Covid-19.
Floor Speech
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Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I would like to do something unusual on the floor of the Senate. I would like to report some good news. It isn't often we have these reports. Today, I have three items in my news that I would like to share with the people who are following this. I would like to start my remarks by sharing an incredible story from the other side of the world.
In May 2020, as the world was reeling from the spread of the deadly new strain of the coronavirus, the Red Cross society in the African nation of Kenya received 500 bicycles from a Chicago-based, nongovernmental organization known as World Bicycle Relief. Community healthworkers used these bicycles to make house visits across southern Kenya, providing health services to remote communities that would otherwise not be reached because of restrictions on movement due to COVID-19.
In Malawi, young girls used these bicycles to get safely to and from school, and when COVID-19 closed the schools down, girls like 17-year- old Elizabeth were able to shift focus to help their parents, who are farmers, weather the economic effects of the pandemic. She used her bicycle to take their produce to market.
Stories like these are common around the world, showing the value of a simple, relatively inexpensive, green, and easy-to-repair means of mobility--a bicycle--to help meet important development objectives.
Since its founding in 2005, the World Bicycle Relief of Chicago has done great work in helping displaced survivors after a natural disaster in Sri Lanka, allowing farmers to move crops in Zambia, and getting girls to school in Malawi.
I have even seen myself how a bicycle ambulance in rural Tanzania can change lives; and not long ago, my staff saw the group's efforts in Kenya, where more than 25,000 sustainable, rugged bicycles have been provided.
Since 2019, I have worked through appropriations to push USAID to invest in bicycles, which help meet the needs in healthcare, education, women and girls' empowerment, and more. Part of this funding has included an in-depth assessment to see what is most useful and how to make the programs locally sustainable. They not only send bikes; they send parts and then train the repairmen. USAID has used these lessons and opportunities with increasing success thanks to the work of many groups, including that of the World Bicycle Relief of Chicago.
Today, I am introducing legislation in partnering with the Kenya bicycle world and U.S. House of Representatives' Representative Earl Blumenauer of Oregon. Our bill is going to codify these important efforts and formalize the creation of a mobility program within USAID's Office of Gender Equality and Women's Empowerment.
COVID-19 has taught us that a global health crisis can easily turn into an economic crisis, a food crisis, a mobility crisis, and more. Sometimes the simplest things, like a bicycle, can help make incredible progress.
That is item No. 1.
4962
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ``Bicycles for Rural African Transport Act''. SEC. 2. RURAL MOBILITY PROGRAM IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA.
(a) Establishment.--
(1) In general.--The Administrator of the United States Agency for International Development (referred to in this section as ``USAID'') shall establish, within the Office of Gender Equality and Women's Empowerment, a rural mobility program (referred to in this section as the ``Program'') to carry out the purposes described in paragraph (2), including through grants made to eligible nongovernmental partner organizations. In making such grants, the Administrator shall give priority to organizations with demonstrated success conducting rural mobility programs in the region for such purposes.
(2) Purpose.--The Program shall focus on country-driven projects within sub-Saharan Africa that--
(A) promote rural communities' access to critical services and opportunities, including education, health care, and livelihood opportunities, through access to affordable, fit- for-purpose bicycles; and
(B) provide support to sustainably increase access to critical services, such as education, health care, and livelihood opportunities in rural areas, including through support for rural-based mechanics, access to spare parts, reduction of social and gender-based stigma, and community project management capacity.
(3) Partnerships.--To the greatest extent practicable, the Program shall partner with existing entities outside the United States that have successful models for providing access to affordable bicycles to achieve development objectives.
(4) Authorization of appropriations.--There is authorized to be appropriated to carry out this section--
(A) $3,000,000 for each of the fiscal years 2023 and 2024;
(B) $6,000,000 for each of the fiscal years 2025 and 2026; and
(C) $12,000,000 for fiscal year 2027 and for each fiscal year thereafter.
(b) Report.--
(1) Prior projects.--Not later than 30 days after the date of the enactment of this Act, the Administrator of USAID shall submit a report to the Committee on Foreign Relations of the Senate, the Committee on Appropriations of the Senate, the Committee on Foreign Affairs of the House of Representatives, and the Committee on Appropriations of the House of Representatives that, with respect to each of the fiscal years 2019 through 2022--
(A) describes the projects carried out by USAID that relate to any of the purposes described in subsection (a)(2);
(B) identifies the countries in which USAID embedded rural bicycle mobility into strategies, programs, and projects of USAID and describes the mechanisms by which rural bicycle mobility was so embedded;
(C) specifies the number of bicycles distributed through projects carried out by USAID; and
(D) assesses the outcomes for, and impacts on, participants in such projects and the efforts of USAID to disseminate lessons learned from such projects.
(2) Current projects.--Not later than December 30, 2024, and each December 30 thereafter, the Administrator of USAID shall submit a report to the congressional committees referred to in paragraph (1) that--
(A) describes the projects carried out by USAID during the most recently concluded fiscal year; and
(B) includes information relating to the matters described in subparagraphs (B) through (D) of paragraph (1). ______
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