Independent Development Evaluation (IDEV) has published its first report assessing the follow-up by the African Development Bank (AfDB or the Bank) of recommendations from its independent evaluations, which are tracked through the Management Action Record System (MARS). The IDEV report finds the level of adoption of recommendations, which considers the alignment of AfDB Management actions to evaluation recommendations as well as the timeliness of their implementation, to be very low. Only a quarter of the 198 recommendations examined had a high or substantial level of adoption. This is mainly because Management often implemented actions much later than scheduled.
The report found that the AfDB’s process of tracking the implementation of evaluation recommendations is close to the practices of comparator organizations. Also, the amount of evidence in the MARS has significantly improved over time. The analyzed Management action plans were highly aligned (84%) with the agreed evaluation recommendations. Most of the action plans (77%) have also been implemented, but generally with significant delays. On average, the committed actions have been implemented more than a year and a half (624 days) after their target completion date, which led to a low score in terms of implementation. Since Level of Adoption measures the extent of both alignment and implementation, and implementation scores lower, this drives the rating for adoption (figure 1).
The MARS is an automated IT system launched six years ago with the objective of strengthening a culture of compliance and accountability by monitoring and reporting on actions committed to by Bank Management in response to IDEV’s recommendations. The system helps Management to keep track of and prioritize recommendations and follow up actions, and assists the Board of Directors in its oversight role. It is a joint initiative of IDEV, the Banks’s Delivery, Performance Management and Results Department (SNDR) and the Corporate IT Services Department (CHIS). Using the data in the MARS, Bank Management reports to the AfDB Board of Directors on the status of implementation of its actions every six months. For its part, IDEV undertakes an annual assessment of the level of adoption (implementation) of the recommendations, thereby aggregating all the actions per recommendation.
In 2019, IDEV carried out this assessment for the first time, for evaluation recommendations with all their actions due by December 2018 – 198 recommendations from 36 evaluations, with 587 actions. The overall objective of the report was to examine the extent to which AfDB Management has adopted and implemented the agreed recommendations, and to provide lessons and recommendations on ways to improve the adoption of IDEV’s recommendations.
Bank management welcomed the project and strongly committed to continue to work closely with IDEV to improve these results and strengthen the Bank’s engagement during evaluations, in line with the Action Plan to strengthen its compliance and accountability. Going forward, IDEV will assess the adoption of evaluation recommendations on a yearly basis.
Find out more and download the full report here