1.

This annual report presents our assessment of the European Development Funds (EDFs). Key information on the activities covered and spending in 2014 is provided in Graph 1 .

2.

Since 1958, the EDFs have been 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). The partnership agreement signed in Cotonou on 23 June 2000 for a period of 20 years (‘the Cotonou Agreement’) is the current framework for the European Union’s relations with ACP States and OCTs. Its main focus is on reducing and eventually eradicating poverty.

3.

The EDFs are of a particular nature:

4.

Each EDF is governed by its own Financial Regulation. The Court has suggested on several occasions that a single Financial Regulation, applicable to all present and future EDFs, would ensure continuity, without the risk of interrupting the implementation of the EDFs, and simplify management (4).

5.

While the EDF Financial Regulations have been progressively aligned with the General Financial Regulation (5), significant differences remain. One main difference is that the principle of annuality does not apply to the EDFs: EDF agreements are usually concluded for a commitment period of five to seven years, and payments can be made over a much longer period. In 2014, spending was made under four EDFs simultaneously, and payments were still made under the 8th EDF opened in 1995.

6.

The EDFs are managed almost entirely by the Commission’s Directorate-General for International Cooperation and Development (EuropeAid), which also manages a wide range of expenditure from the EU budget (6)  (7).

7.

EDF interventions are implemented through projects and budget support (8) under four main arrangements. In 2014, 38 % of payments were made under direct management, of which 22 % of the total related to budget support. The remaining 62 % were made under indirect management, of which 32 % through international organisations, 25 % through third countries and 5 % through national bodies of the EU Member States (9).

8.

The expenditure covered in this report is delivered using a wide range of methods implemented in 79 countries. Rules and procedures are often complex, including those for tendering and awarding contracts. The absence of a stand-alone, user-friendly Financial Regulation for the 11th EDF significantly increases this complexity (10).

8.

9.

In two areas — budget support (11) and EU contributions to multi-donor projects carried out by international organisations (12) such as the United Nations (UN) — the nature of the instruments and payment conditions limit the extent to which transactions are prone to errors.

10.

Budget support contributes to a state’s general budget or its budget for a specific policy or objective. We examined whether the Commission complied with the specific conditions for making budget support payments to the partner country concerned and verified that general eligibility conditions (such as satisfactory progress in public finance management) had been complied with.

11.

However, the legal provisions offer broad scope for interpretation and the Commission has considerable flexibility in deciding whether the general conditions have been met. Our audit of regularity cannot go beyond the stage at which aid is paid to the partner country. The funds transferred are then merged with the recipient country’s budget resources. Any weaknesses in its financial management will not generate errors in our audit of regularity.

12.

When the Commission’s contributions to multi-donor projects are pooled with those of other donors and are not earmarked for specific identifiable items of expenditure, the Commission assumes that EU eligibility rules are complied with as long as the pooled amount includes sufficient eligible expenditure to cover the EU contribution. This is what the Commission calls the ‘notional approach’. The notional approach applied by the Commission limits the work of the auditors in case of substantial contribution of other donors, which the Commission then considers sufficient to cover any ineligible expenditure we may have found.

13.

The 8th EDF (1995-2000) amounts to 12  840 million euro and the 9th EDF (2000-2007) to 13  800 million euro. The 10th EDF (2008-2013) totals 22  682 million euro. Of this amount, 21  966 million euro is allocated to ACP countries and 286 million euro to OCTs. These sums include, respectively, 1  500 million euro and 30 million euro for the Investment Facility managed by the EIB, mainly for support to the private sector in the ACP countries and OCTs. Finally, 430 million euro is earmarked for the Commission’s expenditure on programming and implementing the EDF.

14.

The Internal Agreement establishing the 11th EDF (13) was adopted in August 2013. It came into force on 1 March 2015 following ratification by all EU Member States. The 11th EDF totals 30  506 million euro (14), of which 29  089 million euro is allocated to ACP countries and 365 million euro to OCTs.

15.

In order to ensure the availability of funds between January 2014 and the entry into force of the 11th EDF, transitional measures, known as the ‘Bridging Facility’, were adopted by the Council in December 2013 (15). The resources available under the Bridging Facility in 2014 amounted to 1  616 million euro. They were funded by:

They are accounted for under the 11th EDF, but do not constitute additional resources to the 11th EDF.

16.

Table 2 shows the use, during 2014 and cumulatively, of EDF resources.

17.

The level of net commitments made in 2014 was extraordinarily low (621 million euro) compared to previous years (16). This was due to the delayed entry into force of the 11th EDF, which limited the resources available for commitments under the Bridging Facility. On the other hand, payments made in 2014 reached a historical high (3  516 million euro) (17), in particular because of 595 million euro paid out from the Bridging Facility, notably for large disbursements of budget support and advances for operations under the African Peace Facility in the Central African Republic and Somalia.

18.

At the end of 2014, almost all resources available had been committed (98,9 % for financing decisions, 91,2 % for individual contracts). Outstanding commitments (18) decreased by 23 % from 12,5 billion euro at the end of 2013 to 9,7 billion euro at the end of 2014. This was the result both of the efforts made by EuropeAid to decrease outstanding commitments and of the low level of financing decisions made in 2014.

19.

For its whole area of responsibility (19), EuropeAid pursued its efforts to decrease old prefinancing and old unspent commitments (20) and to reduce the number of open expired contracts (21). The 2014 targets set for old prefinancing and unspent commitments were largely exceeded (22). However, while the 2014 target set as regards the share of expired contracts on the total number of contracts was almost met for EuropeAid’s whole portfolio (23), progress has been less satisfactory for the EDFs (24).

I —

Pursuant to the provisions of article 287 of the Treaty on the functioning of the European Union (TFEU) and Article 49 of the Financial Regulation applicable to the 10th EDF as regards the application of the transition period between the 10th European Development Fund and the 11th European Development Fund until the entry into force of the 11th European Development Fund Internal Agreement, which also applies to previous EDFs, we have audited:

II —

In accordance with Articles 310 to 325 of the TFEU and the applicable Financial Regulations (26), management is responsible for the preparation and presentation of the annual accounts of the EDFs on the basis of internationally accepted accounting standards for the public sector (27) and for the legality and regularity of the transactions underlying them. This responsibility includes the design, implementation and maintenance of internal control relevant to the preparation and presentation of financial statements that are free from material misstatement, whether due to fraud or error. Management is also responsible for ensuring that the activities, financial transactions and information reflected in the financial statements are in compliance with the authorities which govern them. The Commission bears the ultimate responsibility for the legality and regularity of the transactions underlying the accounts of the EDFs (Article 317 of the TFEU).

III —

Our responsibility is to provide, on the basis of our audit, the European Parliament and the Council with a statement of assurance as to the reliability of the accounts and the legality and regularity of the underlying transactions. We conducted our audit in accordance with the IFAC International Standards on Auditing and Codes of Ethics and the INTOSAI International Standards of Supreme Audit Institutions. These standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain reasonable assurance as to whether the annual accounts of the EDFs are free from material misstatement and the transactions underlying them are legal and regular.

IV —

An audit involves performing procedures to obtain audit evidence about the amounts and disclosures in the accounts and the legality and the regularity of the transactions underlying them. The procedures selected depend on the auditor's judgment, including an assessment of the risks of material misstatement of the accounts and of material non-compliance of the underlying transactions with the requirements of the legal framework of the EDFs, whether due to fraud or error. In making those risk assessments, internal control relevant to the preparation and fair presentation of the accounts, and supervisory and control systems implemented to ensure legality and regularity of underlying transactions, are considered in order to design audit procedures that are appropriate in the circumstances but not for the purposes of expressing an opinion on the effectiveness of internal control. An audit also includes evaluating the appropriateness of accounting policies used and reasonableness of accounting estimates made, as well as evaluating the overall presentation of the accounts.

V —

We consider that the audit evidence obtained is sufficient and appropriate to provide a basis for our opinions.

VI —

In our opinion, the annual accounts of the 8th, 9th, 10th and 11th EDFs for the year ended 31 December 2014 present fairly, in all material respects, the financial position as at 31 December 2014, the results of their operations, their cash flows and the changes in net assets for the year then ended, in accordance with the EDF Financial Regulation and with accounting rules based on internationally accepted accounting standards for the public sector.

VII —

In our opinion, revenue underlying the accounts for the year ended 31 December 2014 is legal and regular in all material respects.

VIII —

Our estimate for the most likely error rate for expenditure transactions from the 8th, 9th, 10th and 11th EDFs is 3,8 %.

IX —

In our opinion, because of the significance of the matters described in the basis for adverse opinion on the legality and regularity of payments underlying the accounts paragraph, the payments underlying the accounts for the year ended 31 December 2014 are materially affected by error.

20.

Annex 1.1, part 2 , of chapter 1 of the Court of Auditors’ 2014 annual report on the implementation of the budget describes our overall audit approach and methodology. For the audit of the EDFs, the following specific points should be noted.

21.

Our observations regarding the reliability of the EDF accounts concern the financial statements (28) of the 8th, 9th, 10th and 11th EDFs (29) approved by the Commission in compliance with the EDF Financial Regulation (30) and received, together with the accounting officer’s letter of representation, by us on 24 July 2015. The audit involved testing amounts and disclosures, and assessing the accounting principles used, significant estimates made by the management and the overall presentation of the accounts.

22.

The audit of the regularity of transactions involved:

(a)

an examination of all contributions from Member States and a sample of other types of revenue transaction;

(b)

an examination of a sample of 30 commitments (31);

(c)

an examination of a sample of 165 transactions (32). The sample is designed to be representative of the entire range of payments within the EDFs. It consisted of 127 payments authorised by 28 EU delegations (33) and 38 payments authorised by the Commission departments (34). Where errors were detected, the relevant systems were analysed to identify the specific system weaknesses involved;

(d)

an assessment of systems examined at EuropeAid and EU delegations, covering: (i) ex ante checks by Commission staff, external auditors or supervisors before payments were made, and (ii) monitoring and supervision, notably the follow-up of external audits, verification missions, monitoring visits, and EuropeAid’s 2012, 2013 and 2014 residual error rate (RER) studies;

(e)

a review of the annual activity report (AAR) by the Director-General of EuropeAid; and

(f)

a follow-up of our previous recommendations.

23.

As indicated in paragraph 6, EuropeAid implements most of the external assistance instruments financed from the general budget and the EDFs. Our observations concerning both the systems and the reliability of the AAR and the Director-General’s declaration for 2014 refer to EuropeAid’s entire area of responsibility.

24.

Since 2007, year of the modernisation of the EDF accounting, the cut-off estimation method applied by the Commission does not include accrued costs related to budget support contracts for which no payment request were submitted by the ACP countries during the year. The Commission considers that, in view of the nature of budget support, the event for the recognition as an expense is the disbursement. The Commission has indeed a broad margin of judgement when assessing the compliance with the eligibility conditions. However, budget support is not a discretionary grant, but an entitlement, under the Commission’s accounting rules: as for other non-exchange expenses, the Commission is obliged to make the payments when eligibility conditions are met.

24.

25.

For prefinancing payments over 7 50  000 euro, the Commission is required to recover interests on an annual basis (3 million euro recovered in 2014 and 5,7 million recovered in 2013). As mentioned in previous years (35), we found that the authorising officers by delegation still do not comply systematically with this rule and the amount of interests revenue disclosed in note 3.5 to the financial statements is partially based on estimates. Furthermore, the interest earned on prefinancing between 2 50  000 euro and 7 50  000 euro were still not recognised as financial revenue in the financial statements because the development of the Common External Relations Information System (CRIS) was completed only in late 2014.

25.

26.

Our audit of revenue transactions found them to be free from material error.

27.

Annex 1 contains a summary of the results of payment transaction testing. Of the 165 payment transactions that we audited, 54 (33 %) were affected by error. On the basis of the 36 errors which we have quantified, we estimate the level of error to be 3,8 % (36).

28.

When excluding from the audited sample budget support and multi-donor transactions referred to in paragraphs 9 to 12, the estimated level of error is 4,8 % (37).

29.

Graph 2 presents the extent to which the different types of errors contributed to our estimated level of error for 2014. Errors relating to non-compliance with procurement procedures by beneficiaries and the absence of supporting documents account for 63 % of the estimated level of error.

30.

Of the 133 payment transactions relating to projects that we audited, 52 (39 %) were affected by error, of which 34 (65 %) were quantifiable errors. Of the 34 payment transactions affected by quantifiable errors, 14 were final transactions authorised after all ex ante checks had been performed.

31.

As was the case in previous years (38), errors were more frequently found in transactions relating to programme estimates, grants and contribution agreements with international organisations than in other forms of support. Of the 66 transactions of this type audited, 29 (44 %) were affected by quantifiable errors accounting for 75 % of the estimated level of error.

32.

The main types of quantifiable error detected in payment transactions related to projects concerned:

(a)

non-compliance by the beneficiary with procurement rules (eight transactions);

(b)

absence of supporting documents showing that eligible activity occurred (11 transactions) (39);

(c)

ineligible expenditure, such as expenditure relating to expenditure incurred outside the implementation period (three transactions), ineligible VAT (two transactions), activities not covered by the contract (one transaction) or indirect costs claimed as direct costs (one transaction);

(d)

expenditure not incurred by beneficiaries (10 transactions);

(e)

incorrect calculation of expenditure (two transactions).

33.

In 21 (40) cases of quantifiable error, the Commission, via its systems, had sufficient information (41) to prevent, detect, and correct the errors before accepting the expenditure. If all this information had been used to correct errors, the estimated level of error would have been 2,3 percentage points lower.

34.

Non-quantifiable errors mainly included shortcomings in the procurement procedures followed (eight transactions) and insufficient procurement documents (seven transactions).

35.

Of the 32 transactions relating to budget support that we audited, two were affected by quantifiable errors of minor impact (less than 0,1 percentage point) relating to the beneficiary governments’ failure to comply with the provisions of the financing agreements in respect of exchange rates to convert budget support disbursements to local currency.

35.

36.

As in previous years, the frequency of errors that we found, including some affecting final claims which had been subject to external audits and expenditure verifications, point to weaknesses in these ex ante checks.

37.

In May 2013, EuropeAid adopted an action plan to address weaknesses identified in the implementation of EuropeAid’s system (42). Implementation of all 23 planned actions started in 2013 and 2014. By the end of 2014, 15 actions had been fully implemented and eight were ongoing (43). It is too early to assess the impact of the action plan as some actions are still under development.

38.

The following measures have been taken to improve external audits and expenditure verifications:

(a)

risk analysis was made compulsory for the preparation of annual audit plans by EU delegations and EuropeAid’s services;

(b)

grant contract templates have been revised so that auditors can be selected or contracted directly by EuropeAid;

(c)

awareness-raising about the most common types of error, training and reinforcing of financial and control skills of EuropeAid staff and beneficiaries.

39.

While planned for December 2013, EuropeAid has not yet developed the quality/eligibility grids assessing the reliability of expenditure verification reports and providing guidance in the event of non-compliance.

39.

40.

As indicated in our previous annual reports (44), there are still shortcomings in EuropeAid’s management information system on the results and the follow-up of external audits, expenditure verifications and monitoring visits. These make it difficult for the Director-General to hold heads of unit or heads of EU delegations accountable for the timely follow-up and correction of the system weaknesses and errors identified. EuropeAid is developing a new audit application to improve the follow-up of audit reports.

40.

41.

EuropeAid carried out its third RER study to estimate the level of error which has evaded all management checks to prevent, detect and correct errors. The RER study is based on an appropriate methodology and provides useful information, which allows EuropeAid to identify where the implementation of control systems should be improved.

42.

The study consisted of an examination of a representative sample of transactions relating to contracts closed between September 2013 and August 2014. Its results are presented in the AAR (45). Following a recommendation made in our 2013 annual report (46), the AAR discloses the scope of the RER study and the estimated lower and upper limits. The study estimates the RER at 2,81 %, i.e. above the 2 % materiality level set by the Commission. The main types of error identified by the study are:

(a)

absence of satisfactory documentation demonstrating eligibility provided by beneficiary organisations (42,70 % of the RER);

(b)

absence of legal basis for payment, over-claim and other non-compliance issues (32,83 % of the RER);

(c)

errors which were estimated because insufficient evidence was available to check the regularity of transactions (16,76 % of the RER);

(d)

unrecovered and uncorrected amounts (7,71 % of the RER).

43.

Our review of the 2014 RER study found that it was carried out overall in accordance with the methodology and provides sufficient evidence that the RER is material. For some transactions examined, we found that there was scope for improvement in a number of respects, relating to:

43.

44.

In his declaration of assurance, the Director-General makes a reservation concerning the legality and regularity of transactions, since the amount considered at risk (205,7 million euro) represents more than 2 % of payments made by EuropeAid in 2014. However, the Director-General also states that the control procedures in place give the necessary guarantees concerning the legality and regularity of the underlying transactions. As for last year (47), we consider that this is not a logical conclusion because systems are not effective when they fail to prevent, detect and correct material error.

44.

45.

The reservation relates to the legality and regularity of all of the expenditure managed by EuropeAid. A reservation is appropriate when control weaknesses relate only to defined areas of revenue or expenditure (48), but not when they affect the operation of the system as a whole and the financial impact exceeds the materiality threshold for the whole budget under the Director-General’s responsibility. However, the Commission’s standing instructions for 2014 AARs do not clearly address such a situation.

45.

46.

The AAR states that EuropeAid’s controls are efficient for each internal control template under direct and indirect management and that total costs of controls, estimated at 370,6 million euro, are reasonable compared to their benefits (49). The extensive information provided in the AAR reflects a significant effort made by EuropeAid to comply with the requirement stipulated in the General Financial Regulation (50). However, the assertions about the efficiency and the cost-effectiveness of controls are not satisfactorily demonstrated because:

46.

(a)

a full cost approach was not followed, as not all direct costs were included (51) and overheads were omitted. In addition, the basis for the allocation keys of indirect staff costs is not clear;

(b)

as regards quantifiable benefits, EuropeAid’s management information systems do not yet provide accurate information on errors detected and corrected following external audits and expenditure verifications (see paragraph 40), and the Commission’s own checks;

(b)

As far as audits, expenditure verifications and similar engagements contracted by the Commission are concerned, the roll-out of a new management information system on the results and the follow-up of external audits, expenditure verifications and similar engagements is expected to lead to significant improvements over time.

(c)

EuropeAid did not set objectively verifiable indicators, including target values, against which to assess the efficiency and cost-effectiveness of controls.

(c)

Reporting is already based on verifiable indicators, including in some cases target values. With the guidance of the central services, the Commission system is still being improved and refined.

47.

We conclude that the EDFs’ accounts for the financial year ending 31 December 2014 present fairly, in all material respects, the financial position of the EDFs and the results of their operations, their cash flows and the changes in net assets for the year then ended, in accordance with the provisions of the Financial Regulation and the accounting rules adopted by the accounting officer.

48.

We conclude that, for the financial year ending 31 December 2014:

49.

Annex 2 shows the result of our review of progress in addressing recommendations made in previous annual reports (52). In the 2011 and 2012 annual reports, we made 12 recommendations. Of these recommendations, one is no longer applicable. EuropeAid fully implemented four recommendations, while five were implemented in most respects and two were implemented in some respects. As regards one of the recommendations implemented in some respects only, EuropeAid was taking action by:

50.

Following this review and the findings and conclusions for 2014, we recommend that EuropeAid:

—

Recommendation 1: set up and implement internal control procedures to ensure that prefinancing is cleared on the basis of actual incurred expenditure not including legal commitments;

—

Recommendation 2: reinforce the systematic verification that partner countries use the correct exchange rate to convert budget support disbursements into their national currency;

—

Recommendation 3: ensure together with the contractor in charge of the RER study that the issues that we have found are addressed;

—

Recommendation 4: improve its indicators in respect of target values against which to assess the efficiency and cost-effectiveness of controls, its cost approach, and its procedures and management information systems to measure the benefits of controls.