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National Rural Employment Strategy in Lao PDR towards increasing opportunities for decent and productive employment in rural areas - Final evaluation

eval_number:

2770

eval_title:

National Rural Employment Strategy in Lao PDR towards increasing opportunities for decent and productive employment in rural areas - Final evaluation

location:

region:

Asia and the Pacific

country:

Lao People's Democratic Republic

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eval_url:

https://analyticstest.ilo.org/ievaldiscovery/eval/2770

recommendations:

title:

Recommendation 4: In any subsequent phase, the project should allocate a sufficient budget and establish a robust MEL system that would not simply collect/manage administrative M&E data needs but also enable systematic learning and knowledge creation. It should engage constituents and stakeholders in project planning, monitoring and project learning.

url:

https://analyticstest.ilo.org/ievaldiscovery/recommendations/15911

action_plan:

The project did allocate a significant budget and a position dedicated to MEL, but the hiring and implementation challenges in Lao could have been considered for revising future HR or MEL tasking strategies. The simple conclusion of the study is that, since there is no continuous MEL officer (given the scarcity of MEL experts in Lao), all the efforts done by the project staff supported by previous MEL staff/consultants were inadequate. This is not a fair or well-studied observation. When the project's comments suggested that the MEL processes that were carried out amid the challenges should also be analyzed, the reply was: "The proposed analysis is beyond the scope of the evaluation. No change." The evaluation report also recklessly stated that the "data was plagued with double counting". Care was done to remove double counting, or where this was unavoidable, it was also duly reported and emphasized. Calculations and formulas could have been furnished if the evaluator had sought clarification. That the evaluator would jump to conclusions, without cross-checking facts and observations, is unfortunate.

comments:

(1) The project undertook a number of monitoring activities (basing on a "light" application of DCED results-based framework), despite the difficulty of recruiting a good local MEL officer. The evaluator noted that it is beyond its role to consider the various MEL exercises done other than simply capitalizing on the lack of an continuously engaged M&E officer. (2) The new project documents have a strong component on monitoring and evaluation.

date:

2022-08-22 00:00:00.0

progress:

Achieved

management_response:

Completed

information_source:

Country Office

admin_units:

CO-Bangkok

project_symbols:

LAO/16/01/CHE

themes:

theme:

Organizational issues

category:

Monitoring and evaluation

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