James Butler. Photo: FAO-Alessandra Benedetti
Jim Butler strongly denies he threatened to quit as agency No.2
By JAN FILIPOWICZ
ROME –The most senior American official at the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), James Butler, has denied that he is contemplating resigning from his post as Deputy Director General, saying he is “strongly committed” to continuing his work at the Rome-based agency including coordinating its current reform programme.
Diplomatic sources close to Mr Butler told the Italian Insider that he had indicated he was ready to quit his job as No. 2 man to Jacques Diouf, the FAO’s Senegalese Director-General, in frustration over the bureaucratic red tape that allegedly prevents it fulfilling its mandate to eradicate world hunger. “James has let it be known that he is contemplating handing in his resignation if nothing changes,” one senior Western diplomat told the Insider.
However a day after Insider reported the remarks, Mr Butler strongly denied the sources’ information. “Your online newspaper reported on 7 March 2010, quoting anonymous sources, that I had threatened to resign,” Mr Butler said in a letter. “This and other allegations are completely unfounded. I am strongly committed to continuing my work as Deputy Director-General, where I am among other tasks responsible for the coordination of FAO’s current reform process.”
Mr Butler asked for his denial to be published, “in particular since I was not given the chance to comment on the anonymous statements before the article was published.”
Mr Butler began working for the FAO in January 2008, starting off his assignment with an address to staff calling on agency employees to cultivate more transparency by leaving their office doors open in the agency’s vast headquarters that previously served as home to the officials running Italy’s African colonies. Butler came to the FAO from the Inter-American Institute for Cooperation in Agriculture, where he has served as Deputy Director-General since December 2005.
Asked what sort of alleged corruption he claimed that Mr Butler perceived the Western diplomat declined to elaborate but indicated that too many FAO employees see their positions as a source of privilege rather than an opportunity for public service. “You just have to look at the number of people lining up to buy goods at reduced prices in the FAO commissary.”
On 18 October 2007, the final report of an Independent External Evaluation of FAO was published. More than 400 pages in length, the evaluation was the first of its kind in the history of the Organization.The report concluded that “The Organization is today in a financial and programme crisis” but “the problems affecting the Organization today can all be solved”
Among the problems noted by the IEE: “The Organization has been conservative and slow to adapt”, “FAO currently has a heavy and costly bureaucracy” and “The capacity of the Organization is declining and many of its core competencies are now imperiled”.
Proposed solutions included“a new Strategic Framework”, “institutional culture change and reform of administrative and management systems”.
An FAO official response Oct. 29, 2007, said “management supports the principal conclusion in the report of the IEE on the need for ‘reform with growth’ so as to have an FAO ‘fit for this century.’”
Hundreds of FAO staff signed a petition in support of the IEE recommendations, calling for ” a radical shift in management culture and spirit, depoliticization of appointments, restoration of trust between staff and management, [and] setting strategic priorities of the organization.”
In November 2008, a Special Conference of FAO member countries agreed a US$42.6 million, three-year Immediate Plan of Action for “reform with growth” as recommended by the IEE.
Mr Butler previously served as Deputy Undersecretary of the Farm and Foreign Agriculture Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture from November 2002 to December 2005.
Mr Butler followed David Harcharik, who held the No. 2 FAO position from January 1998.
In May 2006, a British newspaper published the resignation letter of Louise Fresco, one of eight Assistant Directors-General of FAO. In her letter, the widely respected Dr Fresco stated that “the Organisation has been unable to adapt to a new era“, that “our contribution and reputation have declined steadily” and “its leadership has not proposed bold options to overcome this crisis.“