NEW YORK -- At the Clinton Global Initiative's final annual meeting, former President Bill Clinton highlighted the progress that his organization has helped bring to Haiti.

He gave credit to a coalition of organizations that includes Heifer International.

The Little Rock-based nonprofit -- a neighbor of Clinton's presidential library -- helped provide goats to thousands of Haitians and then gave assistance on how to breed, feed and market the animals.

Heifer International President and CEO Pierre Ferrari joined others onstage as Clinton thanked the participants and praised their work.

"A lot of you have done a lot of good work, and I'm very grateful for it," Clinton said later Monday. "A blizzard of things have been done. It's way better than it otherwise would be."

Ferrari said the Clinton Global Initiative had encouraged numerous groups to work together after a devastating 2010 earthquake in Haiti. The earthquake killed tens of thousands of people in the poverty-stricken nation nearly 1,000 miles southeast of Florida.

"I think one of the criticisms that's been aimed at the [nongovernment organizations] as well as at businesses that have been working in Haiti is that there's no coordination, there's a tremendous amount of redundancy, money's being wasted," he said. "The Haiti Action Network was formed to actually improve the performance of everyone within it."

As part of a commitment Heifer International made at a previous Clinton Global Initiative annual meeting, the Little Rock organization has worked to help tens of thousands of Haitians by "improving goat quality, improving the understanding of goat health, good nutrition, good marketing and all of that," he said.

Ferrari said the Global Initiative deserves credit for helping to foster cooperation and coordination.

Launched in 2005, the Global Initiative has held events throughout the years, but the annual meeting in September has been its biggest. It draws a large number of world leaders and addresses a vast array of international challenges.

Since Clinton launched the Global Initiative as an arm of the Clinton Foundation in 2005, its members have made more than 3,550 commitments and pledged to raise $125 billion to meet them, according to a Bloomberg News calculation based on annual reports.

On Monday, Queen Rania of Jordan discussed refugees. U2 frontman Bono appeared on a panel titled "Partnering for Global Prosperity."

On Monday evening, guests were set to hear from the president of the Inter-American Development Bank, supermodel Iman and singer Andrea Bocelli. Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos and Jon Bon Jovi, the pop star-philanthropist, were among those scheduled to receive a Clinton Global Citizen Award.

With Clinton's wife, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, battling Republican Donald Trump for the White House, the ex-president has said that he'll step down from the foundation if she is elected in November.

The Clintons' daughter, Chelsea, still intends to serve on the board, officials have said.

During the Global Initiative's final annual meeting, Bill Clinton highlighted projects that it helped launch: cleaning up the environment, improving health care, creating jobs, and providing schools and clean drinking water in impoverished areas.

On Monday, heads of state, celebrities, business titans, philanthropists and a queen consort took the stage, and pointed out a variety of challenges, such as poverty in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, and civil war in Syria.

Clinton was at the center of it all.

The former president moderated a panel that included Argentine President Mauricio Macri, Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi and London Mayor Sadiq Khan.

Chelsea Clinton spoke about the steep decline of the African elephant population.

Hillary Clinton did not attend. President Barack Obama, who appeared at several Global Initiative events over the years, was also missing from this year's list of speakers.

Republicans have made the foundation an election issue, saying the lines between the nonprofit organization and the State Department were blurred while Hillary Clinton was secretary of state from 2009-13.

Last month, Trump said the Clintons "have spent decades as insiders lining their own pockets and taking care of donors instead of the American people. It is now clear that the Clinton Foundation is the most corrupt enterprise in political history."

In an interview with NPR on Monday, Bill Clinton defended his time at the helm of the foundation and portrayed its work as purely philanthropic.

"I've had this job longer than I ever had any job, and I've loved it," Clinton said. "And, you know, we always say in response to our critics that nobody in my family ever took a penny out of this foundation and [the Clinton family] put millions of dollars in."

The Clinton Global Initiative, which ends Wednesday, has drawn several Arkansans, including Acxiom Executive Vice President Jerry Jones, who has attended six years or so.

"It's an amazing collection of people that can actually get things done in the world," he said.

Because it coincides with the start of the U.N. General Assembly, it attracts political leaders from around the globe.

"You have people from business, from [nongovernment organizations] and philanthropy as well as government all involved in trying to come together and solve problems and make things better. That's why I come back year after year," Jones said.

"I think there's so much good that comes out of CGI and the work that the Clinton Foundation does that the criticism is very unfair. Millions and millions of people have been benefited by the work of the Clinton Foundation and specifically the ideas and the actions that are committed to at CGI."

While he realizes there is criticism on the political front, he said, "Only good comes out of this in terms of how it actually affects people."

Other Arkansans spotted Monday: Southern Bancorp CEO Darrin Williams, former state Attorney General Dustin McDaniel and City Year Little Rock Executive Director Sarah Roberson.

A Section on 09/20/2016