Crown Agents

Crown Agents Ltd is a not-for profit international development company with head office in London, United Kingdom, and subsidiaries in USA and Japan. The company is working in partnership with ministries, governments, institutions, donors, foundations, philanthropists and the private sector to tackle complex challenges, ranging from procuring and delivering COVID-19 vaccines to hard to reach locations to delivering essential health services to the population of South Sudan. Crown Agents operates worldwide; the company's areas of expertise are: Supply Chain and Inspections; Institutional Efficiency, Programme Design, Delivery and Evaluation, Project and Fund management, and Training and Professional Development.[1]

Crown Agents Ltd
TypePrivate limited company
IndustryInternational Development
Founded1833. UK statutory public corporation, 1980–1997
21 March 1997 (Ltd.)
Headquarters
Southwark, London
,
England
Area served
Worldwide
Key people
Baroness Neville-Rolfe DBE CMG
(Chair)
Fergus Drake
(CEO)
Websitewww.crownagents.com

Crown Agents fully owns Greenshields Cowie, a freight forwarding limited company also based in the United Kingdom.

In April 2016 its financial services arm, Crown Agents Bank and Crown Agents Investment Management, was sold to Helios Investment Partners.

Incorporated as a private limited company Crown Agents Ltd has only one shareholder – the Crown Agents Foundation, a not-for-profit company.[2] Crown Agents Ltd's registered office is in Southwark, London.[3]

History

Early history

Prior to 1997, Crown Agents was a UK public statutory corporation, overseen by the British Ministry of Overseas Development.[4]

Crown Agents originated as a body conducting financial transactions for British colonies. Agents were first appointed in 1749 to transfer and account for grants made to colonies from the British Treasury.[4] These representatives were known unofficially as 'Crown Agents' from at least 1758, and were accountable to colonial governments, though selected on the recommendation of the British government.[4] A single body was created in 1833, when the Crown Agents' business was consolidated under two Joint Agents General for Crown Colonies with an office of several staff.[4]

The opening words of A. W. Abbott’s history were telling in the light of events to follow. “The Crown Agents have no formal Constitution and are not part of the United Kingdom Civil Service or of the United Kingdom Government machine. The Crown Agents are simply two individuals …who have been appointed by the Secretary of State for the Colonies.[5]

In 1861 the office was renamed Crown Agents for the Colonies.[4] Crown Agents' responsibilities on behalf of colonial governments included accounting for Treasury grants, purchasing supplies, recruiting certain staff and raising capital on the markets. Crown Agents also oversaw specific colonial projects, such as certain stamp issues and some infrastructure construction.[4]

As decolonisation accelerated, the office was renamed Crown Agents for Oversea Governments and Administrations in 1954, and the rules were changed to allow it to take on projects for independent states (Iraq being the first example).[4] Crown Agents expanded its activities to include more international development projects and investment management. The world's first sovereign wealth funds were managed by Crown Agents.[6]

Background

The financial collapse of the Crown Agents, which necessitated a bail-out by the Government, was one of the most high-profile failures of the 1974 property and secondary banking crisis, and widely considered a scandal. [7] The decline in its traditional government business had led the Crown Agents “to consider ways of diversifying…and operating on their own account rather than acting as agents for others…So began a short but disastrous period in an otherwise long and distinguished service to others” [8] The move into own account trading dated back to March 1967 [9] and by the end of the 1960s, the activities of the Agents were being publicly queried by The Sunday Times and Private Eye.[7] By 1970, concerns were being raised in Parliament: Mrs. Judith Hart later referred back to her earlier comments that the “constitutional relationship between the Crown Agents and the Government, which was somewhat obscure”.[10]

The Fay Report and Tribunal

The impact of the financial and property collapse on the Crown Agents’ finances became increasingly apparent during 1974 and in October John Cuckney was appointed to sort out the problems, To meet the potential financial shortfall, the Crown Agents received an £85m grant from the Government. Recognition of the severity of the Agents’ problems. the necessity for further financial support and the political ramifications led to the establishment of the Fay Committee of Enquiry in April 1975;[11] that Committee reported on 1st December 1977. Among its detailed findings was the estimate that losses would exceed £200m.[11]

The Fay report gives extensive detail on the Crown Agent’s activities. It was a body without effective supervision in which inexperienced officers engaged in a wide range of speculative banking and property developments on a worldwide basis. “It is manifest from the minutes of the committee that during the period from 1967 to 1974 the conduct of the affairs of the Crown Agents and. In particular, the actions of certain of its staff, lacked competence and good judgement.” [7]] The parliamentary debate on the Fay report in turn led to the establishment in March 1978 of a Tribunal "to inquire to what extent there were lapses from accepted standards of commercial or professional conduct or of public administration in relation to the operations of the Crown Agents as financiers on own account in the years 1967-1974. The Tribunal findings were submitted in March 1982. In a formal statement to the House of Commons, the Prime Minister reported that “the tribunal has identified a number of serious shortcomings that existed at that time, not only in relation to the conduct of individuals, in respect of some of whom lapses or criticisms falling short of lapses were formally specified, but also in relation to the operation of institutions and procedures.”[12]

The Investments

The best-known of the Crown Agents’ investments was with the William Stern group; Stern himself became Britain’s largest ever bankrupt to date and the losses of the Crown Agents were reported to be £54m.[13] Less well-known but also a substantial problem were the Australian property investments held under the umbrella of English and Continental Group, where losses were estimated as a possible £35m. [7]] There was also a commitment to a wide range of secondary banks. Margaret Reid regarded the Crown Agents’ support for them as “much the biggest and widely discussed amount of finance for the Bank of England’s Lifeboat support operation”. Institutions singled out included Triumph Investment Trust, Sterling Industrial Trust and Burston Group.[14]

Recovery

The appointment of John Cuckney in October 1974 was the first step in rescuing the Crown Agents and restoring confidence in its traditional functions. He instituted a programme of controlled disposals, realizing what he could from the property and banking investments. Probably the most intransigent were the Australian property investments which took some years to bring under the Agents full control. One of the most important organizational decisions made by Cuckney was in March 1977, concerning the Agents’ subsidiary, Millbank Technical Services. Millbank had been established in 1967 to offer services “outside their traditional agency role.”: in effect, it had become a substantial exporter of military equipment. Millbank was transferred to the Ministry of Defence, thereby returning the Agents to its traditional activity.[15] However, uncertainty continued over the legal status of the Crown Agents and it was not until the Crown Agents Act 1979 that the legal and constitutional position was regularized. The Act established the Agents as a corporate body under formal name of Crown Agents for Oversea Governments and Administrations.[16]

International development work

Disaster response and COVID-19 work

The company has been at the front line of the response to major disasters across the world such as 2010 Earthquake in Haiti, the 2014 Ebola outbreak, Hurricane Irma in 2017 and most recently the global COVID-19 pandemic. Since the outbreak of the pandemic in 2020, Crown Agents has procured and distributed over 300 shipments of cargo that includes 625,000 kgs of medical equipment, including PPE, life-saving drugs and medical supplies to 45 countries and Overseas Territories, supporting countries and territories with strained health systems, often in remote, hard to reach locations.[17]

Flagship programmes

Crown Agents leads major global development projects such as Lot 1 of the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office's (FCDO) ASCEND programme, tackling NTDs across Eastern and Southern Africa and South Asia. The organisation also delivers other key fund management projects in some of the world’s poorest and most fragile nations, such as: building humanitarian capacity in Myanmar through the Humanitarian Assistance and Resilience Programme Facility (HARP-F), providing 10 million people with life-saving healthcare in South Sudan through South Sudan Health Pooled Fund (HPF3), empowering women and girls to make their own family planning choices through the Children Investment Fund Foundation (CIFF), and implementing the Results-Based Financing (RBF) programme in Zimbabwe in partnership with Zimbabwe Ministry of Health. Since 2015, Crown Agents has been supporting the Ministry of Health in Ukraine to reform the health sector. Crown Agents’ achievements in Ukraine have been recognised in The Economist: “The health ministry contracted Crown Agents…and two United Nations bodies to buy medicines on its behalf…When the results came back…they showed a 38% saving compared with 2015, without compromising on the quality of the drugs. Whereas before, two or three suppliers dominated supply, Crown Agents have brought in almost 30, thus defeating the tricks previously used to corner the market.”[18]

Furthermore, the company has provided governmental services as large as reforming the customs system of Angola,[19] and transforming the central medical stores in Zambia [20]

Crown Agents is a member of the Partnership for Supply Chain Management, a partnership of thirteen private sector, non-governmental and faith-based organizations that implements the SCMS project, providing a reliable, cost-effective and secure supply of products for HIV/AIDS programs.[21]

Partners

Crown Agents partners with development agencies, donors, private corporations, foundations and governments. Some of them are:

African Development Bank, Asian Development Bank, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Children’s Investment Fund Foundation, Commercial Bank of Ethiopia, the UK Department of International Trade, the UK Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office, European Union, Government of Ghana, Government of Lebanon, Government of Nigeria, Government of Tajikistan, Government of Ukraine, Government of Zimbabwe, Millenium Challenge Corporation, United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), United States Agency for International Development, United States Trade and Development Agency, World Bank.[22]

Awards

The work of Crown Agents has won several awards throughout the years. The most notable are:

Supply Chain Excellence Awards: Extreme Logistics Category] (2018 and 2019)

Crown Agents in partnership with international freight forwarding company, Greenshields Cowie and the International Procurement Agency, picked up the prize for their performance in ensuring the timely delivery of lifesaving medicines to the people of South Sudan as part of the multi-donor Crown Agents-led Health Pooled Fund.[23]

Supply Chain Excellence Awards: Public and Third Sector Category] (2016)

Crown Agents won the Public and Third Sector Category at the 20th Logistics & Supply Chain Excellence Awards for its work tackling Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTDs) in Northern Nigeria with its partner Sightsavers.[24]

References
  1. "Crown Agents". www.crownagents.com.
  2. "DueDil". app.duedil.com.
  3. "Companies House Webcheck". Archived from the original on 29 December 2008. Retrieved 20 March 2013.
  4. "Crown Agents – Our History". Retrieved 17 December 2016.
  5. A W Abbott, A Short History of the Crown Agents and their Office, (1959)
  6. "Our History". Crown Agents Bank. Retrieved 22 July 2016.
  7. "Lord Chancellor Memorandum to Cabinet Crown Agents The Fay Report. National Archives CAB 129/198/12". 7 November 1977.
  8. Ireton, Barrie: Britain's International Development Policies: A History of DFID and Overseas Aid, (2013), Palgrave
  9. Sunderland, David, Managing British Colonial and Post-Colonial Development: The Crown Agents, 1914-1974 (2007) Boydell & Brewer, ISBN 9781843833017
  10. The Minister of Overseas Development (Mrs. Judith Hart), 18 Dec 1974, Hansard
  11. Crown Agents: The Fay Committee of Inquiry; publication of the Fay Report, National Archives, reference OD 71/48
  12. The Prime Minister, 26 May 1982 Hansard
  13. "William Stern, property developer and financier – obituary". Daily Telegraph obituary. 30 March 2020.
  14. Reid, Margaret: The Secondary Banking Crisis, 1973-75,(1982), Macmillan
  15. "Millbank Technical Services". Hansard. 29 March 1977.
  16. "Crown Agents Act 1979".
  17. Online interview for BBC World on Thursday, 28 May 2020.
  18. "Ukraine is struggling with corruption, sometimes successfully". The Economist. 2017-05-25. ISSN 0013-0613. Retrieved 2021-02-05.
  19. "Angola's new drive to modernise its customs services aims chiefly at a major volume of incomes after taxes have for long been relegated to a minor plan". Angola Press Agency. 2 March 2001. Retrieved 4 January 2021.
  20. "Medical Stores". www.medstore.co.zm. Archived from the original on February 16, 2010.
  21. "SCMS website". Archived from the original on 2013-10-05. Retrieved 2013-10-04.
  22. "Who we work with". www.crownagents.com. Retrieved 2021-02-05.
  23. "Crown Agents picks up 2019 Supply Chain Excellence Extreme Logistics Award for work in South Sudan". www.crownagents.com. Retrieved 2021-02-05.
  24. "Crown Agent's receives award for lifesaving NTDs work in Nigeria". www.crownagents.com. Retrieved 2021-02-05.

Sources
  • Sunderland, David (2004). Managing the British Empire: The Crown Agents, 1833–1914. Boydell. ISBN 0-86193-267-6.
  • Sunderland, David (2007). Managing British Colonial and Post-Colonial Development: The Crown Agents, 1914-1974. Boydell. ISBN 978-1-84383-301-7.
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