A/HRC/10/5 page 3 I. INTRODUCTION 1. The Special Rapporteur on the right to food, Olivier De Schutter, presents his first annual report to the Human Rights Council pursuant to its resolution 7/14. Since he took office on 1 May 2008, the Special Rapporteur has focused on integrating a right to food perspective in responses to the global food crisis in various forums.1 He also presented a preliminary report to the General Assembly, outlining his approach to the mandate (see A/63/278), and conducted a mission to the World Trade Organization (WTO) (see A/HRC/10/5/Add.2). This report2 examines the contribution of development cooperation and food aid to the realization of the right to food. 2. Development cooperation is one aspect of a broader obligation of international assistance and cooperation which may include, but is not limited to, the transfer of resources.3 In recent years, development cooperation has been criticized from a number of different angles. Some have dismissed it as excessively donor-driven and top-down, and therefore as insufficiently informed by the views of the ultimate beneficiaries.4 The tendency of donors - whether Governments, intergovernmental agencies or private non-governmental organizations - to impose various demands on recipients without coordination has also been seen as imposing a heavy burden on the partner Government’s administrative capacities, leading to suboptimal results. Others have denounced the mismanagement of aid by recipient Governments, noting that poor governance often resulted in aid not being used effectively. On 2 March 2005, the Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness was adopted as an attempt to improve the quality of aid. It has been endorsed by 122 Governments and the European Commission, 27 international organizations including 6 regional development banks, the World Bank and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), and a number of non-governmental organizations. The commitments contained in the Paris Declaration focus on the five principles of ownership, alignment, harmonization, managing for results and mutual accountability. These principles mark a shift from donor-driven to needs-driven aid strategies, and emphasize the need for evaluating the performance of both donors, particularly as regards harmonization and predictability of aid, and their partners. In this report the Special Rapporteur argues that the Paris Declaration could be further concretized if placed under a human rights framework, and particularly by taking into account the human right to adequate food and explores the implications of that approach.5 1 See, in particular, his report to the Council, A/HRC/9/23. 2 An extended and more fully referenced version of the report is available at www.srfood.org. 3 See A/63/278, paras. 11-12. 4 See, e.g., W. Easterly, The white man’s burden: Why the West’s efforts to aid the rest have done so much ill and so little good, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2006, and other works by the same author. 5 See also A/HRC/4/WG.2/TF/2 (7 February 2007), paras. 45-48 and 65-66; and A/HRC/8/WG.2/TF/2 (24 January 2008), paras. 36-40.