USAID To Review Population Services International Contracts After Realizing Board Member Operates Sexual Products Company
A spokesperson for the U.S. Agency for International Development has said that the agency "was not aware" that the founder of Population Services International, a not-for-profit organization that manages sexually transmitted disease prevention and international family planning programs, also founded and operates a sexual products mail-order distribution company Adam and Eve and that USAID Administrator Andrew Natsios has "ordered an immediate review of the PSI contract," the Washington Times reports. USAID has awarded $170 million in contracts to PSI to manage health programs. Philip Harvey, who currently sits on PSI's board of directors, originally founded the Adam and Eve company in 1974 as the country's first mail-order condom distributor, but he has since expanded its products to include X-rated videos, lingerie and sex toys. Although Harvey founded PSI in 1971 and served as its chief executive until 1978, he currently has no management responsibilities, according to current PSI President Richard Frank. Harvey said, "I don't see any conceivable conflict in being a businessman with serving nonprofit organizations. Indeed, the confluence of interests seems to have worked well over the last thirty years." Frank added that PSI has "nothing to do with what [Harvey] does in his private life ... and his private life ... has zero to do with [PSI]." Harvey also is a founder and board member of DKT International, a social marketing organization that manages programs in nine countries, mainly involving condom distribution (Seper/Taylor, Washington Times, 3/3).
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