Top official from the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) assured on Monday that the Philippines would not be directly impacted by the freeze on aid from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).
NEDA Undersecretary Rosemarie Edillon stated that the Philippines is no longer in a position where it heavily relies on USAID for support. “We have a different situation now. Before, we usually depended on USAID for our school buildings,” Edillon explained.
She further added, “Right now we are not in that situation. So, it’s really more of the technical assistance part, which we can source from other development partners.”
The freeze on USAID assistance follows a directive from U.S. President Donald Trump to halt all existing foreign assistance and pause new aid while the administration reviews whether aid allocations align with its foreign policy objectives.
The USAID headquarters in Washington was shut down on February 4 after billionaire Elon Musk revealed that Trump had agreed to close the agency, which administers billions of dollars in global aid programs.
