The United States Department of State Agency Financial Report (AFR) for Fiscal Year 2008 provides an overview of the Department’s financial performance and results to help Congress, the President and the public assess our stewardship over the financial resources entrusted to us.
The AFR is the first of a series of four reports in the Office of Management and Budget’s Pilot Program for Alternative Approaches to Performance and Accountability Reporting. For the second year under this voluntary program, the Department has chosen to reconfigure its annual reporting documents and publishing dates to present more streamlined and timely information that clarifies the relationship between performance, budget and financial reporting. The Department believes this approach improves federal reporting and makes information more meaningful and transparent to the public, and provides a more succinct and easily understood analysis of the Department’s accountability over its resources. The report provides readers a sense of the Department’s highest priorities in the conduct of U.S. foreign policy, and our strengths and challenges in implementing programs that pursue our country’s foreign policy agenda.
As part of the four-tiered Pilot Program reporting schedule, the Department provides financial reporting in mid-November, a two-page Budget, Performance and Financial Snapshot of high priority outcomes and financial results in mid-December 2008, a complete performance report in mid-January, and a summary of performance and financial information in a Citizens' Report in mid-January. All four reports will be available online at www.state.gov/s/d/rm.
After the new President assumes office, the Department’s fiscal year 2010 performance plan will be issued in conjunction with the fiscal year 2010 budget request to Congress, called the Congressional Budget Justification, which will be available at www.state.gov/s/d/rm.
