Annan Prepares For Privatization Of UN

The move comes as the UN grapples with the oil-for-food scandal in which officials have been accused of taking bribes from Saddam Hussein's regime. Annan will report by the end of February on management reforms to the General Assembly. According to an internal UN document previewing Annan's report obtained by The Business, he will include "proposals to outsource or off-shore select administrative processes" -- suggesting its New York headquarters may shed staff. Annan is reviewing the study conducted for the UN by US consulting firms Epstein & Fass Associates and Faulkner & Associates. Their preliminary study, which The Business has seen, makes no firm recommendations. But it examines three privatisation possibilities, from the most conservative to the most radical: * Maintain the status quo of in-house operations, but save money and create efficiency through greater use of technology and eliminating more than 200 jobs through attrition by 2009; * Retain a core of in-house functions while outsourcing some operations, along the lines of a similar exercise by the World Bank and IMF; * Spin off the General Assembly department entirely as a for-profit, private company or an independent unit with some control by the secretariat. http://www.thebusinessonline.com/Stories.aspx?Annan%20prepares%20for%20privatisation%20of%20UN&StoryID=523E5488-44AB-4751-8EEB-171844A8CC44&SectionID=F3B76EF0-7991-4389-B72E-D07EB5AA1CEE or http://tinyurl.com/dkk2w [Proofreader's note: this article was edited for spelling and typos on February 19, 2006]

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