APPENDIX G
THE PROBLEM OF THE PROGRAMME OF WORK AND BUDGET CYCLE

(Statement by Mr. E.M. West, Director, Programme Formulation)

1. The Director-General's note refers to the concept of a single programme and to the further consultations which are under way between Headquarters and the Regional Offices for this purpose.

2. The Director-General's note also refers to the timing difficulties involved in matching up the recommendations of the sectoral Committees of the Council, the Regional Conferences and the present session of the Council itself, in time for presentation in the printed Programme of Work and Budget to be issued 90 days before the June session of the Council held in the Conference year. This requirement means that the PW&B must be sent at the latest for processing in January to allow time for translation, processing and printing and distribution. Even then it gives little time for the Programme and Finance Committees to study it. The main problem however is that programme budget preparation, from the programme element upwards, must start many weeks earlier and indeed before the Fall cycle of Regional Conferences is complete. This gives very little time indeed to take the recommendations of the Regional Conferences properly into account and even less for a process of reconciling and matching Headquarters and Regional Office programme elements, so as to produce an integrated, economical and effective programme and presenting this in an intelligible way.

3. For various reasons, it is not practicable to change in a major way the calendar of meetings of the Council Committees and Regional Conferences, nor of the Council itself. There would however be a solution, if the Council agrees, which could apply even in 1973 avoiding the need to present a printed Programme of Work and Budget in March plus a supplementary document which might complicate Council discussion in June.

4. This solution is based, with some modification, on a suggestion of the Ad Hoc Committee on the Methods of Work of the Council that in any case the PW&B to be submitted to the June session of the Council in the Conference year should be a “preliminary version”. A preliminary version in the same detail as the full version which the Conference must vote upon would involve many difficulties, not least that of cost. A summary version, followed in late August -- early September by the full printed PW&B, would avoid this and have other advantages.

5. The advantages would be as follows:

1. the preparation of the PW&B could be delayed so as to take into fuller account the views of the Council Committees and Regional Conferences and subsequent joint programming by Headquarters and the Regional Offices;

2. the views of the November (non-Conference year) Council could also be taken into account;

3. the decisions of the January session of the Governing Council of the UNDP insofar as these affected the PW&B, e.g. regarding the related extra-budgetary activities and agency income, could be considered by the Director-General in his preparation;

4. the estimates of cost increases would be more up-to-date;

5. final adjustments to the PW&B would be facilitated.

The main advantage would however be the additional time given for consultations between Headquarters and the Regional Offices in order to present an effective total programme, built up from the programme element level on the basis of the effective use of resources for the benefit of Member Countries.

6. If the Council agrees, it could thus be arranged with immediate effect that the issue of the printed Programme of Work & Budget in full would be delayed until September of the Conference year; the June Council in that year would receive a condensed and summarised document which would however provide all the essential information on policies, priorities, programmes and use of resources, by Chapter and by organisational Annex, to enable the Council to make recommendations to the Director-General and the Conference. The document would not contain all the detailed information at the sub-programme level to be found in the full printed version, although of course any major changes even at the sub-programme level would be covered, as also any organisational changes and overall financial issues. The document would obviously indicate the main lines of integrated action in the Regions resulting from the joint programming exercise of Headquarters and the Regional Offices.

7. In practice, this has often the basis on which, with relatively few exceptions, the Council has considered and made recommendations upon the full printed version of the PW&B as issued so far earlier in the year. In order, however, to avoid any loss of opportunity to the Council to be assured that it has all the information on essential issues which it requires, it could, if it so wished, entrust to the Programme and Finance Committees the responsibility for conducting an enquiry in more depth, not only on the summarised document, which would in any case be submitted to them, but also on preliminary information at the programme or sub-programme level. This could be provided on a limited basis to the April sessions of the Programme & Finance Committees in the form of stencilled or photocopy drafts, on the basis of which the Committees could make self-contained reports to the Council, elucidating and making recommendations on either major issues or detailed points in a manner which would assist the Council in focussing on important questions. If, as seems likely, the Council wishes the two Committees to hold a further session in the Fall of the Conference year, the two Committees could subsequently also make any supplementary recommendations they saw fit on the full, printed version of the Programme of Work and Budget issued in September. The Conference would then have a more up-to-date and informative PW&B, and reports of the Programme and Finance Committees, and the Council itself, upon which to make decisions.

8. It is not the convenience of the Secretariat which is involved, but the desire of the Director-General to present to the Governing Bodies a more up-to-date, realistic, and responsive Programme of Work and Budget - responsive to the wishes of Member Nations, which involve not only financial considerations, which are of concern to both developed and developing countries, but also, or primarily, effective programmes which make flexible and rational use of the Organization's total resources irrespective of organizational location.

MEMBERS OF THE FAO COUNCIL

The composition of the Council until 31 December 1972 is as follows:

Independent Chairman: Michel Cépède

Argentina²
Brazil³
Canada³
Chile¹
Colombia³
Egypt¹
France¹
Germany, Fed. Rep. of²
Hungary³
India¹
Indonesia²
Iran³
Italy²
Japan²
Kenya³
Morocco³
New Zealand¹
Norway¹
Pakistan¹
Peru²
Philippines²
Romania²
Saudi Arabia¹
Sierra Leone³
Switzerland³
Sri Lanka²
Syrian Arab Republic³
Tanzania¹
Togo²
United Kingdom¹
United States of America³
Upper Volta¹
Venezuela³
Zaire,²

The composition of the Council from 1 January 1973 is as follows:

Independent Chairman: Michel Cépède

Argentina²
Australia⁴
Brazil³
Canada³
Chile⁴
Colombia³
Dahomey⁴
Denmark⁴
Egypt⁴
Ethiopia⁴
France⁴
Germany, Fed. Rep. of²
Hungary³
India⁴
Indonesia²
Iran³
Italy²
Japan²
Kenya³
Morocco³
Pakistan⁴
Peru²
Philippines²
Romania²
Sierra Leone³
Sri Lanka²
Sudan⁴
Switzerland³
Syrian Arab Republic³
Togo²
United Kingdom⁴
United States of America³
Venezuela³
Zaire²

¹ Term of office until 31 December 1972.
² Term of office until conclusion of Seventeenth Session of the Conference, November 1973.
³ Term of office until 31 December 1974.
⁴ Term of office until conclusion of Eighteenth Session of the Conference, November 1975.

COUNCIL COMMITTEES (elected)

November 1971 – November 1973

PROGRAMME COMMITTEE

Chairman:
G. Bula Hoyos (Colombia)

Members:
K. Ando (Japan)
M.A. Bajwa (Pakistan)
H.J. Kristensen (Denmark)
R.W. Phillips (United States of America)
B.Shaib (Nigeria)
A.S. Tuinman (Netherlands)

First Alternate:
E. Buciuman (Romania)

Second Alternate:
K.Prasad (India)

Third Alternate:
S. Haidar (Lebanon)

FINANCE COMMITTEE

Chairman:
F.Shefrin (Canada)

Members:
Miss Marina de Barros e Vasconcellos (Brazil)
P. Byrnes (United States of America)
E. Luhe (Germany, Fed. Rep. of)
G. Weill (France)

First Alternate:
A. Lochen (Norway)

Second Alternate:
Ju In Song (Korea, Rep. of)

Third Alternate:
J. Murenga (Kenya)

COMMITTEE ON CONSTITUTIONAL AND LEGAL MATTERS

Australia
Ecuador
Italy
Japan
Morocco
Pakistan
United Kingdom

OTHER COMMITTEES

AD HOC COMMITTEE ON THE METHODS OF WORK OF THE COUNCIL

Argentina
Egypt
Indonesia
New Zealand
Nigeria
Norway
United States of America

AD HOC COMMITTEE ON INCREASING THE PRODUCTION AND USE OF EDIBLE PROTEINS

Brazil
Canada
France
India
Iran
New Zealand
Sierra Leone

UN/FAO INTERGOVERNMENTAL COMMITTEE OF THE WORLD FOOD PROGRAMME 1973

Argentina*
Australia
Canada
Denmark
France*
Germany, Fed. Rep. of*
Hungary
India*
Indonesia*
Japan
Kenya
Netherlands*
New Zealand*
Norway
Pakistan
Peru
Sudan
Togo
Trinidad and Tobago*
Tunisia*
Turkey
United Kingdom
United States of America*
Uruguay*

* Elected by FAO Council.

FAO MEMBER NATIONS

(as at 1 December 1972)

Afghanistan
Algeria
Argentina
Australia
Austria
Bahrain
Barbados
Belgium
Bolivia
Botswana
Brazil
Bulgaria
Burma
Burundi
Cameroon
Canada
Central African Republic
Chad
Chile
Colombia
Congo
Costa Rica
Cuba
Cyprus
Czechoslovakia
Dahomey
Denmark
Dominican Republic
Ecuador
Egypt
El Salvador
Ethiopia
Fiji
Finland
France
Gabon
Gambia, the
Germany, Federal Republic of
Ghana
Greece
Guatemala
Guinea
Guyana
Haiti
Honduras
Hungary
Iceland
India
Indonesia
Iran
Iraq
Ireland
Israel
Italy
Ivory Coast
Jamaica
Japan
Jordan
Kenya
Khmer Republic
Korea, Republic of
Kuwait
Laos
Lebanon
Lesotho
Liberia
Libyan Arab Republic
Luxembourg
Madagascar
Malawi
Malaysia
Maldives
Mali
Malta
Mauritania
Mauritius
Mexico
Morocco
Nepal
Netherlands
New Zealand
Nicaragua
Niger
Nigeria
Norway
Oman
Pakistan
Panama
Paraguay
Peru
Philippines
Poland
Portugal
Qatar
Romania
Rwanda
Saudi Arabia
Senegal
Sierra Leone
Somalia
Spain
Sri Lanka
Sudan, the
Swaziland
Sweden
Switzerland
Syrian Arab Republic
Tanzania
Thailand
Togo
Trinidad and Tobago
Tunisia
Turkey
Uganda
United Kingdom
United States of America
Upper Volta
Uruguay
Venezuela
Viet-Nam, Republic of
Yemen Arab Republic
Yemen, People's Democratic Republic of
Yugoslavia
Zaire
Zambia