Member State Representatives

Executive Board members and alternate members may be accompanied inside the Board Room by one additional delegate as decided in the 124th session of the Executive Board.

The Executive Board, at its 100th session, considered silent observers at Executive Board sessions and noted that ‘Additional delegates of members and alternate members of the Executive Board may follow proceedings by closed circuit television in the salle d’écoute. EB 2010/100/R.38 para. 7 (a) refers [Arabic] [English] [French] [Spanish]

Also at its 100th session, the Executive Board determined to ‘Invite a single representative of a non-Executive Board country to follow discussions on a project/programme proposals for their country in the salle d’écoute. [Arabic] [English] [French] [Spanish]

When considering silent observers at the Executive Board, at its 100th session, the Board recommended that the Rules of Procedure of the Executive Board be amended to include the provision to invite a single representative from each of the five regions covered by IFAD’s operations (West and Central Africa, East and Southern Africa, Near East, North Africa and Europe, Asia and the Pacific, and Latin America and the Caribbean) to the Executive Board session as silent observers for items pertaining to the country strategic opportunities programmes, project and programme proposals, and grant proposals for consideration of the Executive Board. The names of said representatives shall be communicated to the President by the Convenors. EB 2010/100/R.38 para. 8 (a) refers [Arabic] [English] [French] [Spanish]  

Country Strategic Opportunities Programmes (COSOP) countries

In December 2002, at its seventy-seventh session, the Executive Board considered the Procedure for the review of country strategic opportunities programmes (COSOPs) by the Executive Board within which the Board stated that 'when a COSOP is discussed by the Board while the country in question is not a Board member, a country representative should be invited to the specific Board session on that COSOP.' Thus “A ‘non-Executive Board’ country will be allowed to take part in Board discussion on the COSOP for the country in question, at no cost to IFAD.” [Arabic] [English] [French] [Spanish]

Entities/Individuals

Document EB 2018/124/R.38 [Arabic] [English] [French] [Spanish] aimed at broadening the attendance by silent observers at Executive Board sessions and states, inter alia, that invitations would be extended to observers by the President as follows:

“(i)      The President would submit to the Board members at list of entities/individuals she/he intends to invite as silent observers to a session, in advance, prescribing a specific time frame within which Board members may, should they so wish, object to the invitation of any of the entities/individuals proposed.

(ii)       If no objection is received from any member within the specified period of time, the proposed silent observers will be deemed accepted by the Board. The President would then issue invitations to the approved entities/individuals to attend the session as a silent observer.

(iii)      Should a member object to the invitation of a particular entity/individual, said entity/individual would not be invited to attend the Board session.”

FAO and WFP

In May 2019, in the spirit of mutual collaboration among the Rome-based agencies, the President requested – and the Executive Board approved – that the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations and the World Food Programme be invited on a regular basis to Executive Board sessions as silent observers without requiring further approval by the Board." Annex III of document EB 2018/125/INF.3/Rev.2 refers [Arabic] [English] [French] [Spanish]

Non-Member States

At its 108th session, in April 2013, the Board authorized the President to invite non-Member States of IFAD at an advanced stage of their membership process to follow the Board's proceedings via closed circuit television in the salle d’écoute. EB 2013/108/R.28 refers [Arabic] [English] [French] [Spanish]