Brussels, 31/03/2011 (Agence Europe) - The Court of Auditors of the EU has highlighted a number of areas where the European Commission is prevented from taking full advantage of the devolution of management of external assistance.
The Court found that devolution has helped improve delivery. However, according to a special report published on Thursday 31 March: - the Commission's use and allocation of human resources in delegations can be further improved; - EuropeAid is hindered in its role of supporting delegations by the great turnover of contractual staff who make up some 40% of its numbers (this situation makes it difficult to build up the necessary expertise, results in a loss of institutional memory and lessens the effectiveness of operations, the Court says); - delegations have not provided sufficient quality and financial monitoring, when one of the potential advantages of devolution was to make it easier to follow things up. Delegation reports back to EuropeAid do not provide information appropriately or the result or the feasibility of financial management systems.
The report covers the period from 2004, the year the devolution process was completed, to 2009. The European Union is the world's largest aid donor, with the European Commission managing a significant proportion of the aid (€8,440 million in 2009). Some 80% of its aid is implemented by means of a devolved management system. “Devolution” involves the delegation of tasks and responsibilities for the management of European Commission financed cooperation activities from the European Commission's headquarters to 111 offices (“delegations”) in partner countries. (L.C./transl.rt)