The 2019 Asian Evaluation Week (AEW), jointly sponsored by the Ministry of Finance and the Asian Development Bank (ADB), took place in Kunming, People's Republic of China, from 2 to 6 September 2019. The theme for 2019 AEW was “Quality Evaluation for Better Results: Local, National, Regional Perspectives”, which recognizes that evaluation is influenced by developments at the regional, national, and local levels.

Ms Johanna Pennarz, Lead Evaluation Officer, IOE, led the following sessions:

• "Evaluation synthesis for evidence-based decision-making and practice — the example of inclusive financial services in IFAD and IsDB ", joint session with the IsDB. Ms Pennarz presented the IOE evaluation synthesis on inclusive financial services. The IsDB shared an evaluation synthesis on Islamic finance which was very complementary. The session attracted a number of representatives from IFIs and was well received.
• "Evaluating national-level objectives" ,joint session with FAO. Ms Pennarz gave a presentation on the qualitative approach for assessing country-level results taking the Egypt country strategy and programme evaluation as an example. This session was well attended by a large number of government representatives, who took a great interest in national-level evaluations.

Ms Pennarz also participated as panellist in a session organised by the ADB on "New frontiers in impact evaluation: taking stock of evidence and defining future directions". The key presenters highlighted evidence gaps in the evaluation of infrastructure, energy and natural resource management and elaborated the specific opportunities and challenges that the latter are for impact evaluations. Ms Pennarz commented on the challenges for evaluating impact on specific groups in these sectors.

Please visit the event website for more information.