CLDP worked with Department of Defense representatives to ensure local business opportunities were created in the procurement of local products for humanitarian assistance projects, and thereby mitigated any potential market distortion as unintended second- or third-order effects.

CLDPs earliest programs involved working with countries in Central and Eastern Europe to help those countries transition to economically stable, market-based economies integrated with the rest of the world. Many of these countries have since tied themselves to the world economy by joining the WTO, the European Union, or both.