order in this land and not just prior to election day, either. >> cspan.org/the contenders. this is c-span3. politics and public affairs programming throughout the week and every weekend, 48 hours of people and events telling the american story on american history tv. get our schedules and see past programs at our websites. you can join in the conversation on social media sites. u.s. trade representative ron kirk spoke at a conference of the national aassociation of counties. the obama administration recently announced it's on track with the goal of doubling exports by 2015. this is just under a half hour. >> i'm paula brooks commissioner from ohio county. i see some of my colleagues

here. it's our distinct pleasure to be here and we'd like to begin with very brief introductions. i mentioned i'm from franklin county, ohio, columbus. and i'm vice chair of the international economic development task force and the chair, valerie brown, gives her regards. she was unable to make it today. and i would like to acknowledge larry, our ceo, and also, stephanie osborne from naco, who really does so well in keeping us appraised of everything we need to know. and if we could i'd like to start on the left-hand side and ask our task force members to introduce themselves. >> alameda county, california. [ inaudible ]

director of u.s. droft affairs for u.s. secretary john rice who you hosted last month. >> yes. we enjoyed having him in columbus, thank you. [ inaudible ] tom freeman for remember trade commission from riverside, california. [ inaudible ]

>> thank you very much, in the interest of time i think we'll go to our main attraction today. we are really honored to have united states trade representative ron kirk joining us today. i almost called you mayor kirk because, of course, ambassador kirk used to be the mayor of dallas, texas. and he has done so many things, actually, he's really done it all. he's been very successful attorney. mentioned mayor. and he was the texas secretary of state under governor anne richards. and we're very proud to have him now. talking to us today about trade, he has really exerted and unprecedented level of effort on behalf of president obama in working to increase exports in

particular. and we are delighted to have him here. he is the father of two daughters. right? and we're talking about vacations and a little bit about tourism beforehand, so without further comment, i would ask representative ron kirk, our u.s. trade representative to step up and tell us what's going on. >> thank you, you can call me mayor and you can call me my vice mayor. thanks to you all for giving me a chance to come and visit. i've not had an opportunity to address you all but i've known larry going back to my time working with the u.s. conference of mayors and larry still dresses better than tom cochran and you can tell ima said so.

i won't take up your time, but larry, tell me. tom cochran and i at least have one thing in common. we flow where we were when tupac was killed because we were standing on the same street corner in vegas but that's a different story. good to see my friend the commissioner here frommer t tec errant county. i think i've visited all of your states since i've been in office. we've started a new template for a trade policy that was focused, at least as much on the job creating benefits of trade, than the traditional consumptive benefits of it and we did that for a fairly simple reason. president obama recognized two things early on. given the reality of our global economy and our competitiveness in the opportunity that america has, to answer our n