IDEV’s mission is to help the African Development Bank (AfDB or “the Bank”) foster sustainable growth and poverty reduction in Africa through independent and influential evaluations of its strategies, policies and operations.
In 2019, we conducted and facilitated evaluations, knowledge sharing events and capacity development activities in more than 26 countries. Our work not only helped strengthen the efforts of the AfDB, but also contributed to those of the whole evaluation community, including governments and parliamentarians, by providing an opportunity to learn from experience, and to plan and deliver development results to the highest possible standards.
And we made an impact.
Informing key decisions by the Bank’s Governors: Evaluation of the implementation of the Bank’s Development and Business Delivery Model (DBDM)
In 2019, as part of its mandate to help the Bank strengthen its development effectiveness, IDEV supported and facilitated the independent evaluation of the Bank’s implementation of its Development and Business Delivery Model (DBDM). This evaluation was presented to the Board of Governors at the 2019 Annual Meetings and informed the recently concluded discussions on a General Capital Increase (GCI) for the Bank and the replenishment of the African Development Fund (ADF).
Contributing to better serving the Bank’s Regional Member Countries: Evaluation of the Bank’s Program Based Operations (PBOs)
In 2019, IDEV held a series of knowledge sharing workshops in South Africa, Kenya, and Cote d’Ivoire to share lessons, best practices and experiences on the application of the Bank’s Program-Based Operations (PBOs, also known as budget support) policy. At the workshops, organized jointly with the Bank’s Governance & Public Financial Management Coordination Office, participants discussed findings and recommendations from IDEV’s evaluation of the Bank’s PBOs for the period 2012 to 2017 with a view to improving the Bank’s performance in using this instrument.
Participants agreed that PBOs should be part of a package of support, combining finance with knowledge and analytical work, technical assistance, advice and policy dialogue to support general economic and financial or sector-specific reforms in Regional Member Countries.
Furthermore,
- The IDEV team delivered 12 evaluations and an evaluation manual. Evaluations delivered included:
- Two Project Completion Report validation syntheses (Synthesis Reports on the validation of 2016 and 2017 Project Completion Reports),
- A project cluster evaluation (Strengthening Agricultural Water Management to Feed Africa),
- Two country strategy and program evaluations (AfDB Country Strategy and Program Evaluation – Kingdom of Eswatini, South Africa: Country Strategy Paper 2013-2017 Completion Report Validation),
- Four corporate evaluations (Independent Evaluation of the Implementation of the Development and Business Delivery Model of the AfDB, Evaluation of the Middle-Income Countries Technical Assistance Fund, Bank’s Self-Evaluation Systems and Processes, Evaluation of the Bank's Safeguards System),
- A regional integration strategy evaluation (West Africa RISP Completion Report Validation),
- One thematic evaluation (Evaluation of the Bank’s utilization of the Public Private Partnership Mechanism), and
- An evaluation synthesis (An Evaluation Synthesis of Partnerships).
- Eight knowledge-sharing events were organized, in addition to the publication of four editions of Evaluation Matters, IDEV’s quarterly magazine dedicated to perspectives and insights on evaluation and development issues. In 2019, IDEV also completed a comparative review of sanctions practices across five Multilateral Development Banks (MDBs) which resulted in the publication of a knowledge product.
- 12 evaluation capacity development activities were organized in 2019, in partnership with the Evaluation Platform for Regional African Development Institutions (EPRADI), the Centers for Learning on Evaluation and Results (CLEAR) and the Twende Mbele peer learning partnership. This includes six webinars that were organized to promote evaluation capacity development and share lessons from IDEV evaluations at the African Development Bank and in Regional Member Countries.
We continued our efforts to support the African Parliamentarians’ Network on Development Evaluation (APNODE), to enhance the capacity of African Parliamentarians to improve their oversight, policymaking, and national decision making by ensuring it is evidence-based. APNODE celebrated its fifth anniversary in 2019 and elected a new Executive Committee.
Finally, our year was also marked by the arrival of the new Evaluator General, Roland Michelitsch.
Our commitment to this work does not waver. Beyond the achievements of 2019, we are beginning the new year with confidence, knowing that our work is not only more necessary than ever; it is having a real impact and making a difference. This year, the evaluation function at the AfDB will celebrate its 40th anniversary. Since the first evaluation unit at the AfDB was launched in 1980, the function has grown in scope, scale and depth alongside the Bank, taking on increasingly greater challenges.
We welcome 2020 with a feeling of gratitude to the staff and management of the Bank, whose time, efforts and cooperation we rely on to conduct our evaluations, as well as to our stakeholders and partner organizations who continue to support our work.