In 2005 the African Development Bank, other aid donors and partner governments signed up to the Paris Declaration, which described a set of principles for how they would do business together based on the principle of partnership.
As part of a wider global evaluation of the Paris Declaration, Itad were commissioned to assess AfDB’s performance in fulfilling its commitments to the Paris Declaration as an institution. This evaluation focused on the context, institutional aspects and outcomes of PD implementation. The institutional aspects were reviewed according to three dimensions: leadership and commitment, capacity, and incentives (CCI). The global evaluation provided the basic evaluation framework which was then further developed to include specific evaluation questions, indicators and methods. This evaluation used a range of methods for data collection, drawing from different sources, including policy document review, organisation review (including staff survey), review of country strategies and portfolios (covering 15 RMCs), country visits (Kenya, Malawi, Burkina Faso, Cameroon) and stakeholder interviews and discussions at AfDB in Tunis.
Our approach
Itad assembled a team of experienced evaluators with a strong background on aid effectiveness. This included a core team of five international evaluators and four senior country evaluators. The team undertook a systematic review of the AfDB policy framework and the extent to which it had been translated into action. The organisational review assessed how the different functions, responsibilities and processes required to implement aid effectiveness principles were organised and how they were joined up during implementation.
The review of the country strategies papers and country portfolios for 15 RMCs provided evidence on the extent to which the AfDB had followed through its commitment to aid effectiveness principles at country level. Findings from documents review were cross-checked and deepened through stakeholder interviews, which included four country visits (Kenya, Malawi, Burkina Faso and Cameroon). A staff survey on capacities and incentives for aid effectiveness principles provided another source for crosschecking. Case studies (on transport sector, trust funds, fragile states and procurement methods) provided focused analysis of into the barriers and challenges faced by the Bank during the implementation of Paris Declaration Commitments.
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