THE COURT’S OBSERVATIONS THE COMMISSION’S REPLIES

INTRODUCTION

1. This Annual Report presents the Court’s assessment of the European Development Funds (EDFs). Key information on the activities covered and the spending in 2010 is provided in Table 1 .

Specific characteristics of the European Development Funds

2. The European Development Fund (EDF) is the main instrument for providing European Union aid for development cooperation to the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) States and Overseas Countries and Territories (OCTs). It was created in 1957 under the Treaty of Rome. The partnership agreement, signed in Cotonou on 23 June 2000 for a period of 20 years (‘the Cotonou Agreement’), is the framework for the European Union’s relations with ACP states and OCTs. It is centred on the objective of reducing and eventually eradicating poverty, consistent with the objectives of sustainable development and the gradual integration of the ACP countries and OCTs into the world economy. It is based on three complementary pillars: — development cooperation, — economic and trade cooperation, and — the political dimension.

3. Operations financed by each EDF are programmed at the beginning of the period covered. A Country Strategy Paper, prepared by the ACP State or OCT concerned and the EU following consultations with a wide range of actors in the development process, sets out the country’s medium-term development objectives and strategies and indicates the EU programmable financial allocation from which the country may benefit.

Table 1 — European Development Funds — Key information 2010 (million euro) Budget Title Policy area Description Payments 2010 Management Mode European Development Funds 8th EDF Administrative expenditure 0 Operational expenditure Projects 21 Centralised direct Budget Support 0 Centralised direct Projects 133 Decentralised Projects 2 Joint management 157 9th EDF Administrative expenditure 8 Operational expenditure Projects 204 Centralised direct Budget Support 63 Centralised direct Projects 29 Central indirect Projects 921 Decentralised Projects 81 Joint management 1 305 10th EDF Administrative expenditure 78 Operational expenditure Projects 181 Centralised direct Budget Support 1 017 Centralised direct Projects 11 Central indirect Projects 215 Decentralised Projects 271 Joint management 1 772 Total administrative expenditure 86 Total operational expenditure 3 147 Projects 2 068 Budget Support 1 079 Total payments (43) 3 233 Total individual commitments (43) 3 304 Total global commitments (43) 2 187 Source: European Court of Auditors on the basis of data provided by EuropeAid DataWarehouse.

4. The EDFs are funded by the Member States, governed by their own financial regulation and managed by a specific committee. The European Commission is responsible for the financial implementation of operations funded with resources from the EDFs. Within the Commission, in 2010 almost all the EDF programmes were managed by the EuropeAid Cooperation Office (EuropeAid), which is also responsible for the management of most of the External Relations and Development expenditure financed by the General Budget of the European Union (1). A small proportion of the EDF projects (2) relates to humanitarian aid and is managed by the Directorate-General for Humanitarian Aid (DG ECHO). The European Investment Bank (EIB) manages the Investment Facility. The Investment Facility is not covered by the Court’s Statement of Assurance or the European Parliament’s discharge procedure (3) (4), even though the operations are conducted by the EIB on behalf of and at the risk of the European Union, using EDF resources.

5. Following the entry into force of the Treaty of Lisbon on 1 December 2009, the European External Action Service was launched on 1 December 2010. Its mission is to support the European Union’s High Representative in fulfilling her mandate to implement the European Union’s Common Foreign and Security Policy and other areas of external representation. In this context, EuropeAid and DG Development merged at the end of 2010 to DG for Development and Cooperation — EuropeAid (DG DEVCO) which has been implementing most of the EDF programmes since January 2011.

6. The EDFs’ contribution is implemented through projects (66 % of 2010 payments) and budget support (5) (34 % of 2010 payments) and managed under three main arrangements ( Table 1 ): centralised, joint and decentralised management (6).

7. Under centralised management (49 % of payments in 2010), the Commission implements the aid activities directly. Under joint management (11 % of payments in 2010), international organisations are responsible for implementing European Union funded actions, provided that the accounting, audit, control and procurement procedures of the organisations offer guarantees equivalent to internationally accepted standards. EuropeAid’s main partners are the United Nations’ agencies and the World Bank. Under decentralised management (40 % of payments in 2010), the Commission may entrust the management of certain tasks to the authorities of the beneficiary countries. The principle of EDF decentralised management is illustrated in Diagram 1 .

8. EDF interventions are implemented in and by countries in which internal control systems are generally weak. The lack of capacity of most National Authorising Officers in beneficiary countries and weaknesses in the establishment and application of financial procedures and controls by implementing organisations and supervisors constitute a high risk for the regularity of transactions. The remoteness of many project sites and the existence of conflicts in certain regions also increase the difficulty of performing verifications. 8. The Commission mitigates these risks through substantial early detection and correction interventions. EuropeAid (at HQ and in delegations) performs a high level of ex-ante control both in terms of coverage and in terms of the nature of these controls, going well beyond the financial safeguards required by legislation. Preventative measures also play a very significant part in the control strategy including substantial training provision both for Commission staff and specifically designed for NAO staff. In addition ‘NAO support’ has been put in place in a number of countries. Guidance has also been significantly expanded in recent years including the publication in 2010 of a new ‘Financial Management Toolkit’ for recipients of EU funds.

CHAPTER I — IMPLEMENTATION OF THE 8TH, 9TH AND 10TH EDFs

Financial implementation

9. In 2010, the 8th, 9th and 10th EDFs were implemented simultaneously. Each EDF agreement is usually concluded for a commitment period of around 5 years, but payments can be made over a longer period. The 8th EDF covers the period from 1995 to 2000 and provides European Union aid amounting to 14 625 million euro. The 9th EDF covers the period from 2000 to 2007 and provides for European Union aid amounting to 15 200 million euro.

10. The 10th EDF, covering the commitment period from 2008 to 2013, provides for European Union aid amounting to 22 682 million euro. It entered into force on 1 July 2008. Of this amount, 21 967 million euro are allocated to ACP countries and 285 million euro to OCTs. These amounts include 1 500 million euro and 30 million euro for the Investment Facility managed by the EIB for the ACP and OCT countries respectively. Finally, 430 million euro are earmarked for the Commission’s expenditure for the programming and implementation of the EDF.

Diagram 1 — Principle of Decentralised management

11. Total contributions from the Member States amounted to 3 500 million euro received in 2010. Contributions were still called up from the 9th EDF. In 2011, the final call under the 9th EDF will be made and the first contributions under the 10th EDF, in which all 27 Member States participate, will be called.

12. Table 2 shows the cumulative use of EDF resources managed by the Commission and their financial implementation. In 2010, gross global commitments were made for an amount of 2 662 million euro (net 2 187 million euro) which is 13 % below financial implementation forecasts by the Commission (7). This is mainly explained by the Commission’s decisions not to proceed with several financing decisions under the Intra-ACP programme (8) and some V-FLEX activities (9), and delays in finalising the 10th EDF programming documents for the OCTs and the 10th EDF Mid-Term Review of the Country Strategy Papers. EuropeAid reports that individual commitments (10) made in 2010 reached 3 710 million euro (net 3 304 million euro), exceeding the financial implementation forecasts by 410 million euro or 13 %. However, at least 305 million euro result from the correction of data related to commitments made in previous years. 12. The Commission confirms that it intentionally delayed a number of projects which were not sufficiently advanced; this explains why the level of total commitments utilised was slightly lower than forecast.

13. Despite being 8 % below the target, gross payments reached a record high of 3 321 million euro (net 3 233 million euro) in 2010. Unspent commitments decreased by 8 % from 12 490 million euro to 11 444 million euro, which is explained by the high level of 2010 payments in comparison with new 2010 commitments. Old and dormant unspent commitments (11) further increased by 11 % from 1 217 million euro to 1 353 million euro. 13. As the Court states, payments have reached record levels, thus reducing outstanding commitments. The Commission has also carried out the important task of closing old projects under the 8th EDF. The increase in old and dormant commitments can be explained by the high level of commitments in previous years and, in particular, 2007 when the 10th EDF opened.

Table 2 — Cumulative use of EDF resources at 31 December 2010 (million euro) Situation at end of 2009 Budgetary implementation during the financial year 2010 (net) Situation at end of 2010 Global amount Implementation rate (45) 8th EDF (46) 9th EDF (46) 10th EDF Global amount 8th EDF 9th EDF 10th EDF Global amount Implementation rate (45) A — RESOURCES ( 44 ) 48 746 –85 – 151 282 46 10 701 16 482 21 609 48 792 B — USE 1. Global commitments 35 591 73,0 % –46 – 116 2 349 2 187 10 698 16 463 10 617 37 778 77,4 % 2. Individual commitments 29 021 59,5 % 8 476 2 820 3 304 10 507 15 683 6 134 32 324 66,2 % 3. Payments 23 101 47,4 % 157 1 304 1 772 3 233 10 240 13 121 2 973 26 334 54,0 % C — Outstanding payments (B1-B3) 12 490 25,6 % 458 3 342 7 644 11 444 23,5 % D — Available balance (A-B1) 13 155 27,0 % 3 19 10 992 11 014 22,6 % Source: Court of Auditors, based on the EDF Reports on financial implementation and Financial statements at 31 December 2010.

The Commission’s Annual Report on the financial management of the 8th to 10th European Development Funds

14. The Financial Regulation applicable to the 10th EDF (12) requires the Commission to report each year on the financial management of the EDFs. In the Court’s opinion, this report presents an accurate description of the achievement of the Commission’s operational objectives for the financial year (particularly concerning financial implementation and control activities), as well as of the financial situation and the events that had a significant influence on the activities carried out in 2010. The Court draws attention to its observation in paragraph 12 on the accounting correction in 2010 of data related to individual budget support commitments made in previous years.

CHAPTER II — THE COURT’S STATEMENT OF ASSURANCE ON THE EDFs

The Court’s Statement of Assurance on the 8th, 9th and 10th European Development Funds (EDFs) to the European Parliament and the Council — Independent Auditor’s Report

Reliability of the accounts

Legality and regularity of the transactions underlying the accounts

Revenue

Commitments

Payments

1 September 2011

Vítor Manuel da SILVA CALDEIRA President

European Court of Auditors 12, rue Alcide De Gasperi, 1615 Luxembourg, LUXEMBOURG

Information in support of the Statement of Assurance

Audit scope and approach

15. The observations regarding the reliability of the accounts of the EDFs set out in paragraphs VI of the Statement of Assurance, are based on an audit of the consolidated financial statements (16) and the consolidated report on the financial implementation of the 8th, 9th and 10th EDFs (17). The audit examined, on a test basis, evidence relating to the amounts and disclosures. It included an assessment of the accounting principles used, significant estimates made by management and the overall presentation of the consolidated accounts.

16. The Court’s overall audit approach and methodology regarding the regularity of transactions underlying the accounts is described in Annex 1.1, Part 2, to Chapter 1 of the 2010 Annual Report of the Court of Auditors on the implementation of the budget. The observations regarding the regularity of EDF transactions, set out in paragraphs VII to X of the Statement of Assurance are based on the following components:

(a) an audit of a sample of 195 transactions, corresponding to 30 individual commitments and 165 interim and final payments made by Delegations or the Commission’s central services (18). Where necessary, implementing organisations and final beneficiaries were visited on-the-spot in order to verify the underlying payments declared in financial reports or cost statements;

(b) an assessment of the effectiveness of supervisory and control systems at EuropeAid’s central services and delegations; this covered the following elements: (i) control environment and Internal Control Standards; (ii) ex-ante controls of contracts and payments by the authorising officers, including the National Authorising Officers; (iii) monitoring and supervision; (iv) external audits; (v) internal audit;

(c) a review of Commission management representations, which covered the assessment of the Annual Activity Report of EuropeAid.

Reliability of the accounts

17. The Court concludes that the accounts of the EDFs for the financial year ending 31 December 2010 fairly present, in all material respects, the financial position of the EDFs and the results of their operations and cash flows, in accordance with the provisions of the respective Financial Regulation and the relevant accounting rules adopted by the accounting officer. 17. The Commission welcomes the Court’s conclusion that the EDF accounts for 2010, as in previous years, were free of material error.

18. However, as in 2009, EuropeAid’s transactional ex-post controls and the Court’s own controls identified a still high frequency of encoding errors (19). While the Court’s audit of the financial statements did not reveal material error due to such errors, these remain a source of concern as they may affect the accuracy of data used for the preparation of the annual accounts, in particular with respect to the annual cut-off exercise at year-end (20). Such errors also affect the reliability of EuropeAid financial management data. 18. EuropeAid has made particular efforts since 2009 to improve the quality of IT data entry. Major reviews of the contracts and audit modules of the management information system (CRIS) — as well as horizontal data quality initiatives — have been initiated in 2010/2011 with this in mind. As the Court points out, this had no material impact on the annual accounts in 2010.

Regularity of transactions

19. Annex 1 contains a summary of the results of transaction testing. The Court’s testing of the sample of payments found 27 % to be affected by error. The most likely error estimated by the Court is 3,4 % (21). The Court describes significant observations in further detail below. 19. The Commission notes that in the previous year (2009) the EDF part of the EuropeAid portfolio was found to be free of material error (i.e. below 2 %) by the Court while the Budget portfolio had an estimated error rate of 2-5 %. For 2010 the Budget part of the EuropeAid portfolio has been found to be free of material error (1,7 %) by the Court but the EDF activities transactions are above the 2 % threshold (at 3,4 %). Thus the performance of EuropeAid’s control architecture seems to be relatively stable over the last 2 years vis-à-vis the Court’s audit, and continuing to show improvements in relation to the period prior to 2009.

Revenue

20. The Court’s audit of revenue transactions found them to be free of material error.

Commitments

21. The Court’s audit of commitments did not find any material error. However, individual commitments made for projects implemented under the decentralised management mode were affected by a significant frequency (four out of 14) of non-quantifiable errors regarding compliance with tendering rules and legal deadlines for the signature of contracts. 21. The Commission will continue its efforts to step up the specific training on contractual procedures for both the offices of National Authorising Officers and Commission departments.

22. No errors were found in individual commitments made under other management modes. As regards budget support, the Court found that, in the context of the Commission’s dynamic interpretation (22), EuropeAid demonstrated in a sufficiently structured and formalised manner compliance with the eligibility criteria set by the Cotonou Agreement. 22. The Commission welcomes the recognition of the significant improvements made during 2009/2010 on structuring and formalising the process of assessing and demonstrating compliance with eligibility requirements.

Payments

23. The Court’s audit found that payments were affected by material error. 23. See reply to paragraph 19.

Project payments

24. Quantifiable and non-quantifiable errors were found for all types of projects, except for supply contracts.

25. The main types of quantifiable errors detected in project payments were the following: 25.

(a) accuracy: calculation errors;

(b) occurrence: absence of invoices or other supporting documents for services rendered or goods supplied, quantities claimed in excess of works carried out;

(c) eligibility: compliance with procurement procedures, expenditure incurred outside the implementation period or related to activities and services not stipulated in the contract and undue payment of VAT. (c) The Commission has issued new instructions on the problem of the taxes imposed by beneficiary countries. These instructions should simplify the processing of certain invoices subject to VAT.

26. The most frequent types of non-quantifiable errors concerned performance guarantees (23) which were not adjusted following the increase of contract amounts; non-compliance with authorisation and contracting procedures for administrative expenditure authorised by the Directorate-General for External Relations; insufficient supporting documents; and inconsistencies within contractual rules.

Budget support payments

27. The Court’s audit found budget support payments to be affected by a high frequency of non-quantifiable errors due to insufficiently structured demonstration of satisfactory progress made by the recipient governments in public finance management. The main explanation was the lack of an appropriate assessment framework since certain recipient governments’ public finance management reform programmes were only in preparation or did not have realistic, clear and prioritised objectives. In a few cases, the Delegations’ public finance management assessment report did not assess progress against the objectives set for the reference period. However, following the introduction of a revised framework for monitoring and reporting on progress in public finance management in June 2010, no such errors were found in the transactions examined for the second half of 2010. 27. The Commission welcomes the finding that no errors relating to the demonstration of progress in public finance management have been detected since the introduction of the revised framework for assessing progress in public financial management in June 2010. The Commission is applying this approach rigorously.

Effectiveness of systems

28. Annex 2 contains a summary of the results of the examination of systems. The Court found that the systems were partially effective in ensuring the regularity of transactions.

29. As stated in paragraph 4, EuropeAid’s mission is to implement most of the external assistance instruments (24) financed from the General Budget of the European Union and the EDFs. Therefore, unless otherwise specified, the Court’s observations concerning both the effectiveness of supervisory and control systems and the reliability of the Director-General’s Annual Activity Report and declaration refer to all of EuropeAid’s area of responsibility.

Control environment

30. EuropeAid’s control environment is assessed as effective at the level of both delegations and central services.

31. EuropeAid has a clear control strategy to prevent or detect and correct errors and the Commission’s Internal Control Standards are largely implemented. In 2010, EuropeAid pursued its efforts to further strengthen its supervisory and control systems. As set out in the Commission’s replies to the 2008 (25) and 2009 (26) Annual Reports of the Court on the EDFs, EuropeAid set up and started to implement an ‘Action Plan for a strengthened EuropeAid management and control pyramid’ (Action Plan) (27). The plan addresses most observations and recommendations from the Court’s previous Annual Reports and also includes actions to better align staffing with corporate objectives (28). However, the plan was still at an early stage of implementation in 2010. 31. The ‘Action Plan for a strengthened EuropeAid management and control pyramid’ is progressing on schedule with many of the actions already implemented by mid 2011. One major activity, the establishment of a new web-based twice yearly reporting tool (External Assistance Management Report) with key performance indicators drawn from the management information systems, will be launched in July 2011.

Ex-ante controls

32. The Court assessed ex-ante controls by authorising officers in EuropeAid’s central services and in the Delegations as partially effective at preventing or detecting and correcting errors.

Projects

33. In respect of project payments, weaknesses were found in the checks on the accuracy, occurrence and eligibility of expenditure (see paragraph 25). Depending on the type of contracts, EuropeAid’s ex-ante checks often largely rely on certificates from external supervisors (for works contracts) or external audits and expenditure verifications (for programme estimates, grants and fee-based service contracts). However, the frequency of errors found by the Court in expenditure which had been subject to such external certifications, audits and verifications shows that the assurance that can be derived from those is limited. As an example, the Court found errors in 12 transactions related to grant contracts which were all authorised following external audits or expenditure verifications. 33. The Commission does not rely solely on these expenditure verifications for assurance. EuropeAid’s (mandatory) audit methodology includes an annual risk assessment of projects to select activities which should be subject to a ‘risk based’ audit — most often in addition to mandatory expenditure verifications. Moreover EuropeAid is continuing its efforts to raise the quality of expenditure verifications — most recently by the issue of mandatory standard Terms of Reference for auditors (whether contracted by the Commission or by beneficiaries). Delegations and HQ also have a role in reviewing the quality of the verifications submitted.

Budget support

34. As regards budget support, one significant improvement was the introduction of a new format and scheme for Delegations’ annual reporting on reforms of public finance management systems in recipient countries during the second half of 2010. This aims to ensure that disbursements are based on a structured assessment of payment conditions. However, certain recipient governments’ public finance management reform programmes were only in preparation or did not have realistic, clear and prioritised objectives, which hampered a structured assessment of the progress of reform (see paragraph 27). 34. The Commission welcomes the acknowledgement of the improvement introduced through the new format for annual reporting on progress in public financial management reforms. It is expected that as this approach is consolidated there will be increased clarity in objectives and the use of appropriate reference periods for assessment.

Monitoring and Supervision

35. The Court assessed monitoring and supervision as effective for EuropeAid’s central services and as partially effective for Delegations.

EuropeAid’s central services

36. At EuropeAid’s central services, a number of tools are in place to monitor the operational activities and the functioning of key controls.

37. Central services analyse delegations’ bi-annual External Aid Management Reports in order to monitor the implementation of projects in recipient countries and other aspects like Delegations’ internal controls and human resources. For the Delegations visited in 2010, the Court found that the reports provided relevant and reliable information. EuropeAid’s Action Plan aims to further strengthen their role as a key control and to place these reports ‘as the foundation of the control pyramid and the main accountability tool between Delegations and headquarters.’ In this context, for the financial year 2011, Heads of Delegations will be required for the first time to provide annual assurance on the performance and the legality and regularity of operations to support the Director-General’s annual assurance declaration (29).

38. Verification missions to Delegations help EuropeAid’s central services to assess project implementation and the adequacy of the Delegations’ internal organisation, systems and processes. In addition to 14 verification missions carried out during the year, EuropeAid made an analysis of the results of 14 verification missions performed in 2008 and 2009. The analysis stresses the need for further capacity building of Delegations’ operational and financial sections and to enhance project monitoring and ownership by partner countries.

39. At the end of 2009 EuropeAid’s central services issued additional guidance for Delegations’ on-the-spot monitoring visits, including selection criteria to ensure proper coverage of both operational and financial aspects. However, most Delegations visited in 2010 by the Court were not yet following the recommended procedures (see paragraph 44). The Court also found that, in order to improve project monitoring and ownership by partner countries, EuropeAid’s central services and Delegations continued to provide support to the services of EDF National Authorising Officers (see paragraph 43). 39. EuropeAid’s current guidelines on on-the-spot visits are not mandatory instructions. EuropeAid is currently reflecting on how to better systematise the monitoring framework (including on-the-spot visits), within the current resource constraints of staffing, mission budget and taking into account security issues. In particular EuropeAid is planning to introduce multi-annual monitoring and evaluation plans and strengthen monitoring guidance and reporting — notably in the 2011 redesign of the External Assistance Management Reports (submitted twice yearly by delegations) and the new Programme and Project Cycle Management Guidelines.

40. Audits mandated by EuropeAid under the framework contract agreement provide valuable information on the systemic weaknesses affecting projects’ control systems and the level and nature of potentially ineligible expenditure. EuropeAid’s central services analyse and follow-up these audit results annually. Most of the findings are of a recurrent nature and include missing or inadequate documentation and the use of incorrect procurement procedures by implementing organisations. In this context, one significant achievement was the ‘Financial Management Toolkit for recipients of EU funds for external actions’, which was finalised and disseminated at the end of 2010 in order to improve the knowledge of financial management and eligibility rules by implementing organisations.

41. EuropeAid’s central services also monitor compliance issues also via transactional ex-post controls. As in previous years, these controls frequently found errors concerning incomplete and inaccurate data in EuropeAid’s CRIS (30) information system. Findings were also identified in the weak documentation of procurement procedures. However, errors with a financial impact mainly related to unjustified clearings of advance payments, which were likely to be anyway corrected before contracts are closed. Although EuropeAid has further developed the system of transactional ex-post controls over the years, it is still not effective in detecting errors in the regularity of underlying transactions and weaknesses in ex-ante controls performed by authorising officers. 41. EuropeAid is currently reviewing its internal control architecture and will look again at the cost effectiveness of the ex-post transactional control system.

42. EuropeAid has not set up management information systems to monitor the results and the follow-up of on-the-spot visits, external audits and expenditure verifications, which makes it difficult for the Director-General and the Heads of Delegation to have an assurance that remedial action has been taken in a timely manner, notably as regards the correction of errors found. In addition, EuropeAid’s information systems CRIS Audit and CRIS Recovery Orders, are not yet linked, which complicates the monitoring of corrective actions. 42. The absence of a standardised IT tool does not mean that audit and monitoring findings are not followed up. Every authorising officer by subdelegation follows up the audits and issues recovery orders if necessary. EuropeAid expects the system modules for processing of audit results and for establishing recovery orders to be linked in the management information system (CRIS) by the close of 2011. See also replies to paragraphs 31 and 62(c).

Delegations

43. As in previous years, the Court found poorly documented and ineffective checks at most National Authorising Officers in EDF beneficiary countries. EuropeAid’s central services and the Delegations frequently provide technical assistance to strengthen these checks, but often with limited results, either because the National Authorising Officers do not perform their tasks adequately or because of resource constraints or high staff turnover rates. 43. See reply to paragraph 8.

44. Most Delegations visited by the Court in 2010 were not following EuropeAid’s guidelines on conducting on-the-spot monitoring visits (see paragraph 39). The summary conclusions drawn by EuropeAid in 2010 from 14 verification missions to Delegations carried out in the period March 2008 to September 2009 (31) are that Delegations are subject to resource constraints which often limit their capacity to perform certain key monitoring activities, such as project monitoring on-site, particularly as regards financial aspects. EuropeAid’s Action Plan addresses the need to enhance project monitoring (32). 44. See reply to paragraphs 39 and to 62(c).

External audits

45. The Court assessed the external audit function as effective with regard to EuropeAid’s central services and partially effective in respect of the Delegations.

EuropeAid’s central services

46. EuropeAid’s central services have developed a common methodology on the set-up, implementation and follow-up of annual audit plans which is compulsory for EuropeAid’s central services and Delegations. A significant improvement for 2010 was the introduction of a common benchmark providing for a 5 % annual audit coverage. EuropeAid’s central services complied with this methodology. 46. The Commission welcomes the Court’s recognition of the significant improvements being made year on year to EuropeAid’s external audit methodology.

47. EuropeAid’s central services closely monitor the Delegations’ external audit functions and the quality of external audits carried out under the Commission’s audit framework contract. Comprehensive annual quality reviews provide useful information on the need for further improvements and serve as the basis for further instructions and guidance to external auditors.

Delegations

48. In most respects, Delegations have carried out their external audits in accordance with the methodology. However, the Court found that there remain areas where improvement is necessary. As indicated already in the 2009 Annual Report of the Court on the EDFs (33), staff constraints in Delegations limit their capacity to launch risk-based audits, the priority being given to compulsory audits. They also have a negative impact on the timeliness of the audit clearance process, which involves a risk that ineligible expenditure may become irrecoverable. 48. While it is true that staffing constraints can have a negative impact on the length of the audit clearance process, all mandatory audit reports must be received before the Commission makes final payment, and therefore the risk that funds become irrecoverable is extremely limited.

Internal Audit

49. The Court assessed internal audit as effective.

50. The Internal Audit Capability (IAC) (34) operated in compliance with its objective to provide the Director-General with assurance as to the effectiveness and efficiency of risk management, control and internal governance processes. Staff shortages faced in 2009 were solved and the IAC was able to fully implement its 2010 work plan.

51. In 2010, there was a significant reduction in the average time taken by EuropeAid’s services to comment on draft audit reports and to follow up recommendations made by IAC and the Internal Audit Service (IAS) (35). There were still significant delays in the implementation of some recommendations from previous years, mainly related to human resources and IT issues. 51. Significantly delayed implementation of audit recommendations relate to human resources policy and information technology systems, both of which are extremely difficult to implement quickly, given the lead times for policy change and implementation within an annual planning cycle. However, the implementation of all recommendations is very carefully and regularly followed up within EuropeAid including through its six-monthly ‘audit’ management reporting.

Reliability of Commission management representations

52. Annex 3 contains a summary of the results of the review of Commission management representations.

53. The Annual Activity Report gives a fair picture of the implementation and results of the various supervisory and control systems in place. It is clear and informative, in particular through the use of quantitative indicators. The report states that, given the design and the results of its multiannual control architecture, EuropeAid does not believe that the residual error rate (36) on its portfolio merits a reservation in the Director-General’s declaration of assurance. However, it still does not provide evidence to support this assertion. 53. The Commission believes that the qualitative and quantitative indicators set out in the four assurance building blocks of the EuropeAid Annual Activity Report do indeed provide the necessary evidence to underpin the Director General’s Statement of Reasonable Assurance and give an accurate assessment of financial management in EuropeAid in relation to regularity.

54. In order to demonstrate how different control layers contribute to the detection and correction of errors, EuropeAid presented for the first time a summary of errors detected and corrected by ex-ante and transactional ex-post controls (37). However, these data are incomplete since there is no comprehensive information on errors detected and corrected following audits and expenditure verifications launched by EuropeAid outside the audit framework contract or launched by beneficiaries. 54. The Annual Activity Report clearly documents that the data setting out errors detected and corrected by auditors, only covers those auditors procured under EuropeAid’s audit framework contract, i.e. the actual monetary figure for EuropeAid’s annual error detection and correction is much higher than that given in the report. In the medium term, IT developments could allow central registration of financial findings for even locally procured auditors, but the cost effectiveness of this development has yet to be fully assessed.

55. EuropeAid has not yet developed a key indicator for the estimated financial impact of residual errors after all ex-ante and ex-post controls have been carried out. As already indicated in the 2009 Annual Report of the Court on the EDFs (38), in the absence of such an indicator EuropeAid is not in a position to demonstrate that the financial impact of shortcomings and errors is below the materiality criteria set. The Court notes that EuropeAid is developing a methodology to provide such information (39). 55. EuropeAid’s work on the development of a methodology for estimating the residual error rate in the DG’s portfolio (once all controls have been executed) was launched as planned in 2010 and is continuing on schedule in 2011. The methodology was approved in March 2011 and a pilot study was launched in May 2011 to test it and to elaborate a detailed work program for its full implementation.

56. With respect to the financial year 2010, EuropeAid’s Director-General declared that he had obtained reasonable assurance that existing control procedures gave the necessary guarantees concerning the regularity of transactions. The Court’s audit does not corroborate this assertion. It found that EuropeAid’s systems were partially effective and that payments made by EuropeAid from the EDFs and from the General Budget of the European Union for External Relations and Development were affected overall by material error (40). 56. The Commission has designed its controls to cover the full lifecycle of its multi-annual projects. It believes that these supervisory and control systems are effective and have significantly improved year on year. The recommendations made by the Court in previous years have been acted on. Many of the improvements made have been recognised by the Court, resulting in significant elements of the key control system being judged ‘effective’, including for 2010 an ‘effective’ rating on EuropeAid’s control environment. See also reply to paragraph 19.

57. The Court considers that the Director-General’s declaration and Annual Activity Report give a partially fair assessment of financial management in relation to regularity. 57. See reply to paragraph 53.

Conclusions and recommendations

Conclusions

58. Based on its audit work, the Court concludes that the EDFs accounts for the financial year ending 31 December 2010 fairly present, in all material respects, the financial position of the EDFs and the results of their operations and cash flows for the year then ended, in accordance with the provisions of the Financial Regulation and the accounting rules adopted by the accounting officer.

59. Based on its audit work, the Court concludes that for the financial year ending 31 December 2010: 59.

(a) the revenue of the EDFs was free from material error;

(b) the individual commitments entered into by the EDFs were free from material error but affected by a significant frequency of non-quantifiable errors; and

(c) the payments made by the EDFs were affected by material error. (c) See reply to paragraph 19.

60. Based on its audit work, the Court concludes that EuropeAid’s supervisory and control systems were partially effective in ensuring the regularity of payments. 60. See reply to paragraph 56.

61. As noted in previous Annual Reports on the EDFs, EuropeAid has set up a comprehensive control strategy, but weaknesses remain in certain areas. At the end of 2010, EuropeAid launched an ‘Action Plan for a strengthened EuropeAid management and control pyramid’. The plan addresses many observations and recommendations from the Court’s previous and current Annual Report and can bring significant improvements to the design and implementation of EuropeAid supervisory and control systems. 61. See reply to paragraph 31.

Recommendations

62. Annex 4 shows the result of the Court’s review of progress in addressing recommendations made in previous Annual Reports. Following this review and the findings and conclusions for 2010, the Court recommends that EuropeAid should finalise the following actions foreseen in its Action Plan: 62.

(a) Develop a key indicator for the estimated financial impact of residual errors after all ex-ante and ex-post controls have been implemented (see paragraph 55 (41)). (a) EuropeAid’s work on the development of a methodology for estimating the residual error rate in the DG’s portfolio (once all controls have been executed) was launched as planned in 2010 and is continuing on schedule in 2011. The methodology was approved in March 2011 and a pilot study was launched in May 2011 to test it and to elaborate a detailed work program for its full implementation.

(b) Assess the cost-effectiveness of the various controls, notably of the transactions ex-post control systems (see paragraphs 41 and 61 (42)). (b) The Commission started work on the cost effectiveness of controls within a wider review of EuropeAid’s control strategy in 2010. This work will be reviewed and relaunched in 2011/2012 in the context of the final outcome of the current revision of the Financial Regulation. See also reply to paragraph 41.

(c) Strengthen the effectiveness of project monitoring, including on-the-spot visits, on the basis of multiannual monitoring and evaluation plans (see paragraph 44). (c) EuropeAid is planning to introduce multiannual monitoring and evaluation plans and strengthen monitoring guidance and reporting — notably in the 2011 redesign of the External Assistance Management Reports (submitted twice yearly by Delegations) and the new Programme and Project Cycle Management Guidelines.

63. The Court also recommends that EuropeAid should: 63.

(a) review the reliability of certificates from external supervisors, audits and expenditure verifications (see paragraph 33); (a) Commission staff does currently review certificates from external supervisors, audits and expenditure verifications in relation to their quality and reliability. In addition, in 2008 the Commission made technical audits mandatory on all works contracts above 15 million euro and later issued standard terms of reference. Technical audits cover the full life cycle of the project from design to implementation including verification of supervisors’ certificates. The full benefits of these changes were not necessarily yet visible in 2010. The Commission is currently also reflecting on possible mechanisms to raise the quality of expenditure verifications contracted by beneficiaries.

(b) introduce management information systems which allow the Director General and the Heads of Delegation to better monitor the follow-up of results from on-the-spot visits, external audits and expenditure verifications (see paragraph 42); (b) The Commission is developing management information systems (notably via a new web-based delegation reporting system) allowing management to better monitor the operational and financial management data available from the field. See also reply to paragraph 62(c).

(c) link the CRIS Audit and CRIS Recovery Orders information systems (see paragraph 42); (c) EuropeAid expects the system modules for processing of audit results and for establishing recovery orders to be linked in the management information system (CRIS) by the close of 2011.

(d) continue its efforts to ensure that data are recorded in an accurate, comprehensive and timely manner in the CRIS information system (see paragraphs 18 and 41). (d) EuropeAid will pursue the significant efforts launched in 2009 to improve the quality of data entry. Major reviews of the contracts and audit modules of the management information system (CRIS) have been initiated in 2010/2011 with this in mind.

64. As regards budget support, the Court recommends that EuropeAid should: 64.

(a) Ensure that Delegations consistently apply the new format and scheme for Delegations’ annual reporting on reforms of public finance management systems in recipient countries so as to provide a structured and formalised demonstration of public finance management progress (paragraph 34). (a) The Commission will ensure that the revised format is rigorously applied in order to underpin its structured and formalised approach to assessing progress in public finance management.