29. The Board of Auditors examined cash management procedures in UNFPA to ascertain whether UNFPA

The Board recommends that cash flow forecasting statements be prepared and effectively used as a tool for cash management.

Audit of the Emergency Fund

48. Cash management also continued to receive extensive audit attention.

The auditors of the Office of Internal Oversight Services have agreed to elaborate criteria, in accordance with international accounting standards, to facilitate the review of audit reports by the secretariat of the Fund.

The Board of Auditors has audited the operations of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA).

Audit of benefit processing

General Audit of the Fund

B. Review of arrangements for internal audits of the

(d) Enhancement of the external audit functions of the Fund and expansion of the Fund's internal audit coverage

Audit of property rentals

The Board apos s review of cash management at the secretariat of the Pension Fund disclosed a lack of adequate internal check in the duties performed by the Cashier in 1997.

Cash in interest bearing deposits

The Board therefore recommended that the Administration should review the policy of recording cash assistance to Governments in line with the provisions of the Financial Regulations and the Policy Manual on Accounts.

The design of the web based data system to monitor the audits of nationally executed projects will enable UNFPA to assess the financial magnitude and the occurrence of audit events to better appraise the risks of national execution.

F. Review of pensionable remuneration

Audit of the United Nations Joint Staff Pension Fund Administration System (PENSYS)

Audit of education grants

It was the Committee s understanding that an audit of the Trust Fund would be carried out by the Board of Auditors in the normal course of the Board s overall audit of all trust funds, and that no separate audit would be undertaken for this Fund.

3. Cash accounting reports

The audit found that, in general, the processing and monitoring of rental subsidies were satisfactory.

The Board will continue to monitor the adequacy of the reserves in subsequent audits.

The audits revealed, however, that cash maintained at some field offices was not sufficiently protected.

As a result, the Fund would pay approximately 83.3 per cent of the total audit costs as opposed to 50.9 per cent under the existing arrangements.

100 000 (in addition to existing financing)

In some cases, the diversion of funds is attributed to poor or improperly audited programmes.

27. The Board apos s review of cash management at the field missions revealed the following control weaknesses

In paragraph 71, the Board indicated that UNODC agreed with the Board's recommendation to account correctly for accrued interest on the Euro cash pool.

The Board also validated the financial statements of UNFPA for the biennium ended 31 December 1997, and has carried out management audits of UNFPA management of cash, property and human resources.

In the opinion of the Board failure to disclose these non cash transactions could affect the reported cash flow from operating activities where the amounts involved are material.

Accrued interest from the euro cash pool

10. On the subject of the combined cash forecast for 1997 and the extent of the cross borrowing between the regular budget and the peacekeeping cash funds, the amount of combined cash in each of the most recent years had been less than that in the preceding year.

For 2004, the UNFPA Audit Services Branch sent the request for audit plans earlier in order to give country offices advance notice and time to prepare their audit plans, which were due by 31 October 2004.

There have been five internal audit examinations of the administrative functions of the Fund but, with the exception of the overall annual audit carried out by the Board of Auditors, it appears that no internal audit examination of the investment operations of the Fund has taken place, at least since 1983.

UNICEF considers the existing internal audit procedures for report issuance to be adequate and will ensure that monitoring of those procedures and reporting to the Audit Committee on report issuance is rigorous.

(Cash and In kind, in thousands of United States dollars)

(Cash and In kind, in thousands of United States dollars)

Figure 9 Estimated Number of Area Staff at 31 December 2007, by Field

4. Requests the Secretary General and the executive heads of the United Nations funds and programmes mentioned in paragraph 3 above to take steps to rectify the situation in order to avoid another qualification during the next audit

4. Requests the Secretary General and the executive heads of the United Nations funds and programmes mentioned in paragraph 3 above to take steps to rectify the situation in order to avoid another qualification during the next audit

The Fund apos s external auditors had indicated that the allocation of audit costs between the Fund apos s administrative and investment areas was approximately on a 50 50 basis, taking into account the audit staff assigned to the respective areas.

Niger Participation in the organization of a national workshop on lessons learned by projects supporting decentralised local governments

UNICEF is taking steps to reinforce current quality assurance processes in accordance with internal auditing standards.

A detailed statement of losses of cash and receivables shall be provided to the Auditor not later than three months following the end of the financial period.

The financial statements of the organization for a specified period or at a specified date audited by the External Auditors (United Nations Board of Auditors).