Edesia Nutrition was one of the lucky few whose USAID deal survived a tumultuous couple of months that saw the agency terminate more than 80% of its foreign aid contracts.
Despite this, the Rhode Island maker of a life-saving paste for chronically malnourished newborns was forced to lay off 10% of its employees last week. Navyn Salem, Edesia’s founder and CEO, said that despite her company’s ongoing contract, her payments to USAID were denied twice this week.
The delay in promised money delayed her manufacturing line and payments to her mostly American supplier chain, which includes farmers who grow components for the paste product’s main constituents.
The layoffs were “the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do,” Salem added.
“The folks here are like members of my family. I’ve attended their weddings. I’ve attended their family’s funerals. I know their grandkids. “We’re an interconnected family,” Salem said.
As Elon Musk, the world’s wealthiest person, and others working for President Trump targeted the State Department agency USAID, a number of global health NGOs have failed due to major supply chain disruptions.
Musk responded on March 2 by writing on his social media site that Edesia’s contract will be saved.
At the time, the essential USAID payment mechanism had not yet been restored. Salem said that it was just reactivated, but on Tuesday and Wednesday, she received notice from USAID that at least two of her bills had been denied. One was refused because her items had not yet shipped, while the other was denied despite the fact that the batch had already sent. She claimed she’s not sure why that one was rejected.
Meanwhile, bills pile up.
“There’s still payroll and the lights to turn on and the peanut farmers to pay,” Salem informed us.
A representative for the State Department responded to queries concerning the agency’s payment processes. The agency did not immediately respond to inquiries concerning Edesia’s invoicing. The spokesman said that an examination of the agency’s projects and programs ordered by Secretary of State Marco Rubio “exposed serious flaws in the legacy systems used to approve and issue payments at USAID.”
“This has caused significant unforeseen delays and prompted the Administration to take unprecedented steps to implement more streamlined processes,” a spokeswoman told reporters. “USAID has 27 payment and finance systems, all of which have been found to be inefficient, broken, and built to intentionally make communication with other systems in the federal government impossible.”
According to Salem, the unexpected delays have had an impact beyond Edesia.
“You have American farmers, American commodities brokers, American manufacturers, American shippers, and the NGOs, the American organizations…..if one of those goes down, the whole system stops,” she told me.
Edesia’s prescription food, Plumpy’Nut, has been feeding children in Africa, especially South Sudan, which is presently facing terrible starvation, until supply was stopped.
Plumpy’Nut is a ready-to-use therapeutic meal indicated for the treatment of severe acute malnutrition in infants as young as six months.
Salem claims her manufacturing line can produce food for 415 infants each hour, but her warehouse is filling fast. Meanwhile, as it reacts to USAID’s abrupt turmoil, Edesia is attempting to improve its efficiency.
“We’ve just changed from a company that’s been here for 16 years to being like a startup, to being more scrappy, we need to change the way we’re doing everything,” Salem told me. “I am always cheerful and hopeful. I believe in the mission that we have. I think that most Americans believe in feeding children worldwide.