This has driven some of the major aid agencies to try new strategies to ensure women can get the contraceptives they need.
After President Lee Myung-bak came to power in Seoul in early 2008, South Korea had been reluctant to provide rice or any other major aid shipments to the North until its government in Pyongyang took significant steps to give up its nuclear weapons.
But it was the first major aid shipment to the North since the South Korean warship, the Cheonan, was sunk.
Lack of foreign investment was made worse by a political coup that caused major aid agencies to leave Madagascar in 2009.
Later, Mr. Shannon said Mexico had changed since 1997, when the United States last provided it with a major aid package to combat drug trafficking.
The US Congress agreed a major aid package to Ukraine on Thursday, overcoming weeks of partisan disagreement that has held up around $1bn in loan guarantees to Kiev.
That bill languished after an outcry from the United States and European nations that are among major aid donors to Uganda, but was reintroduced last month.
Britain has been a major aid donor to Pakistan for decades, and many high-ranking Pakistanis, in political life and in the country's armed forces, have been educated or trained in Britain.
But he has been careful not to alienate Israel, with whom Egypt's former military rulers signed a peace treaty in 1979, or Washington, a major aid donor to Egypt.
