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Fraud Prevention in Food Aid Commodity Management, Part 1 and 2

Resource Type:
Documents

Presented by: Syon Niyogi, Deputy Regional Director for Management Quality, Catholic Relief Services

Each year, thousands of metric tons of food commodities, donated by the United States Government, are programmed all over the world. Food aid is usually distributed to the recipient beneficiaries through national or international cooperating partner non-governmental organizations with heavy reliance on local infrastructure and local capacity, which vary greatly from one country to another or one agency to another.

Most of the countries where food aid programs are implemented have to deal with local challenges on a daily basis. Yet the implementing agency remains accountable to the US government for commodities lost, damaged, misused, or misappropriated, unless USAID determines that such improper distribution or use or loss or damage could not have been prevented by the agency under reasonable circumstances.

In Part 1, participants gained an understanding of risks and potential loopholes in food commodity management. The session assisted them to be mindful about fraud prevention in designing and staffing food aid programs, developing control mechanisms and closely monitoring and having oversight of food aid programs.

In Part 2, the session used case studies to delve deeper into fraud in commodity management and used Transparency International's Preventing Corruption in Humanitarian Operations to address some of the issues.