Improving the transparency of international aid

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the William & Flora Hewlett Foundation are jointly supporting efforts to improve access to information on how international aid resources are being spent. Unless aid can be traced all the way down the chain to its intended beneficiaries, it is difficult to monitor the impact it is having. Ensuring that we can get transaction-level data (ie data on who is actually getting the funds) is thus a first step towards increasing the impact of aid on poverty reduction.