We are a group of students from the University of Oklahoma department of Sociology advocating for more effective ways to combat poverty in Africa. U.S foreign aid in Africa is of paramount interest to us as students in our global inequality studies. We feel that U.S. foreign aid strategies must be altered or changed completely in order to better allocate the resources we make available to the impoverished citizens of Africa. If we as a nation are going to effectively help, we must rethink the target of the aid we send, and to whom, and how it is used.

Much of the foreign aid sent by the U.S. to Africa is monetary, and economic in nature. While the BUILD Act, and Global Food Security Act are great steps we have made this year, they still need a better focus.

In order to more effectively help African nations develop we must first disperse money to the right places. We propose that all U.S. aid to Africa not be sent to government entities, but rather to non-profit organizations who attack problems including education and basic necessities.

It seems as if our legislation is trying to beat a problem that has sub-problems which need to be addressed first. Money and food are great resources they without a doubt need, but empowering them with education and social safety net institutions is where aid needs to focus. Education has proven in countless studies to be the baseline of development. Monetary and food supplies help, but they are more so short-term fixes to a larger problem.

If we as a nation can help African nations build institutions that build a healthy base for their future development and create progress in helping them help themselves we will see our investments in their nations have greater returns.

One last starting point that we must consider. With globalization expanding we also face exploitive practices by U.S. owned businesses in impoverished nations. While cheap labor is good for the American consumer, bringing jobs to foreign countries is a lose-lose when these companies can charge unlivable wages and working conditions. Legislation needs to be introduced that regulates these businesses there, just as they are here.

We are not naive, and we understand the U.S. budget only has 1.2 percent allocated for foreign aid. It is not within our scope to increase this number, but rather to see change in the percentages used on certain issues within that budget. According to the Council on Foreign Relations 33 percent of this budget goes to military aid and security, while 14 percent goes to humanitarian aid, 42 percent goes to long-term development, and 11 percent goes to political aid. As we have come to know, much of this military aid is not used in the best interests of many nations. That is why we propose cutting the military aid by 25 percent and allocating those funds to bringing aid up to 25 percent in humanitarian aid and political aid. Military aid does nothing more than worsen problems in many cases. Increasing the budget in these areas would have a greater impact on the issues that need to matter to the U.S. Educating and empowering these nations would decrease the need for their militaries and militias to have more money, while at the same time allow the citizens themselves to bring about socially beneficial advancements.