Governors,
Mr. President,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

It is an honour and a pleasure for me to attend and address the 35th Session of the Governing Council of IFAD on behalf of Austria.

Looking back on the past year, I believe that the replenishment exercise was the most salient issue for the Fund. We congratulate the Fund and the membership for the positive outcome. Thanks to the efficient support of the President and his management team and the able independent chairmanship of Johannes Linn,  the ninth replenishment of IFAD’s resources was successfully concluded last December. The consultation agreed on a record replenishment level of USD 1.5 billion. The commitment shown by the membership is impressive. However, in order to see these funds materialise ,  I wish to encourage those members who were not yet able to announce their contributions to do so soon, to enable a timely coming into effect of the Ninth Replenishment.

The fresh money will enable the Fund to continue its important mission and at least maintain the current level of work of USD 3 billion over the period 2013 to 2015. The replenishment Consultation strongly endorsed this goal.

The recent food price crisis has moved nutrition issues and agricultural development to the centre stage of development activities and in this context,  made this institution better known to the public.

Given its unique mandate of rural poverty alleviation and increase of food production,  the Fund has an important role to play in the global efforts to find practical avenues out of poverty for the poorest rural people that count for more than one billion and whose number is growing. Food security and affordable food prices remain the major challenge for IFAD’s clientele as commodity prices due to growing demand, production constraints and market distortions will continue to rise.

We trust that IFAD will work hard to make the commitments the replenishment Consultation agreed upon turn out. There is a need for greater operational and institutional effectiveness and efficiency, for improved financial capacity and management and a stronger and broader impact of its interventions.

The consultation agreed on many areas of reform. Let me highlight scaling up. We consider it important for this organisation to commit even stronger to scaling up of successful country owned interventions. This will guarantee more impact and better use of scarce resources. Engagement with the private sector is another area where a more systematic approach should be explored to raise private sector investments in rural areas and facilitate access to value chains for rural producers.

IFAD’s performance has improved over the years as it has constantly adapted to its challenging environment. But there are still areas where performance  remains weak. The sustainability of project benefits still remains weak and the performance of recipient governments has not shown much improvement during the last decade.
We therefore encourage the Fund to make even greater efforts and keep improving in the pursuit of its mandate.

Regarding the Budget for 2012,  we can approve the proposed figures. The zero real growth approach is commendable. In this context, we wish to underline that for the sake of clarity and transparency,  the approach of presenting all administrative expenditures in a single budget should be maintained. Otherwise  creating special vehicles for different expenditure budgetary variations would be hard to follow and understand from the outside.

We also support the envisaged lending level for 2012 in the order of 1.2 billon USD . This is in line with the envisaged programme of work  of USD 3 billion for the IFAD 8 Period.  By using USD 600 million additional funds from bilateral donors,  the overall lending volume should even attain an ambitious level of USD 1.8 billion. This means a heavy workload for the Institution. But taking note of the assurances from management,  we trust that the Fund can successfully handle the implementation of such a substantive  program of work.

With regard to the resolution concerning the Revision of the Financial Regulations of IFAD,  I wish to voice concerns regarding the amendment of Regulation VIII.2.that transfers responsibility for treasury investments also to the Executive Board. I believe that a governing body’s role should be restricted to the conduct of the general operations of the Fund. 

Estonia and the Republic of South Sudan have applied for membership. We wish to congratulate the Fund on  its growing membership and welcome Estonia and the Republic of South Sudan as new members of the Institution.

Mr. President,

you have done an excellent job over the last year. The replenishment was expeditiously concluded. I wish you continued success and luck at the helm of the Institution.

In conclusion,  my thanks also go to the excellent staff of the Fund for its professional work and proven dedication.

22 February 2012