Monitoring

1
Monitoring Evaluation in the national context
Role of Evaluation Networks/Associations

• by Ms Oumoul Khayri BaTall
• AfrEA Chairperson
• Presentation to the Regional Workshop on the UNDP
  Evaluation Policy, Johanessburg, 28 nov-1 dec 06

2
Evaluation in the national context

• Current status
• Evaluation networks and associations in Africa
• Emerging only
• The role of AfrEA

3
Evaluation in African Countries the current
status

• No enough capacities
• Lack of organisational capacity within the
  existing associations and networks
• Absence of Evaluation culture, and interest in
  evaluation or worst defiance (?)
• No internal demand
• Lack of institutional framework

4
Role of AfrEA

• Presentation of AfrEA
• Overview of past and current activities
• Perspectives and challenges ahead

5
Presentation of AfrEA

• Main objectives
• Historical background
• Leadership and Governance
• Organisational setting
• Evaluation stakeholders within AfrEA
• Membership and
• AfrEA clients or target groups

6
AfrEA organisation

• An informal network established
• as an umbrella organisation for national
  evaluations and networks in Africa, as well as
  regional networks
• welcomes individuals in countries without such
  organisations
• No membership fees so far
• Managed by an Executive Committee of six leaders
  selected across the continent (3 anglophone and 3
  francophone)
• Day-to-day and substantial administrative support
  is also provided by a Secretariat based in South
  Africa
• Work is mainly organised thru the Internet

7
AfrEA main Objectives

• To promote African Development oriented
  Evaluations
• promote useful evaluations that support
  development in Africa.
• encourage the development and publication of high
  quality evaluation practice, research and theory
  development based on African experiences and
  expertise.
• To promote the Evaluation capacity building on
  the continent
• advance the building of evaluation capacity on
  the continent.
• help establish, develop and support national
  African evaluation associations and regional
  evaluation interest groups.
• promote and share African evaluation expertise at
  relevant regional and international forums and
  events.
• To strengthen the organization of the sector in
  Africa
• facilitate networking and information sharing on
  evaluation in Africa.
• be a reference point for evaluation information
  relevant to Africa.

8
ME networks support to Capacity Development -

• Creation of networks at national, regional,
  international level is increasing
• In Africa,rapid growth shows interest 6 in 1999,
  20 in 2006
• International networking facilitates learning,
  visibility, exposure
• 1999 African Evaluation Association (AfrEA)
• 2002 International Development Evaluation
  Association (IDEAS)
• 2003 International Organization for Cooperation
  in Evaluation (IOCE)
• Networks allow for greater interaction between
  various development stakeholders
• Government, development partners, civil society,
  consultants
• Diversity of actors allows for more focus on
  development oriented ME
• Greater interest from development stakeholders in
  ME
• governments, donors, UN agencies and, Civil
  society
• practitionners, commisioners, users

9
Building an Evaluation Culture

• AfrEA together with national networks could be
  most instrumental in facing the different
  challenges raised
• Building an Evaluation culture
• advocacy towards the different national
  constituencies to highlight the several benefits
  that may derive thru high quality evaluations
  and
• raising awareness on the needs to improve the
  quality of public action, with regard to
  development programmes and policies, and the
  active role Evaluation must play

10
Building Evaluation Expertise

• Capacity building for the African Evaluation
  Expertise
• Education, opportunity to network together as
  well as worldwide, access to documentation,
  information and Evaluation resources
• An umbrella for African Experts to access
  greater exposure and more independence

11
Example of services rendered by Evaluation
networks in Africa

• facilitate information sharing (meetings,
  training sessions, scholarships, grants, books
  and manuals, newsletters, international
  electronic networks, etc.)
• bring purchasers and providers of ME services
  together to promote a mutual understanding of
  evaluation needs
• create and maintain a database of evaluators
  containing information on areas of expertise,
  experience and recent publications and
• facilitate the definition of professional norms
  and practices

12
Specific Support from AfrEA

• Development of the African Evaluation Guidelines
  (AEG)
• In french,Principes Directeurs de lEvaluation
  Africaine (PDEA) in 2002
• Revision under process, a participatory process
  involving 45 participants from 20 countries
  international resource persons
• Facilitates sharing of knowledge thru its
  listserv and website
• Develop strategic partnerships to benefit its
  members
• CES/PEI facilitate the participation of 6
  persons to the CES 25th Conference in
  Charlottetown contributions encouraged as a
  condition
• Drafted a capacity building project with the
  ACBF, other partners are being approached to seek
  interest (UNICEF, ADB,)
• Four international conferences

13
AfrEA Conferences

• 1st inaugural conference in Nairobi, 13-17 Sept
  1999, more than 300 evaluators from 35 pays
  support UNICEF, East and Southern African
  Regional Office (ESARO)
• 2nd AfrEA in Nairobi, 10-14 June 2002 300
  evaluators and other stakeholders (researchers,
  decision makers, users, donors participants from
  Africa, Europe, Asia, New Zealand, Colombia et
  the USA) 12 thematic strands
• 3rd conference in Cape Town, 4 déc 04 480
  participants from 56 countries, 36 Africans

14
The fourth AfrEA conference

• First in West Africa, and in a francophone
  African country, a recognition to the RENSE
• A capacity building process co-organisation
• Theme Evaluate development, Develop Evaluation
  A Pathway to Africas future / Evaluer le
  Développement, Développer lEvaluation un
  Maillage porteur davenir pour lAfrique
• 1 Evaluation of Development in Africa
• 2 The quality of Evaluation in Africa
• 3 Capacity-building in Evaluation
• 4 Governance, Evaluation and Development

15
Evaluation Capacity Building in AfricaNeeds
Assesment

• Knowledge of basic competencies in various key
  fields
• Essential skillseconomic analysis, statistics
  data collection and analysis, demographs
• Sociologists
• Evaluation fundamentals planification,
  analysis, strategic negotiations, design of
  strategies,
• Little evaluation practitionners in africa have
  received formal evaluation training
• Need to offer
• Qualified training, professional development thru
  workshops
• Certified training
• Institutional and organisational capacity at
  national level
• Legal environnment (are programme managers
  accountable for programme outcomes, what role do
  statistics institutions play in the data
  collection and monitoring of data for evaluation
  purpose, is ME institutionalised)
• Results-based management in public services and
  for programme implementation
• Local networks/associations face severe
  weaknesses
• Use of available resources (most in English only)
• Creation or Capacity development of training and
  university institutions

16
Challenges and Perspectives

• Formalisation of AfrEA
• Sustainability
• Governance structure
• Mastering its growth
• Voluntary work of profesionalisation of the
  management

17
To contact us

• E-mail afrea-chair_at_afrea.org
• Conference Secretariat lise_at_evalnet.co.za
• daniela.gregr_at_undp.org
• Website Site internet de lAfrEA et du RéNSE
• http//www.afrea.org
• http//www.pnud.ne/rense