JAMES T. MORRIS APPOINTED TO HEAD WORLD FOOD PROGRAMME

                                                            SG/A/787

                                                            WFP/1063

                                                            14 February 2002

JAMES T. MORRIS APPOINTED TO HEAD WORLD FOOD PROGRAMME

New York/Rome, 14 February -- Secretary-General Kofi Annan and Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) Director-General Jacques Diouf announced today their appointment of James T. Morris as Executive Director of the World Food Programme (WFP).  The announcement came following consultations with WFP’s executive board of 36 member countries.

Mr. Morris is a citizen of the United States and was chairman and chief executive officer of IWC Resources Corporation, the parent company of the Indianapolis Water Company.  He also serves as president of the Indiana University Board of Trustees.  Formerly, Mr. Morris was president of the Lilly Endowment.  The Lilly Endowment, one of the largest charitable foundations in the United States, was established in 1937 by members of the Lilly family to pursue philanthropic interests.

Mr. Morris succeeds Catherine Bertini, the first United States national to head the Rome-based programme.  Ms. Bertini’s second five-year term will end in March.

Established in 1963, WFP is an autonomous joint subsidiary programme of the United Nations and FAO for food aid.  In 2000, the programme fed 83 million people in 83 countries, including most of the world’s internally displaced people, delivering 3.7 million tonnes of food aid.

For further information please contact the FAO Media Relations Office at

telephone:  +39 06 5705 2232 or 2519, e-mail:  john.riddle@fao.org.  Please visit the FAO Web site at:  http://www.fao.org.

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