Study: UN spending billions on partnerships, often without oversight

The United Nations is spending billions annually on partnerships with private organizations, governments in the developing world, and think tanks, often without knowing where the money is going or how well it was spent, according to a report from a U.N. watchdog.

The partnerships, which number in the tens of thousands, stretch across economic development and humanitarian relief efforts to such things as “peacekeeping, disarmament, human rights and good governance,” it says.

The report, with the bland title of “Review of the management of implementing partners in the United Nations system,” was released earlier this month by a U.N. watchdog known as the Joint Inspection Unit, or JIU, the only organization mandated to carry out inspections across the constellation of U.N. organizations, funds and programs.

It apparently also reflects growing concern among U.N. member states over what the report calls “the lack of adequate managerial control over programs and projects carried out by third parties on behalf of the United Nations.”

The inspectors also cited concerns raised by the U.N.’s own auditors about money transfers from the U.N. to its “implementing partners,” and what the report delicately calls “the lack of robust mechanisms to provide assurance that partners are spending funds as intended, and projects are executed efficiently and effectively.”