Audit Reports

As part of its annual workplan, the Office of Internal Audit conducted an audit of selected WFP processes in Syria. The audit faced staffing constraints and fieldwork limitations due to the volatile security situation prevailing in the region, which led to the shortening of the on-site mission. Accordingly, the Office of Internal Audit adjusted the scope and the methodology of the audit, relying on remote testing. The areas in audit scope included: governance, beneficiary management, management of cooperating partners and monitoring activities. The audit covered the period from 1 January 2022 to 30 June 2023. Over this period, WFP expenses amounted to USD 866 million. The country office reached six million beneficiaries in 2022 and the main transfer modality was in-kind delivery. The operational context in Syria remained complex and was further compounded by limited access to beneficiary data. The internal audit report does not include an engagement level rating as the audit scope focused on a limited set of selected processes. The results of the audit highlighted that the internal controls for the processes included in the audit scope were generally established but needed improvements. Prompt management action is required to ensure that identified risks are adequately mitigated and to enable WFP in Syria to manage unprecedented funding constraints.

As part of its annual workplan, the Office of Internal Audit conducted an audit of WFP operations in Madagascar, focusing on supply chain, management of the emergency response, cooperating partner management, monitoring activities, cash-based transfers, payment processes, and budget management. The Country Strategic Plan has five strategic outcomes: promote an integrated, shock-responsive social protection system; provide children in vulnerable communities with access to nutritious foods while at school; extend integrated approaches for the prevention of malnutrition among vulnerable women, adolescent girls, and children; build the resilience of vulnerable smallholder households and communities; and ensure that interventions for addressing needs are supported by enhanced capacities and resources for emergency preparedness and response. Over the audit period, the country office assisted 2.8 million beneficiaries through the distribution of 84,000 metric tons of food worth USD 54 million and USD 21 million of cash-based transfers, representing 72 ercent and 28 percent respectively of total transfer value to beneficiaries. Based on the results of the audit, the Office of Internal Audit reached an overall conclusion of ineffective / unsatisfactory.

The audit focused on a comprehensive review of six high-risk areas: (i) governance and risk management; (ii) programme design and implementation; (iii) identity management; (iv) non-governmental organization management; (v) monitoring; and (vi) cash-based transfers. In addition, the audit partially tested controls for six areas: (i) donor engagement; (ii) human resource transition; (iii) management services; (iv) supply chain management; (v) digital solutions and automation; and (vi) security and access management. Throughout the audit period, WFP operations were defined by an unprecedented scale-up of relief activities while responding to the threat of famine. The integrated food security phase classification for Somalia projected six million severely food-insecure people by June 2022. It also projected 322,000 people facing catastrophic outcomes by March 2023, triggering the risk of famine in various locations. WFP activated the corporate scale-up emergency phase in August 2022, which lasted for nine months and was deactivated in May 2023. The audit focused on two activities under strategic outcomes 1 and 2, which accounted for 92 percent of the total direct operational costs and 95 percent of beneficiary caseload during the audit period: (i) provide integrated food and nutritional assistance to crisis-affected people (activity 1); (ii) provide conditional and unconditional food and/or cash-based food assistance and nutrition-sensitive messaging to food-insecure people through reliable safety nets (activity 3). Based on the results of the audit, the Office of Internal Audit reached an overall conclusion of major improvement needed.