VZCZCXRO5473
RR RUEHGA RUEHHA RUEHMT RUEHQU RUEHVC
DE RUEHOT #0882 1792102
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
R 272102Z JUN 08
FM AMEMBASSY OTTAWA
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 8110
INFO RUCNCAN/ALL CANADIAN POSTS COLLECTIVE

UNCLAS OTTAWA 000882 
 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR WHA/CAN AND EEB/IFD 
STATE PASS USAID 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: EAID PGOV CA
SUBJECT: NEW CIDA DIRECTOR NAMED 
 
¶1. (U)  Prime Minister Harper has named veteran civil servant 
Margaret Biggs to replace Canadian International Development 
Agency (CIDA) president Robert Greenfield on July 1.  Biggs 
has been a deputy secretary to the Cabinet in the Privy 
Council Office with responsibility for plans and consultation 
since May 2006.  Greenfield will become managing director and 
chief business officer of the World Economic Forum in Geneva. 
 
 
¶2. (U)  According to press reports, Biggs joined the Canadian 
civil service in 1978 as an economist in the Finance 
Department and has served in a variety of roles with 
different government departments, primarily with Human 
Resources and Development Canada.  She also has had 
experience outside government, including several years in the 
early eighties at the North-South Institute, a Canadian 
non-profit and independent research institute focused on 
international development. 
 
¶3. (U)  Biggs takes over CIDA at a time when the agency is 
facing criticism as a "troubled agency" and under pressure to 
shift direction and overhaul how it delivers its aid and 
development programs.  A Canadian Senate report last year 
called upon the government to consider dismantling the agency 
because it had failed to make a difference in Africa over the 
past 40 years.  It criticized CIDA as slow, top heavy, 
"ineffective, costly, and overly bureaucratic." 
Non-government groups also have been critical of CIDA 
operations although they see the agency as a major player and 
supporter of international development in a league with USAID 
and the UK's Department for International Development (DFID). 
 The head of CARE Canada believes that the Canadian 
government and CIDA should re-examine the balance between 
funding government groups like UN agencies and supporting 
civil NGOs who may often be better equipped to deliver 
programming than bureaucracies.  Since 2000 the percentage of 
CIDA funding going to NGOs has fallen below 20 percent. 
 
¶4. (U)  Some observers hope that the Prime Minister's 
decision to appoint a senior bureaucrat to head CIDA is a 
sign of the agency's growing stature within the government. 
The president of the North-South Institute said "the fact 
that she's coming from the Privy Council Office will serve 
CIDA in good stead because, quite frankly, it is at the 
bottom of the totem pole, and it needs all the allies in the 
system that it can get."  Outgoing president Greenhill's 
experience had been predominately in the private sector. 
 
Visit Canada,s Economy and Environment Forum at 
http://www.intelink.gov/communities/state/can ada 
 
WILKINS