INTRODUCTION - PROCEDURE OF THE SESSION
1. The Hundred and Second Session of the Council was held in Rome from 9 to 20 November 1992 under the Chairmanship of Antoine Saintraint, Independent Chairman of the Council.
2. The Council, after examining the Provisional Agenda and Timetable, noted the Declaration of Competences and Right to Vote presented by the European Economic Community and its Member States.
3. The Council subsequently adopted its Agenda and Timetable. The Agenda is given in Appendix A to this report.
4. Some members of the Council made statements referring to the presence at the Council session of an observer delegation from Yugoslavia. They drew the attention of the Council to United Nations General Assembly Resolution 47/1 adopted on 22 September 1992, in which the General Assembly considered that the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro) could not continue automatically the membership of the former Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in the United Nations and therefore decided that the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro) should apply for membership in the United Nations and that it should not participate in the General Assembly. Those Members stated that the presence of the observer delegation in question should not be considered as prejudicing future action which might be taken on this issue. The Council took note of these statements.
5. At the end of the Session, the Council took up again the matter of the participation of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro) in the work of Council. The Council noted United Nations General Assembly Resolution 47/1 adopted on 22 September 1992, in which the United Nations General Assembly had considered that the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro) could not continue automatically the membership of the former Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in the United Nations, and had therefore decided that the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro) should apply for membership in the United Nations and that it should not participate in the General Assembly. The Council, taking note of the United Nations precedent, decided that henceforth the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro) shall not participate in the work of the Council or its subsidiary bodies. The Council recognized that this measure was an exceptional one.2
6. As regarded the participation of the EEC in the work of the Council, two practical questions arose related to (a) the presentation of the EEC Declaration of Competences and Right to Vote and (b) the seating of the EEC within the Council chamber.
7. The Council agreed that in future the Declaration of Competences and Right to Vote presented by the EEC and its Member States should be submitted to the Director-General well in advance for it to be translated, reproduced and circulated to Council members before the opening of the Council session concerned. The same principle should apply to other meetings of the Organization.
8. With respect to the seating of the EEC within the Council chamber, the Council decided to request the CCLM to examine the subject at its next session and to submit to the Council session in June 1993 a formula that would be clear and, if possible, definitive.
Election of Three Vice-Chairmen. and Designation of the Chairman and Members of the Drafting Committee
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9. The Council elected three Vice-Chairmen for its session: M.S. Gill (India), Francisco Javier Alejo López (Mexico), Zine El Abidine Sebti (Morocco).
10. The Council elected David Drake (Canada) as Chairman of the Drafting Committee with the following membership: Angola, Argentina, Australia, Canada, France, Iran (Islamic Republic of), Japan.Mexico, Pakistan, Philippines, Sudan, Sweden and Zambia.
Statement by the Director-General
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11. In his statement, the Director-General referred to the current precarious situation in Africa, the former Yugoslavia and the newly-independent states of the former USSR, and mentioned the heavy toll of destitution, hunger, ignorance and disease in Latin America, Asia and parts of the Near East, as well as the mushrooming pockets of poverty in the industrialized world. Despite FAO's early and repeated calls for help to deal with worsening food situations, as in the case of Somalia, the international community's response continued to be inadequate and demonstrated the need for more concerted action. This should include implementation of the proposal made by him to the Committee on Food Security as early as 1983 to better equip the World Food Programme to cope with emergencies by giving the International Emergency Food Reserve (IEFR) the status of a binding agreement; supplementing the annual target of 500 000 tonnes with an immediately available reserve of between 500 000 and 1 million tonnes; earmarking for the IEFR a portion of the cash contributions made under the Food Aid Convention; and, finally and above all, pre-positioning stocks either in the countries at risk or in the ports of the donor countries so as to speed up delivery.
12. The Director-General highlighted FAO's efforts to effect an upward re-evaluation of agricultural exports, consisting mainly of tropical commodities from developing countries, with
a view to assisting them to clear their heavy burden of debt and to pay for their import requirements. He stressed FAO's continuing determination to deploy efforts to bring about a new economic and trade order, and expressed the hope that the conclusion of the multilateral trade negotiations of the Uruguay Round would result in a significant improvement in the prices of tropical products.
13. Referring to the major effort under way at the UN General Assembly to restructure the entire economic and social sector, the Director-General pointed to the dangers of over-centralization at a time when central planning had led to so many resounding failures. The UN system was by its very nature polycentric and the unique character of the individual agencies should be preserved as each agency had an irreplaceable wealth of experience and expertise, the pooling of which could have a synergetic effect of the greatest possible benefit to international development. He therefore expressed concern that decisions could be taken by the General Assembly which could introduce changes directly affecting FAO without prior consultation with the Organization and its Governing Bodies.
14. The Director-General also mentioned that the Organization was already in the process of preparing the 1994-95 Programme, and emphasized that he was faced once again with the challenge of presenting a Programme of Work and Budget that would take account of the expectations of the major contributors that there would be no budgetary growth, while also responding to the increasing demands from the vast majority of Member Nations. In this context, he would have to bear in mind the foreseeable enlargement of the Organization's membership and the fact that the majority of countries now seeking FAO membership were mainly from Eastern Europe, and in need of enormous assistance.
15. In conclusion, the Director-General referred to the increasing difficulty of recruiting and retaining staff of the integrity and calibre required. He stated again that he shared the staffs concern and unease about their present and future status and committed himself to continuing to support their cause.
16. The full text of the Director-General's statement is given in Appendix D to this report.
Statement by His Excellency Viktor N. Khlystun, Minister for Agriculture of the Russian Federation
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17. His Excellency Viktor N. Khlystun, Minister for Agriculture of the Russian Federation, made a statement in which he offered the Council an overview of the situation of the food and agriculture sectors in his country.
18. The Minister described the reform measures that had been taken to radically transform the economic structure of his country in general, and that of food and agriculture in particular. Reference was also made to the transition from collective to private farming in the attempt to establish a market economy.
19. The Minister reminded the Council that the former Soviet Union had been a Founder of FAO and that there was a growing feeling in the Russian Federation that the country should
become a Member Nation to benefit from the broad experience accumulated by the Organization and to enhance agricultural cooperation at the international level.
Tribute to the Memory of Dr A. H. Boerma. former Director-General of FAO
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20. The Council observed one minute of silence in memory of Dr A.H. Boerma, former Director-General of the Organization who had died in Vienna on 8 May 1992. Dr Boerma's involvement with FAO began in 1946 when, following the establishment of the FAO Council, he represented his Government at its sessions. He became FAO's Regional Representative for Europe in 1948 and held key posts in the Organization until 1962, when he was appointed the first Executive Director of the World Food Programme. He served in this position for five years until he was elected Director-General of FAO in November 1967, a post he held through 1975.
Tribute to the Memory of Her Excellency Millicent H. Fenwick. former Ambassador of the United States of America to FAO
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21. The Council observed a minute of silence in memory of Her Excellency Millicent H. Fenwick who had died on 16 September 1992 and who had been Ambassador of the United States of America to FAO from August 1983 to March 1987. The Chairman and the Council paid tribute to her altruism, independence of spirit and eminent membership of the Programme Committee from November 1983 to the end of her term of office.
1 CL 1021; CL 102INF/l; CL 102INF/19; CL 102PV/l; CL 102PV/18, CL 102PV/19.
2 Some members abstained from taking a position on the matter.
3 CL 102INF/9; CL 102PV/l; CL 102PV/2; CL 102PV/4; CL 102PV/18.
4 CL 102INF/5; CL 102PV/l; CL 102PV/18.
5 CL 102PV/12; CL 102PV/8.
6 CL 102PV/l; CL 102PV/18.
7 CL 102PV/10; CL 102PV/18.
