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Description of the Delegation's work in Rome

Head of Delegation: Ambassador Luis RITTO

INTRODUCTION:

The Delegation of the European Commission to the FAO and other UN Organisations in Rome dates back to 1993. It finds its origin in the European Community's (EC) accession to the FAO as a full Member on the 26th November 1991. This accession represented an institutional breakthrough as it was the first time that the EC became a Member as such of a UN Body.

The year 2006 has been marked by an important addition to the Delegation's mandate with the accreditation of Mr Luis Ritto as Ambassador to the Holy See on 24 June 2006. To pave the way to this accreditation, President Barroso came for a visit to the Holy Father in May 2006. In November 2006, Commissioner Ferrero-Waldner organised the first official visit after the full reciprocity of diplomatic relations had been finally ensured. Finally, in 2007, Mr Luis Ritto was appointed as representative of the European Commission to the Sovereign Order of Malta.

The Delegation has a small structure of 5 officials, 4 local contractual agents and one seconded national expert. Despite this new accreditation to the Holy See, it continues to essentially work in the multilateral framework ensuring the liaison between the Headquarters in Brussels, the 27 EU Member States and the three UN Organisations based in Rome.

Rome is considered as the UN capital for activities in the fields of food and agriculture and hosts since 1948, the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), since 1963 the World Food Programme (WFP) and since 1976 the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD).

The highest priority for the EC falls within the scope of the FAO. Indeed the mandate of this Organisation covers many important areas of EC competence (such as agriculture, fisheries and different trade-related issues), where the EC carries out an important normative mission (i.e. establishment of codes of conducts and conventions, setting of standards; statistic databases; international agreements). In addition, the FAO performs field operations such as emergency and rehabilitation operations as well as technical assistance, to which the EC contributes greatly.

The three UN Organisations are complementary and share a common goal to which Member Nations pledged at the FAO World Food Summit of 1996: the eradication of hunger in the world. This goal was reiterated with the Millennium Declaration in 2000. This Declaration puts specific emphasis on fighting global hunger and poverty, which is also one of the cornerstones of the EU development policy. In this context, the WFP is also seen as an important partner. For several years now, the EC is the second largest donor to WFP after the US and enjoys a privileged position of permanent observer in WFP Executive Board.

As far as IFAD's work is concerned, since it is linked to project lending (loans) in developing countries, the EC's interest is determined on a case by case basis. The EC has a history of collaboration with IFAD, although no Strategic Partnership Agreement has been signed yet. A closer collaboration for the future is under examination.

Besides its representational functions and diplomatic role, the Delegation aims to maintain the coherence and consistency of the European Community's positions in Rome, in order to reinforce the EU presence and visibility. Besides the regular meetings of the governing bodies, the Delegation has to cover an increasing number of formal or informal donors' consultations, expert meetings, presentations in both the FAO and WFP, and to give appropriate feed-back to the HQs.

The Commission coordinates at least once a month with the EU Member States, both in Brussels, mainly within the so-called AGRI-FAO Council Working Group, but also within the Council Working Groups on Food Aid, Humanitarian Aid (HAC), CONUN and External Fisheries Policy. The European Commission and the 27 EU Member States also meet monthly in Rome.

FOOD AND AGRICULTURAL ORGANISATION

1. Mandate and representation

On 26 November 1991, the EC became the 161st Member of the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), the oldest of the UN's specialised agencies. This accession was the first one in the EC history with a status comparable to a Member Nation in a UN body. Today FAO count a total membership of 190 Members (of which the EC is the only Member Organisation) with around 3700 employees based in Rome.

The EC membership to FAO was motivated by following two main objectives:

The EC Membership (as Member Organization) also introduced the concept of the "alternative exercise of membership rights" between the EC and the Member States, which applies not only to voting rights but also to speaking rights. This means that the Commission speaks, negotiates and votes on issues of EC competence, whereas the presidency speaks, negotiates and votes on issues of MS competence. There can be no cumulative exercise of rights of the EC and the Member States. [competence between the EC and the EU Members States in FAO].

In practise both the EC and the EU Member States participate in all meetings of FAO's main Governing Bodies (the Council and the Conference) and to all the FAO Technical Committees (Agriculture, Commodity Problems, Fisheries, Forestry and World Food Security). For these meetings, detailed arrangements on coordination for the distribution of competences between the EC and the Member States were adopted by the Council at the time of the accession of the EC to the FAO. It is to be noted that the European Commission is not allowed to hold offices or to be members of the three restricted FAO Governing Bodies of the FAO (Finance Committee, Programme Committee and Committee on Constitutional and Legal Matters).

The accession of 10 new Member States in May 2004 as well as of Bulgaria and Romania in January 2007, as well as the support given by the candidate countries (Croatia, FYROM and Turkey) to the statements delivered by the EC or the Presidency, has strengthened EU position within the FAO. Indeed the EU now represents 27 out of the 43 states of the European regional group.

For the European Community, FAO constitutes a centre of excellence with regard to normative work and policy advice in the main areas within its mandate. The EC considers very useful the Organisation's efforts to promote a North/South dialogue at expert level, thus developing interesting work in a wide variety of areas including with regard to world food security, the participation of rural populations in development, food safety issues, fisheries, forestry and sustainable development.

Moreover, some of these fundamental issues are also the subject of negotiations between FAO members which have resulted in several international normative instruments being adopted by FAO, for example, the International Plan of Action to Prevent, Deter and Eliminate Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated Fishing, the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture [ "International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources"] and, certainly one of the most important, the [ "Codex Alimentarius"] of which the EC is a full member since 2003. Again - from the point of view of the European Community - in addition to this useful normative work, FAO also constitutes an important international forum through which the EC can fully explain its policies, especially those in favour of developing countries.

2. Framework of EC-FAO cooperation

Cooperation between the European Commission and the FAO dates back to 1991, when a first Framework Cooperation Agreement was concluded.

This cooperation was further strengthened with the signature in 1993 of the Arrangement on Procedures for Technical Cooperation covering the collaboration between the Community and the FAO.

In 2003, an exchange of letters was signed between the EC and the FAO for the FAO accession to the Financial and Administrative Framework Agreement (FAFA). Established in 2002 between the EC and the UN for all UN organisations, this agreement replaced the old EC/FAO Arrangement of 1993. The FAFA provides for a shift towards a result-based approach, simplifies and standardises payments and reporting as well as provides for better EC visibility.

In 2004, a Strategic Partnership Agreement was established between the EC and the FAO with the aim of enhancing the effectiveness of both partners in their efforts to achieve common goals and objectives in the field of development and humanitarian affairs. The new partnership focuses on fostering closer collaboration on five areas:
(i) food security,
(ii) sustainable rural development and agricultural policies,
(iii) food and quality,
(iv) natural resources management, and
(v) statistical cooperation an information exchange.
Under this new partnership agreement, the Commission and the FAO have further enhanced the policy dialogue at Headquarters level and strengthened collaboration, particularly at country level. A policy dialogue on senior level takes place once a year.

3. EC/FAO Cooperation

FAO's normative work is complemented by - and benefits from - numerous development projects in the field. The Commission cooperates with the FAO in financing specific projects and programmes in developing countries, where a comparative advantage exists in using this channel.

Since 1994, the EC has been contributing to the FAO through the so-called extra-budgetary funds (Trust Funds), of which the EC is today the largest donor. In 2006, the EC contribution to FAO reached a record level with a level of commitments (i.e. signed contracts) amounting to € 71 million [Examples of FAO-EC cooperation projects].

The EC does not contribute directly to FAO's budget but pays an annual fee to cover the additional administrative costs caused by its membership to the Organisation. The amount for the biennium 2006-2007 as fixed by the 2005 FAO Conference was € 517 145.

4. FAO-related Activities in 2006

2006 has seen a series of important events and meetings of the Governing Bodies. In particular, it is worth mentioning the following ones : The first session of the Governing Body was hosted by Spain with the ambitious agenda of having to adopt its founding principles such as the rules of procedure, financial rules, compliance rules, and budget. The outcome of meeting was successful. Indeed, the Standard Material Transfer Agreement, cornerstone for the implementation of the Treaty, was adopted. An agreement was reached on the core budget for 2006-2007, on the rules of procedure and on compliance issues. The funding strategy was also adopted, but its technical Annexes need to be elaborated. A ministerial segment took place with participation of 81 countries, with most Ministers coming from developing countries.

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See also
 

European Union Member States