On April 12, USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah testified before the Senate State and Foreign Operations Appropriations Subcommittee in support of the President's Fiscal Year 2012 budget request for USAID. The testimony comes just a few weeks after Shah testified before the same committee in the House. Once again, he stressed the importance of funding USAID at the President's requested funding level to "continue to build on the most results-oriented programs," and he specifically highlighted the agency's work in malaria.

Shah's testimony addressed two main efforts that USAID participated in this last year: 1) the presidential study directive on development and 2) thequadrennial development and diplomacy review, both aimed at determining how the U.S. can better undertake its mission abroad. Recognizing that government reforms are not easy, Shah emphasized that his goal is to ensure that USAID is making the best use of its available resources.

Shah highlighted the success of the President's Malaria Initiative, stating that recent data from the program shows a "30 percent reduction in the number of children under the age of five who die from all causes because of our efforts to get a low-cost insecticide-treated bed net, some indoor residual insecticide spraying, and improved treatments to hospitals and communities where kids get malaria and often die."