Plan to split aid responsibility

Date: 24/10/1996

By Ole Ryborg and Rory Watson

RESPONSIBILITY for running the Union's development cooperation programmes around the world would be shared with an outside agency under a controversial proposal being examined by a group of senior European Commission officials.

Under the plan, the administrative and technical aspects of the EU's various aid schemes would be handed over to a European Cooperation Agency.

Supporters of the plan maintain the move is necessary if the Commission is not to be swamped by the financial and geographical expansion of its work.

But critics fear the Commission's role in development policy would be undermined if it went ahead.

The agency would not make policy, but would handle all the studies, tenders, service contracts, staffing and accountancy tasks involved in projects extending from central and eastern Europe to various African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries.

“Today you have A-grade officials in the Commission dealing with accountancy in Uganda. That is absurd. These people are educated to think and to make policy,” said one senior official who supports the proposal.

However, coming hard on the heels of a lengthy internal battle between the Commission's various external relations departments over the reorganisation of its many overseas delegations, the idea is set to spark off a fierce interdepartmental battle when a small group of directors-general examines it on Tuesday (29 October).

“The Commission has been fighting over the past 20 years to get this competence and now it is being suggested it should be thrown away,” protested a strong opponent of the idea.

The initiative, launched by the Commission's overseas development Directorate-General (DGVIII), will be seen by officials handling the Union's relations with other parts of the world and the EU's humanitarian aid programme as an attempt to dilute their responsibilities. They also fear it could mean a cut in staffing levels.

Critics are unhappy with the suggestion that both member states and the European Parliament be given a role in the agency's operations, with seats on the board of directors - an arrangement which already applies to other organisations such as the Copenhagen-based European Environment Agency.

The change would give EU governments an indirect role in the implementation and administration of development programmes which are now the preserve of Commission departments.

Against the background of the Intergovernmental Conference, some officials administering the institution's aid schemes believe the idea plays into the hands of countries such as the UK and France which are arguing for a more limited role for the Commission.

Defenders of the proposed agency deny that it would transfer any responsibility away from the Commission. They maintain that the arrangement would increase the transparency of EU projects and involve member states in day-to-day business.

They add that transferring certain tasks to development experts would improve efficiency and increase the Commission's chances of maintaining aid levels for ACP countries at a time when it is under growing pressure to help the Mediterranean, the countries of the former Soviet Union and eastern Europe.

The proposal is also aimed at helping the Commission match its demands with resources. A recent study indicated that the UK employed eight administrators for every 8 million ecu of aid it awarded, the Netherlands six, France 5.7, and the Commission just 2.7.

The proposed format is similar to the way many member states deal with their own bilateral development aid, separating policy-making ministries from agencies which handle the actual implementation and administration of programmes.

Despite the mixed response to the idea in the Commission, others, including British socialist MEP Glenys Kinnock, a vice-chairwoman of the European Parliament's ACP delegation, believe it is worth investigating.

“We definitely need to organise our external relations more coherently and this is one kind of option. As a general idea, having one umbrella agency is to be welcomed, but more detailed work needs to be done on its actual structure. It might also help to achieve a more natural flow between relief efforts and economic development programmes and prevent the compartmentalisation we have now,” she explained.