Featured  Projects

Cui Prodest LLC is a subcontractor to the USAID Learning, Evaluation and Analysis Project (LEAP III) and it holds one of the two key personnel positions. LEAP III Research Director Brenda Lee Pearson supervises the design and implementation of analyses and evaluations - 90 to date - to provide clear, unbiased views of USAID interventions to ensure these activities operate at an optimal level. Cui Prodest maintains superb working relationships with the LEAP III COR/Alternate COR and USAID Mission staff, 96% of whom rated our performance as exceptional or very good quality.

Performance Evaluations. Research Director Brenda Lee Pearson was Team Leader and Subject Matter Expert for 8 Performance Evaluations: Georgia Economic Security Program; Georgia Agriculture; Ukraine Competitive Economy Program; Youth Economic Support Georgia; Support for Economic Growth in Asia (US-SEGA); Power Africa DQA, East Africa Regional Gender Assessment, and Global Women’s Economic Empowerment. Assessed 45 global activities designed to accelerate Women’s Economic Empowerment across every region in the world through women prospering in the workforce, succeeding as entrepreneurs and enabled in the economy.

Research and Program Planning. Technical leadership, research, and field support for 32 missions in 40 countries in the areas of economic growth and trade, infrastructure and engineering, education, environment, global climate change, land tenure, urbanization, water, gender equality and economic empowerment in Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Egypt, Jordan, Kenya, Timor Leste, Vietnam and Zambia.

Training (16% of activities). Support learning for USAID Missions through facilitation of visioning exercises, trainings and workshops and external communications, profiles and success stories. Design and share analytical and evaluation tools to enhance staff capacity and piloted local solutions during COVID-19.

Cost Benefit Analysis, Inclusive Growth Diagnostic.Overall quality assurance and subject matter expertise in gender, youth, marginalized and rural populations. Analysis of how any inequalities may impede achieving results and identify the largest and most important barriers to inclusive, broad-based economic growth and development. Mainstream gender lens in CBA work products. Examine the enabling environment, access to finance, workforce development, tariff and trade policy, agriculture, land tenure issues, private sector engagement, market systems development and land tenure issues in Armenia, Kyrgyzstan, Madagascar, Mali, Sudan, Tanzania and Sahel Region. 

Millennium Challenge Corporation - Malawi

Awarded 4-year technical services contract to perform political economy analysis and social research on gender, and pro-poor development strategies; design project activities that address gender and social inequalities and reduce poverty; provide quantitative and qualitative research design and implementation and data analysis; and identify and quantify the differential impacts across gender and social lines and barriers for women, youth, and other disadvantaged groups to access opportunities and benefits from economic growth. Conducting deep dives into property rights and agriculture to examine land tenure security and rights for women and the collection and analysis of gender and social data on agricultural value chains, examining market conditions, laws and policies, and potential to contribute to increased income opportunities and resilience for women and youth.

Lessons Learned: Stabilization & Reconstruction in the Balkans

Cui Prodest President Brenda Lee Pearson was honored to participate in the 20th Anniversary of the end of the war in Kosovo. Crowds of people gathered in central Pristina on June 12, 2019 to applaud former US President Bill Clinton and his Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, and General Wesley Clark, who were key advocates of NATO’s military intervention. NATO launched its bombing campaign in 1999 to end Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic’s campaign of repression and ethnic cleansing against Kosovo Albanians. NATO’s troops entered Kosovo on June 12, 1999 after its campaign of air strikes ended. 

“Never forget, when you think of the challenges ahead of you, and I say that to your existing leaders, you have already done something amazing. You have given a whole generation the first 20 years of their life in peace,” said former US President Bill Clinton.

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The Cui Prodest Team has been integrally involved in the post conflict stabilization and reconstruction of Southeast Europe, especially in shaping the policies that will build a more peaceful region. The senior technical advisors of Cui Prodest met while working in the Balkans 25 years ago.  Brenda Lee Pearson was the Country Director the National Democratic Institute in Macedonia, one of the original staff that launched the International Crisis Group, and a senior policy advisor to the Prime Ministers of Kosovo and Macedonia. Ellen Goldstein was the World Bank Country Director in Macedonia and later the Regional Director who led a diverse team of 200+ field staff in eight locations to deliver portfolio of $2.5 billion in programs for six Balkan countries overcoming past conflicts and moving toward European Union membership.  Sarah Farnsworth served as the USAID’s pre-eminent advisor and analyst for activities in Macedonia, Kosovo, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, and Montenegro and guided the development of programs to assess the relevancy and implications of global social, political, economic, geographic, and military issues affecting the formulation and execution of U.S. foreign policy. 

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Geoffrey Mazullo directed efforts to rebuild the financial sectors, capital markets, stock exchanges, and public finance management systems in 11 countries while Director of the regional Partners for Financial Stability (PFS) Program and Chief of Party of the USAID Legal and Regulatory Reform Project in Bosnia Herzegovina. Claire Grimes served as Press Spokesperson and Strategic Communications Officer for the United Nations Peacekeeping Forces in Bosnia, Croatia and Macedonia, her experience of working with the international media and local media outlets in crisis situations brought to the world an award-winning television report of war. Lawrence Robertson during his 8 yeas with USAID’s Office of Conflict Management and Mitigation led efforts to design a new analytical framework and research tools to better measure aid impact based on his work in the region.  Laura McGrew served as an OSCE election monitor for the first post-war elections in Bosnia Herzegovina and reflected on this experience to publish widely on global issues of reconciliation, transitional justice, and gender-based violence in conflicts.

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We have learned the important lessons of war, stabilization and reconstruction. Building democracy and stimulating private sector investment requires an understanding of local history and culture. Democratic governance cannot be built overnight. Our Cui Prodest Team has the first-hand knowledge and experience of analyzing the political economy, training and mentoring local populations, and strategically supporting local solutions with long-term.