Development issues : U.S. actions affecting the development of developing countries. The 1982 annual report of the Chairman of the Development Coordination Committee

bilateral and multilateral development assistance reveals a new emphasis on encouraging developing countries (DC"s) to formulate more effective economic policies and on increasing the role of the private sector in global development activities. Besides providing such a review, this report assesses the position of DC"s in the world economy and formulates U.S. priorities for future assistance. Given the bleak prospect for DC growth in the near future (due primarily to poor industrial country growth, DC dependence on high-priced oil imports, and a reduction in external concessional aid), DC"s must increasingly depend on domestic resource mobilization and on sound internal economic policies which lead to greater efficiency and growth, e.g., improve the functioning of markets and allow the private sector to operate more freely, enforce resource-efficient pricing regimes, limit public expenditures to socially and economically viable projects, and restrain inflation. Accordingly, U.S. development policy is based on three premises: (1) assistance should be based on distinctions between types of DC"s, e.g., newly industrializing countries, middle-income countries, etc.; (2) multilateral and bilateral aid projects should complement and reinforce each other; and (3) the poorest of the DC"s deserve most of the concessional aid. The major sectoral policies for bilateral assistance are food and agriculture, particularly nutrition and food security; energy, particularly in facilitating private sector alternatives to oil and timber; and human resources, especially in improving DC"s health, nutritional, educational, and population status. U.S. multilateral assistance will continue to promote steady economic growth based on the market-oriented international economic system and to show concern for alleviating poverty and improving DC material well-being. All U.S. assistance will focus on facilitating the role of the indigenous and international private sector, strengthening local institutional capabilities, mobilizing human resource potentials, and developing appropriate technologies.