6 March 2015: The UN Evaluation Group (UNEG) has launched a report calling for evaluation to be an intrinsic part of the post-2015 development agenda and for strong national evaluation systems. It provides examples of evaluations successfully carried out in countries and the UN system by UNEG members, such as the UN Development Programme (UNDP) Independent Evaluation Office and the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF).
Titled ‘Evidence Changes Lives: Realizing Evaluation’s Potential to Inform the Global Sustainable Development Goals,’ the report was produced in the context of the 2015 International Year of Evaluation, and launched on 6 March 2015, at UN Headquarters in New York, US, during UNEG 2015 Evaluation Week.
The report’s introduction highlights that, since the accountability framework for the post-2015 development agenda will not be legally binding but will instead rely on political will and persuasion, evaluation will be crucial to assess how programmes and policies are contributing to results and to establish incentives for effectiveness, transparency and accountability. Evaluation can help “ensure that we are doing the right things, doing these things right, and doing them on a scale that is making a difference,” according to the report.
In a Question and Answer section (Q&A) of the report, Margaret de Goys, Director, Evaluation Office, UN Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), and Indran Naidoo, Director, Independent Evaluation Office, UN Development Programme (UNDP), outline the challenges of evaluating the proposed Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Naidoo notes: the need for adequate resources to attain the SDGs; the complexity of evaluating quantitative and qualitative elements of the Goals; and the absence of consensus on benchmarks, indicators and success criteria. Compared to the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), he writes, “while the SDGs are more inclusive, there are many goals, each with a measurement complexity that has not been thought through when proposed.”
De Goys remarks that the MDGs were translated into national goals without proper monitoring and evaluation systems, and it was challenging for UN organizations to report on their contribution to the goals. She calls for a monitoring and evaluation framework for the SDGs that can be disaggregated, and that can “zoom in” on pertinent indicators.
On operationalizing the agenda at country level, the report calls for monitoring, evaluation and accountability mechanisms to be based on national monitoring and evaluation systems, and for increasing support to national evaluation capacity. It also highlights the important role of parliamentarians, such as the Parliamentarians Forum for Development Evaluation in South Asia, the African Parliamentarians Network for Development Evaluation, and the Women Parliamentarians Group in the Middle East North Africa region, in pursuing oversight powers, and in advocating for stronger evaluation policies and systems in their countries.
UNEG is an voluntary professional network that brings together the evaluation units of 45 UN agencies. It is currently chaired by Marco Segone, UN Women. [Publication: Evidence Changes Lives: Realizing Evaluation’s Potential to Inform the Global Sustainable Development Goals] [UNEG Webpage] [Webcast of Launch Event] [UN Press Release]