Updates
Top-rated decentralized evaluations at UNFPA in 2021
22 Mar 2022
In 2021, 13 UNFPA decentralized evaluations have been assessed as ‘very good’, among 21 decentralized evaluations that were externally quality assessed. This includes country programme evaluations from Afghanistan, Brazil, Honduras, Iraq, Lao PDR, Moldova, Mongolia, Mozambique, Somalia, Syria and Thailand. It also includes the Arab States regional programme evaluation and the Caribbean sub-regional programme evaluation.
Since the COVID-19 crisis, UNFPA programmes have adjusted significantly on the ground to respond to the complex situation. Decentralized evaluations kept pace with this change and aligned real-time to the changing programmatic focus. These top-rated decentralized evaluations demonstrate a higher degree of adaptation to COVID-19. Further, they demonstrate a thorough analysis and understanding of the context, utilization of a robust methodical approach and integration of gender responsive and disability inclusion dimensions.
Over the previous UNFPA strategic plan, 2018-2021, decentralized evaluations have consistently improved in quality. The number of ‘very good’ rated evaluations increased by 23 percentage points over four years. These high-quality evaluations provide important evidence and lessons to accelerate the implementation of the UNFPA strategic plan, 2022-2025, particularly to deliver for those furthest behind.
To ensure high quality evaluative evidence, UNFPA utilizes an Evaluation Quality Assurance and Assessment (EQAA) system. Quality assurance takes place throughout the evaluation process, while an external independent assessor quality assesses the final evaluation report, based on a specific criterion that includes a focus on gender and disability inclusion.
To continue to build capacities of country and regional programmes to conduct and manage high equality evaluations, the Evaluation Office rolled out the Country Programme Evaluation Management Kit in 2021. The Kit, currently available in English and French, complements the UNFPA Evaluation Handbook, by providing up-to-date and ready-to-use guidance and tools to facilitate effective preparation, management and utilization of a country programme evaluation. To ensure high quality evaluations during COVID-19, the Evaluation Office also released the guidance on adapting evaluations during COVID-19 and the guidance on adapting evaluation questions to COVID-19.
Supplementing these capacity development efforts, an e-learning course on managing and conducting evaluations at UNFPA will be released in 2022. In addition, new guidance on incorporating social and environmental standards in evaluation and guidance on integrating a ‘leave no one behind’ lens in evaluation will be released shortly.
UNFPA country and regional programme evaluations and their corresponding Evaluation Quality Assessments are available on the Evaluation Database.
