G l o b a l E n v i r o n m e n t F a c i l i t y
GEF/ME/C.28/1
May 12, 2006
GEF Council
June 6-9, 2006
Agenda Item 7
GEF EVALUATION OFFICE:
PROGRESS REPORT FROM THE DIRECTOR
(Prepared by the GEF Evaluation Office)
Recommended Council Decision
The Council, having reviewed document GEF/ME/C.28/1 GEF Evaluation Office: Progress
Report from the Director and having taken note of the work on on-going evaluations, the
implementation of the GEF M&E policy, the consultative process and the Office's international
cooperation and knowledge management activities, requests the Evaluation Office to:
1.
Continue to develop the country portfolio evaluations
2.
Present a proposal for an Agency Performance Overview Matrix at the Council
session of December 2006
3.
Explore the possibility to extend the consultative process on M&E issues to country
level evaluation capacities
ii
Executive Summary
1.
The GEF Evaluation Office is presently conducting a series of evaluations on cross-
cutting issues, institutional procedures and principles, country level support and impact. The
Office found some of the evaluations proposed for this year more complex than initially thought,
requiring development of appropriate methodologies and approaches.
2.
The Joint Evaluation of the GEF Activity Cycle and Modalities and the evaluation
of Incremental Cost Calculation are on track and reports will be presented to the December
2006 meeting of Council. After initial steps to develop the approach paper for the Impact
Evaluation, an extensive additional effort has been undertaken to develop an appropriate
evaluation methodology for a first pilot evaluation to be undertaken in FY07. The Capacity
Building Evaluation did not start in FY06 as originally proposed due to the extra attention in
staff time that needed to be devoted to the Evaluation of the GEF Support to the Cartagena
Protocol. Before the end of FY06 an approach paper will be published on the website. The
evaluation itself will start in the first half of FY07.
3.
The Office completed the first Country Portfolio Evaluation in Costa Rica. The final
report is presented to Council as GEF/ME/C.28/5. The experience in Costa Rica clearly
indicated that this type of evaluation is feasible and valid. The report strongly recommends that
this type of evaluation should be continued. The Office is now preparing terms of reference for
future Country Portfolio Evaluations based on the experience gathered in Costa Rica. Some of
the lessons gathered include the importance of ensuring support of focal points, collaborating
with consultants that are based in the country and have independent credibility, and the need to
develop clear and transparent criteria to select countries for portfolio evaluations.
4.
The Office is developing better tools and methodologies on a continuous basis to keep
the standards of our work on a high professional level. Furthermore, the development of an
Agency Performance Overview Matrix has started for inclusion in the Annual Performance
Report in future years, containing indicators on project outcomes and sustainability, on
processes affecting results and on the quality of M&E, as well as on learning. The purpose will
be to provide the GEF Council with an independent assessment of the performance of the
Implementing Agencies, Executing Agencies and the GEF Secretariat. On the basis of
consultations with these agencies, a proposal will be presented to Council at its December 2006
session,
5.
The new GEF Monitoring and Evaluation Policy was approved by Council through
a written procedure on February 6, 2006. The Office is mainstreaming the new M&E policy
through-out the GEF system in four ways: dissemination, development of guidance and
administrative procedures, support of monitoring, and oversight and performance feedback.
6.
The Council at its meeting of November 2005 requested the Office to develop a
proposal for an M&E training program to be presented in June 2006, in order to introduce
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the new policy and minimum requirements for M&E to the appropriate staff. Consultations held
since the approval of the new policy lead to the conclusion that the need for training varies
greatly throughout the GEF partnership. Rather than introducing a self-standing training
program, the way forward seems to integrate the new M&E policy as much as possible in
existing training and introduction programs. This means that no proposal has been formulated for
Council's consideration at this moment in time.
7.
The consultative process with M&E partners in the GEF is proceeding as planned. An
emerging challenge is to interact with independent evaluators in recipient countries. The Office
will explore possible ways of reaching out to national evaluation capacities and creating a
network through which the GEF can ensure involvement of independent evaluation capacity on
the country level. The proposed international workshop on evaluating sustainable development
will be an important vehicle for this purpose.
8.
The Office has introduced new ways of publishing and disseminating its products. Two
series of publications (of Evaluation Reports and of Evaluation Documents) have started and
new summaries of evaluations, "Signposts", are now available. The Office will continue to
explore possibilities to use the new media to full advantage.
9.
The Office is active in various international evaluation forums and meetings to ensure
that new developments, international norms and standards and possibilities for collaboration and
interaction are taken up. The M&E work in the GEF benefits in two ways. First of all, the
highest international norms and standards continue to be applied. Secondly, the joint evaluation
of the GEF activity cycle and modalities shows that substantial efficiencies can be achieved
through international collaboration where feasible and possible.
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Introduction
10.
At the Council meeting of June 2005 a Progress Report was presented for the first time
to Council as an Information Document. The report was discussed and Council requested that
the second progress report would be a Working Document. This report contains information on
on-going evaluations, on development of tools for future use, on the consultative process on M
& E issues in the GEF, the implementation and mainstreaming of the new GEF M & E policy,
the international activities of the GEF Evaluation Office (the Office), and the knowledge
management and dissemination activities. The Progress Report complements and adds to the
information provided in the Four Year Work Program and Budget and Results from FY06
(GEF/ME/C28/7).
On-going Evaluations
11.
The Office is presently conducting a series of evaluations on cross-cutting issues,
institutional procedures and principles, country level support and impact. Most of the proposed
work in support of the evaluation program was successfully completed. In addition, the Office
has established an impressive network of partners across the Implementing and Executing
Agencies as well as throughout the world interested in pursuing the evaluation principles of
accountability and lessons learning. The Office also found some of the evaluations proposed for
this year more complex than initially thought, requiring development of appropriate
methodologies and approaches. For example, the completion of the evaluations of GEF
impacts, capacity building and of the incremental costs calculations have been delayed until the
end of calendar year 2006.
12.
The Joint Evaluation of the GEF Activity Cycle and Modalities is on track to
deliver a report to the GEF Council at its session in December 2006. The management group of
the evaluation, in which the evaluation offices of UNDP, UNEP, the World Bank, the Asian
Development Bank and UNIDO participate, met early May in Vienna, Austria, to discuss
progress and intermediary products. A database has been assembled of all projects funded by
the GEF, for which additional information is still sought. A survey under stakeholders is on-
going. Several desk studies are nearing completion. Furthermore, a number of field visits have
been undertaken and will continue in the coming months. The draft report will be discussed at a
seminar at the end of September.
13.
The evaluation of Incremental Cost Calculation has started in March 2006 and is
ongoing. The evaluation team has been assembled. One part of the evaluation will focus on the
compliance of incremental cost calculations with the guidelines which will be completed in the
coming months, before June 30, 2006. Furthermore, a survey will take place of stakeholders,
which is expected to be ready for launch in early June 2006. The evaluation team is currently
making arrangements for interviews with Implementing Agency at their headquarters in
Washington, New York and Nairobi. In addition to this several field visits to key GEF
operational centers are planned to gain inputs from field-based Implementing and Executing
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Agency staff, Government and NGO project proponents involved in preparation of Incremental
Costs Assessments:
· Kenya (May 2006): Under implementation
· Malaysia / Thailand (June 2006): Planning underway
· Panama (June 2006): Planning underway
14.
The evaluation team is also collecting inputs from similar globally mandated programs
with additionality and/or `incremental-like' principles. To this end a visit to the Global Fund for
AIDS, TB and Malaria is planned for May 2006 to collect experiences on the operation of their
`financial and programmatic gap analysis' which is similar to GEF Incremental Costs
assessment. It is expected that the Global Funds experiences will provide an important external
context for the findings of this evaluation. All data collection is expected to be completed by July
31st 2006 while the analysis and report drafting will take place from August through September.
The evaluation will be completed for the GEF Council meeting scheduled for December 2006.
15.
In FY06 the Office began to develop an approach to impact evaluation within the
GEF, and initially it was envisioned that the pilot impact evaluation would be completed by the
end of FY06. After initial steps to develop the approach paper for the evaluation, it was
determined that an extensive additional effort would be necessary to develop a methodology
appropriate for the challenge of evaluating impacts within the context of the GEF. It is necessary
to ensure that impact evaluation of GEF support be cost-effective and produce findings in a
manner that satisfies the needs of all GEF stakeholders. Therefore, the work undertaken thus far
has focused on identifying and exploring the methodology that will be used in the pilot exercise,
which will be carried out in FY07.
16.
Although the final methodology proposal is not yet complete, a general approach has
been identified. It is proposed that the methodology for impact evaluation build on theory-based
approaches, and be tailored to the GEF context. The GEF portfolio is far too large for the
Office to begin to evaluate the impact of a statistically representative sample of projects.
However, the adoption of a theory-based approach will enable empirical results to be used to
assess the robustness of the theories of change underlying the key strands of the portfolio.
Furthermore, the adoption of a perspective from the "realistic evaluation" approach will enable
the studies to focus on the extent to which the theories have promoted effective mechanisms,
which in turn have been appropriately adapted to specific project contexts to generate the
desired impacts, whilst avoiding or minimizing any unexpected and undesirable impacts. Even
within focal areas there is an extremely wide range of project approaches to various
environmental challenges. Thus, the impact evaluation approach will have to be flexible in its
application of the proposed model and key questions. It is anticipated that the complete
methodology will be proposed by the end of FY06.
17.
The Office completed the first Country Portfolio Evaluation with a pilot case of
Costa Rica. The final report is presented to Council as GEF/ME/C.28/5. The experience in
Costa Rica clearly indicated that this type of evaluation is feasible and valid even when the GEF
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does not have a country program but rather a cohort or portfolio of projects approved at
different times and within different contexts. The evaluation was able to answer the two key
questions proposed in the TOR about the relevance and efficiency of the GEF portfolio in the
Costa Rica. Regarding reporting on results, the evaluation was able to gather evidence that
several of the projects have actually produced important global environmental benefits,
particularly in climate change and biodiversity. Furthermore, the evaluation seems to be an
important tool to report how the GEF is implemented in a country and how these apparently ad
hoc projects do fit within the national environmental strategy and the country's response to the
global conventions for which GEF is the financial mechanism.
18.
The report strongly recommends that this type of evaluation should be continued. The
Office is now preparing terms of reference for future Country Portfolio Evaluations based on the
experience gathered in Costa Rica. Some of the lessons gathered include:
· Country Portfolio Evaluations are valid and feasible even if there is no GEF strategy to
evaluate against. The group of projects implemented in the country forms the GEF
portfolio to be evaluated.
· The key questions on relevance and efficiency are appropriate. Aggregation of results
from projects is only possible at the focal area level and not at the national level.
· It is difficult to include regional and global projects in a Country Portfolio Evaluation
since they require a different level of analysis and are approved and implemented within
a different context. To keep evaluations costs within limits, those regional and global
projects that have their Project Implementing Units within the country under evaluation
could be included.
· It is very important to be able to use consultants that are based in the country and have
independent credibility.
· 4-5 months is the minimum time necessary to evaluate a medium size country like Costa
Rica with a portfolio of $38 million and about 15 projects implemented between 1992
through 2005. Evaluations of countries with larger portfolio may take longer.
· The choice of Costa Rica was appropriate as a pilot, particularly as an example of a
medium to small size GEF country.
· There should be clear and transparent criteria to select countries for portfolio
evaluations.
19.
The Capacity Building Evaluation did not start in FY06 as originally proposed due to
the extra attention in staff time that needed to be devoted to the Evaluation of the GEF Support
to the Cartagena Protocol. Before the end of FY06 an approach paper will be finalized and
published on the website. The evaluation itself will start in the first half of FY07.
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Development of Tools and Methodologies
20.
The Office is developing better tools and methodologies on a continuous basis to keep
the standards of our evaluation work on a high professional level.
21.
An Agency Performance Overview Matrix is under development for inclusion in the
Annual Performance Report in future years. Gradually the oversight work of the Office in
various areas of performance will lead to the development of performance indicators at the GEF
Agency level and in turn will provide an overview of the performance of Agencies. The purpose
of this overview will be to provide the GEF Council with an independent assessment of specific
aspects of the performance of GEF agencies, including Implementing Agencies, Executing
Agencies and the GEF Secretariat. The report will also provide timely feedback to GEF
Agencies by pointing out strengths and weaknesses and making recommendations on ways to
strengthen performance.
22.
A relatively large and diverse number of agencies participate in the GEF system.
Agencies have different structures, cultures and ways to manage information. These differences
place limitations on the type and number of performance indicators on which comparable
information can be obtained. Another important issue is the small number of GEF operations by
some agencies, which limits the extent to which robust conclusions could be drawn from the
data. To address this limitation the Office will assess performance on certain indicators on a
biannual basis and/or will cluster two years into one cohort. The Office will use conventional
tests to determine differences between groups and to assess trends and tendencies. Also the
Office will include real numbers and percentages when presenting findings in a tabular or
graphical form and will be cautious in the kind of conclusions it draws when numbers of
observations are small.
23.
Given the diverse nature of the indicators that are assessed, the Office will use different
evaluative tools to obtain the information needed. The APR and the Focal Area Program
Evaluations will be the two main instruments used to gather information. Other evaluations, such
as the joint evaluation of the GEF activity cycle and specific thematic evaluations will also be
used to obtain information when appropriate. Reporting on specific parameters will also take
place at different intervals (annually, biennially or every 4 years).
24.
One important limitation is that several Executing Agencies do not have a sufficiently
large portfolio of projects completed and under implementation to be reported on in a GEF
Agency Performance Overview Matrix. As a minimum, data on 20 projects or interventions
would need to be available to be able to include an agency.
25.
A first proposal for an Agency Performance Overview Matrix will be discussed with the
GEF Secretariat, the Implementing and Executing Agencies in the framework of the consultative
process and the preparations for the 2006 Annual Performance Report. On the basis of these
consultations, a proposal will be presented to Council at its December 2006 session. The
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proposal will contain indicators on project outcomes and sustainability, on processes affecting
results and on the quality of M&E, as well as on learning.
26.
On several other methodological issues work was done in FY06. As stated above,
various impact evaluation methodologies and approaches to evaluation of capacity building were
discussed and explored as part of the preparation of the Office's work in that area.
Furthermore, internal discussions took place on the use of evaluation matrixes to ensure
consistent gathering and analysis of data in evaluations. The Office aims to incorporate the most
relevant and up-to-date methodologies in its evaluations where appropriate.
Implementation of the New M & E policy
27.
The new GEF Monitoring and Evaluation Policy was approved by Council on a no-
objection basis through mail on February 6, 2006. The Office is mainstreaming the new M&E
policy thought-out the GEF system in four ways: dissemination, development of guidance and
administrative procedures, support of monitoring, and oversight and performance feedback.
28.
Dissemination of the new policy. The Office has made the new policy available on
the internet and is in the process of publishing and distributing hard copies among the key GEF
stakeholders. The Office also presents and discusses the new policy at the Sub-regional
Consultations with GEF Focal Points. The Office will also work with the GEF Secretariat to
incorporate M&E and GEF M&E minimum requirements in various training programs and the
focal points training workshop.
29.
Development of guidance and administrative procedures. The Office will develop
further guidance on the minimum M&E requirements, on project terminal evaluations and on
criteria for the development of program indicators. Terminal evaluation guidelines will address
the content, evaluation ratings, process, timing requirements and independence of terminal
evaluations. Criteria for the development of program indicators will provide overall parameters
for indicators developments including among others, scientific validity, consistency with agency
monitoring and supervision systems, and viability. The Office will also support the GEF
Secretariat in development of guidance on project monitoring. Furthermore, administrative
procedures will be established which fully cover the interaction of the Office with its
administrative host, the World Bank, and the GEF Secretariat, which provides certain
administrative support. These administrative procedures follow the TOR of the independent
M&E unit as established by Council in July 2003.
30.
Support to the establishment of portfolio and program monitoring systems.
During FY06 the Office has provided support to the GEF Secretariat in various aspects related
to the Secretariat's new monitoring roles. When requested, the Office provided assistance to
the Project Performance Report process and provided comments on the Secretariats proposal
for performance monitoring. The Office also supports the International Waters Task Force to
define scientific based indicators for environmental results and catalytic impact for nutrient
reduction projects and to define baseline indicators for ground water projects. The Office has
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also worked with the Land Degradations Task Force to further define the global environmental
benefits in this focal area and to put in place an indicator system conceptual framework for the
focal area. In the coming year the Office will continue to work with the GEF Secretariat and
other GEF Agencies to further develop and strengthen monitoring in the GEF system.
Furthermore, the Office participates in the Steering Committee responsible for the redesign of
the GEF Project Management Information System (PMIS).
31.
Oversight and performance feedback. The Office has put in to place a system to
assess project M&E as part of the Annual Performance Report that provides GEF agencies
with precise information of the performance of several aspect of project monitoring and
evaluation. Quick action taken by Implementing Agencies as a result of the feedback provided
by the 2004 APR contributed to a noticeable improvement of terminal evaluation reports
submitted to the Office during FY05. Steps undertaken by UNDP and UNEP are also likely to
significantly enhance the independence of the process of GEF projects terminal evaluations. The
early interaction on preliminary findings of the 2005 APR on the quality of M&E projects at
entry has also contributed to attention of the GEF Secretariat for a further enhancement of
program indicators. The 2005 APR has also established a baseline on projects compliance of
M&E minimum requirements that will be used to track progress in the implementation of the
policy during project design. The Office will continue to track and provide feedback on the
efficacy of the policy and processes that GEF agencies put in place to implement the new GEF
M&E Policy.
32.
The Council decision of November 2005 on the GEF M&E policy requested the Office
to develop a proposal for an M&E training program to be presented to the GEF June 2006
Council, in order to introduce the new policy and minimum requirements for M&E to the
appropriate staff. Consultations held since the approval of the new policy lead to the following
conclusions:
33.
The need for training varies greatly throughout the GEF partnership. Some partners
have strong institutional knowledge on M&E issues, others lack such institutional capacity.
Officials in the various agencies working on GEF issues have a wide range of expertise on
M&E. Many have a solid basic understanding of M&E, some are clearly exceptional
professionals, whereas some colleagues have only rudimentary knowledge. Furthermore, there
is a clear differentiation of needs in three areas: roles and responsibilities as defined by the new
policy, minimum M&E requirements, and monitoring and indicator development. The great
variety in training needs and in areas to be covered makes it very difficult to develop one training
program to cater to all needs in all areas of work.
34.
Existing opportunities have created venues to start with the first steps of training:
dissemination of information. Increasingly over the past few months the Office has been asked
to participate in and contribute to consultative and training meetings organized by the GEF. The
Sub-regional Consultations with GEF Focal Points have been the most recent example. The
Office has developed presentation tools to introduce the new policy and will continue to adapt
these to the circumstances, as needed.
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35.
These conclusions indicate that rather than introducing a self-standing training program,
the way forward seems to integrate the new M&E policy as much as possible in existing training
and introduction programs, using existing training tools as much as possible. This means that no
proposal has been formulated for Council's consideration at this moment in time. If the need for
a separate training program with separate funding would emerge at a later date, the Office will
present a proposal to Council with a full justification of why the need emerged and how it can
be met.
Consultative Process
36.
Several meetings took place in FY06 and the consultative process continues to function
as hoped for by Council: to engage all partners in further development of M&E practices in the
GEF, in reaching agreement on and mainstreaming the new GEF M&E policy, and in ensuring
full cooperation and preventing duplication in the M&E system. This culminated in the adoption
of the new GEF M&E policy in February 2006.
37.
The most successful element of the consultative process so far is the joint nature of the
evaluation of the GEF Activity Cycle and Modalities, which has led to substantial savings for the
GEF whereas the evaluation itself has increased scope and validity.
38.
The Office has also established a network of senior level evaluation experts that have
participated in previous evaluations in our Office. This network will provide regular feedback to
the GEF EO work program and specific products.
39.
The biggest challenge for the consultative process is to reach out to evaluation partners
at the country level. Whereas GEF evaluations at the country level include local evaluators as
much as possible, there are often no official counterparts representing national independent
evaluation units, with which an institutional collaboration could be set up. Only a few recipient
countries in the GEF have independent evaluation units which would be potential partners. To
link to and support national evaluation capacities is a major challenge, not only faced by the
GEF Evaluation Office but by evaluation units of other donor organizations as well. The
proposal to organize an international workshop for evaluation professionals on environmental
and sustainable development issues has been formulated with the possibility in mind to gradually
develop an international network of potential collaborators of the Office.
International Activities
40.
The Office is active in various international evaluation forums and meetings to ensure
that new developments, international norms and standards and possibilities for collaboration and
interaction are taken up. The M&E work in the GEF benefits in two ways. First of all, the
highest international norms and standards continue to be applied. Secondly, the joint evaluation
of the GEF activity cycle and modalities shows that substantial efficiencies can be achieved
through international collaboration where feasible and possible.
9
41.
In March 2006, the GEF Evaluation Office was accepted as a permanent member of
the UN Evaluation Group. Furthermore, interaction has started with the Evaluation Cooperation
Group of the International Financial Institutions (IFIs) on benchmarking of environmental
evaluations. This means that the Office is now firmly connected to its peer offices in both the
UN system and the IFI system. This allows the Office to ensure that the latest developments in
international standards, new evaluation norms and standards, methodologies and benchmarking
become available for the GEF. Furthermore, efficiencies will be achieved through joint work.
Both in the UN system and with IFI partners the possibilities are being explored to do country
portfolio evaluations in parallel or jointly, in order to reduce costs and benefit from the
perspective of other development and environmental partners on the country level.
42.
Both the UN system and the IFIs are working towards higher norms and standards and
higher quality of evaluation work, which are meant to be promoted through various forms of
peer review: benchmarking in case of the IFIs and peer panel reviews in the case of the UN.
The latter effort is also undertaken by the DAC Evaluation Network, which has now undertaken
two joint peer reviews, one on the evaluation office of UNDP and one on the evaluation system
of UNICEF. It was proposed to Council in November 2005 that the GEF M&E system would
be peer reviewed through this initiative of the DAC Evaluation Network, in which Germany's
evaluation office of BMZ would take the lead.
43.
On the basis of the two peer reviews so far, of UNDP and UNICEF, the DAC
Evaluation Network and the UN Evaluation Group have taken stock and reviewed experiences,
and have decided to establish a joint task force which will further work on the peer panel review
instrument. The aim is to turn this even further into an independent internationally accepted
professional peer review mechanism, in which highly respected international evaluation
professionals from the various evaluation communities will participate: UN, DAC, IFIs, recipient
countries, NGOs, private sector and scientific community. The peer review of the GEF M&E
system will take place after further developments in the joint task force, which will meet in June
in Copenhagen.
44.
In the UN Evaluation Group, the Office will give priority to the work on country level
evaluations (where potential efficiencies can be gained by the Office) and the work on standards
and peer reviews, which is being carried out by the Task Force on "Quality Stamp". The
Director of the Office has been appointed co-chair of this task force.
45.
The Director has been invited to become a member of a panel of international experts
assembled by the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) in Rome to advise
IFAD's Office of Evaluation on updating its evaluation methodologies. The invitation was
accepted and draft documents of IFAD's Office of Evaluation were reviewed and discussed at
the end of 2005, which led to a report of the panel to IFAD's Office of Evaluation. The
required amount of time and energy did not detract from the other duties of the Director. A
meeting in Rome of the panel was attended through a teleconference link. The benefit to the
Office was the input into the methodologies used by the Office and the added insight into current
practices of one of the GEF M&E partner offices.
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46.
On invitation the Director became a member of an independent expert panel for the
evaluation of the French Global Environment Facility. The panel met with and interviewed a
series of stakeholders and counterparts in Paris, France, in February 2006 for three days. A
series of self-evaluation documents and assessments of consultants formed the basis of the work
of the panel. The resulting evaluation report was presented to the French government early
March 2006.
47.
More recently, the Director has been invited to become a Quality Assurance Advisor to
the Independent External Evaluation of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the
UN in Rome. As a Quality Advisor the Director is expected to provide the FAO with an
independent professional judgment on whether the evaluation is designed, implemented and
reported on in such a way that the independence and quality of the evaluation are guaranteed.
The ensuing work can be undertaken without detriment to the other duties of the Director. The
benefit to the GEF will be a close look at how a major independent external evaluation of a UN
organization takes shape and is executed and reported on, which will be of value for the further
planning of OPS4. Any travel costs to Rome will be born by FAO.
48.
The Director will co-host a workshop on evaluation of environmental and social
sustainability at the International Program for Development Evaluation Training (IPDET) at
Carlton University in Ottawa, sponsored by the World Bank, in July 2006. IPDET has become
a focus for training of professional evaluators all over the world. This is a good opportunity to
ensure that environmental and sustainability evaluation are on offer at this highly prestigious and
highly rated program.
Knowledge Management and Dissemination
49.
The Office will continue to improve and further develop its strategies and tools for
dissemination and feedback, as well as knowledge management. Highlights of FY06 included
the international presentations of OPS3 and Office evaluations in Egypt, Japan, Brasil,
Switzerland and the Netherlands, in various circumstances and for various audiences.
Furthermore, in a joint effort with STAP a brainstorming workshop organized by the GEF
Secretariat on knowledge management was supported in January 2006.
50.
Regarding its publications, the Office decided to develop various products. Firstly, the
Office will issue Evaluation Reports, namely the main reports that are produced by specific
evaluation activities of the Office. They include all program evaluations, impact evaluations,
country evaluations, thematic evaluations, organizational evaluations, as well as the Annual
Performance Report and the overall performance studies. They will have ISBN numbering and
be subject to tailored dissemination strategies. Evaluation Documents are presented to the
Council in accordance with regular Council procedures as Working Documents.
51.
Secondly, the Office will publish Evaluation Documents of interest to the general
public or specific audiences. These documents either emanate from evaluations, such as
research papers or case studies, or from other activities of the Office, such as the M&E Policy.
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In addition, the Office is producing various knowledge products and ad hoc papers, brochures
or web-based documentation. The knowledge product launched during the last year, the
Evaluation Office Signposts, provide easy access to main findings and recommendations of
evaluation reports or documents.
52.
The website of the Office has been upgraded, but continues to be a source for concern.
It is still impossible to search through evaluation reports and documents on key words. From a
learning and knowledge management perspective a search engine is of crucial importance. The
Office will actively pursue in FY07 new methods to improve the accessibility of its findings and
to present an up-to-date picture of the completed and on-going work of the Office.
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