section_path: Organization/Country development programs
section_name: Country development programs
paragraph_text: Country development programs
  
  USAID plans its work in each country around an individual country development program managed by a resident office called a "mission". The USAID mission and its U.S. staff are guests in the country, with a status that is usually defined by a "framework bilateral agreement" between the government of the United States and the host government. Framework bilaterals give the mission and its U.S. staff privileges similar to (but not necessarily the same as) those accorded to the U.S. embassy and diplomats by the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations of 1961.
  
  USAID missions work in over fifty countries, consulting with their governments and non-governmental organizations to identify programs that will receive USAID's assistance. As part of this process, USAID missions conduct socio-economic analysis, discuss projects with host-country leaders, design assistance to those projects, award contracts and grants, administer assistance (including evaluation and reporting), and manage flows of funds.
  
  As countries develop and need less assistance, USAID shrinks and ultimately closes its resident missions. USAID has closed missions in a number of countries that had achieved a substantial level of prosperity, including South Korea, Turkey, and Costa Rica.
  
  USAID also closes missions when requested by host countries for political reasons. In September 2012, the U.S. closed USAID/Russia at that country's request. Its mission in Moscow had been in operation for two decades. On May 1, 2013, the president of Bolivia, Evo Morales, asked USAID to close its mission, which had worked in the country for 49 years. The closure was completed on September 20, 2013.
  
  USAID missions are led by mission directors and are staffed both by USAID Foreign Service officers and by development professionals from the country itself, with the host-country professionals forming the majority of the staff. The length of a Foreign service officer's "tour" in most countries is four years, to provide enough time to develop in-depth knowledge about the country. (Shorter tours of one or two years are usual in countries of exceptional hardship or danger.)
  
  The mission director is a member of the U.S. Embassy's "Country Team" under the direction of the U.S. ambassador. As a USAID mission works in an unclassified environment with relative frequent public interaction, most missions were initially located in independent offices in the business districts of capital cities. Since the passage of the Foreign Affairs Agencies Consolidation Act in 1998 and the bombings of U.S. Embassy chanceries in East Africa in the same year, missions have gradually been moved into U.S. Embassy chancery compounds.
  
  USAID plans its work in each country around an individual country development program managed by a resident office called a "mission". The USAID mission and its U.S. staff are guests in the country, with a status that is usually defined by a "framework bilateral agreement" between the government of the United States and the host government. Framework bilaterals give the mission and its U.S. staff privileges similar to (but not necessarily the same as) those accorded to the U.S. embassy and diplomats by the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations of 1961.
  
  USAID missions work in over fifty countries, consulting with their governments and non-governmental organizations to identify programs that will receive USAID's assistance. As part of this process, USAID missions conduct socio-economic analysis, discuss projects with host-country leaders, design assistance to those projects, award contracts and grants, administer assistance (including evaluation and reporting), and manage flows of funds.
  
  As countries develop and need less assistance, USAID shrinks and ultimately closes its resident missions. USAID has closed missions in a number of countries that had achieved a substantial level of prosperity, including South Korea, Turkey, and Costa Rica.
  
  USAID also closes missions when requested by host countries for political reasons. In September 2012, the U.S. closed USAID/Russia at that country's request. Its mission in Moscow had been in operation for two decades. On May 1, 2013, the president of Bolivia, Evo Morales, asked USAID to close its mission, which had worked in the country for 49 years. The closure was completed on September 20, 2013.
  
  USAID missions are led by mission directors and are staffed both by USAID Foreign Service officers and by development professionals from the country itself, with the host-country professionals forming the majority of the staff. The length of a Foreign service officer's "tour" in most countries is four years, to provide enough time to develop in-depth knowledge about the country. (Shorter tours of one or two years are usual in countries of exceptional hardship or danger.)
  
  The mission director is a member of the U.S. Embassy's "Country Team" under the direction of the U.S. ambassador. As a USAID mission works in an unclassified environment with relative frequent public interaction, most missions were initially located in independent offices in the business districts of capital cities. Since the passage of the Foreign Affairs Agencies Consolidation Act in 1998 and the bombings of U.S. Embassy chanceries in East Africa in the same year, missions have gradually been moved into U.S. Embassy chancery compounds.