Country programme evaluation

At the request of the Tunisian Government, IFAD undertook an evaluation of its cooperation programme with Tunisia. A core learning partnership comprising representatives of the various stakeholders was set up in September 2002 to guide the evaluation process. An Approach Paper was then drafted spelling out the evaluation objectives and methodology. The evaluation fieldwork followed in Oct-Nov. 2002. A Round Table workshop was held from 8 to 9 July 2003 to conclude the evaluation exercise. During the Round Table participants discussed the evaluation findings and recommendations. They also reviewed and finalised this Agreement at Completion Point. This agreement contains the conclusions and recommendations reached, through consensus, by the members of the core learning partnership. It also contains follow-up measures they pledged to implement.

Main recommendations and agreed follow-up

Focus on disadvantaged areas in favour of vulnerable sectors of the population in a context of sustainable natural resource management: the IFAD co-financed investments concentrated on the disadvantaged central and southern areas of the country, where they could ease certain constraints and favour the largest number of smallholders. Despite this, some areas still face natural resource degradation, weak economic integration and limited development of grass-roots organizations. Additionally, the beneficiary selection criteria they used proved fairly ineffective in terms of targeting the very poorest.

Recommendation: IFAD should continue to focus its activities on the least advantaged areas. Approaches should stress the most vulnerable as they are the core focus, but at the same time accept that action should also address other local stakeholders in the interests of integrated development and interaction among the various sectors of the total population. The very poorest should be specifically targeted via a investments and services specifically adapted to their particular constraints.

Agreed follow-up: the new IFAD strategy will define a participatory approach to best define the rural poverty status, means of subsistence, and expectations of the most vulnerable target groups, together with the support they feel that they need in order to participate in a process of sustainable local development in agricultural and non-agricultural domains. The approach will bring together other local stakeholders such as the social and trade associations, decentralized administrations, banks and NGOs – especially for defining specific forms of support.

Policy innovation and dialogue: IFAD co-financed projects have made a direct contribution to the implementation of national policies, with which they are fully integrated. They have also introduced innovations, sometimes directly and sometimes indirectly, by helping to implement new approaches by other stakeholders.

Recommendation: IFAD should pursue its policy of allocating financial resources to innovative-approach development projects which can be more widely replicated and contribute to national policy development. Here, project planning should more clearly spell out innovation at project operational levels and eventual links to central level policy definition.

Agreed follow-up: IFAD and the Government will clearly define innovation objectives in the next country strategy. They will also define the mechanisms for capitalizing upon and disseminating the results of the experimental new approaches at the central level. Such mechanisms will be based on a better understanding of the institutional environment and better M & E systems created to facilitate the realisation of these experimental approaches and capitalisation of the methods used and results obtained.

Income-enhancement and better living conditions for the least advantaged as the focus of intervention strategies: the areas where projects intervene typically face a range of environmental and social constraints and agricultural potential is often quite weak. Agriculture is not the main source of income for the poorest households and cannot comprise the sole basis for development in these areas. Despite this, projects tend to implement a range of agriculture-based, standardized services not always suited to the specific and varied needs of smallholders in difficulty.

Recommendations: increased incomes and improved living conditions should again become the core focus of intervention strategies, in line with the objectives and strategies of the target population. These two imperatives imply: (i) not excluding categories other than agriculture, and, (ii) adapting flexibly to the demands and needs of local stakeholders.

Agreed follow-up: IFAD and the Government will focus the new strategy on raising incomes for target groups, and enhancing the full available agricultural and non-agricultural potential. In coordination with local stakeholders, they will adopt principles designed to guarantee the flexibility of future interventions and their adaptation to local conditions and strategies as outlined above. In formulating each future project, IFAD and the Government will make a survey reviewing and pinpointing the strategies and expectations of people in the target area, especially the most vulnerable. They will identify the constraints and opportunities for job and income-generation in all sectors, and, in coordination with the local stakeholders, will suggest the most appropriate forms of intervention. This survey will be extended to all areas reached by IFAD-co-financed projects to identify complementary action to incorporate this strategy orientation into ongoing projects.

Support measures for local initiatives: The experience of ongoing projects, especially the Siliana project, has revealed a genuine development potential for micro-projects, even in poor areas, but support measures for local initiatives are needed.

Recommendation: support measures for local initiatives and productive activities adapted to the specifics of intervention areas and mindful of the existing economic and institutional environment are needed. This specifically involves financing private investment, advice and support to productive project entrepreneurs, support for rural stakeholder capacity-building, support for partnership development, for research and, perhaps, financing decentralized public investment.

Agreed follow-up: In the formulation of each new project, IFAD and the Government specifically review the promotion of local initiatives within the zone of intervention, and the main stumbling-blocks for rural entrepreneurs in accessing financing and support measures for setting up and implementing projects. The review will also constitute the basis for the design of a support framework for income-generating activities. IFAD and the Government will jointly review with local stakeholders whether or not to develop other support measures for local initiatives and, if so, how.

Anchoring projects in the economic and institutional environment and local stakeholder responsibility: the projects have helped to boost farm income, whilst fostering new habits of farmer/government dialogue through the increasing prominence of the participatory approach. Though the projects faithfully reflect national agricultural policies, there has been a certain failure to anchor them within regional economic and institutional frameworks. This has hindered interaction and any possible snowball effect. Specifically, there has been a focus on traditional agricultural investments and natural resource conservation, mainly planned by the CRDA, with little participation by farmers and other local stakeholders, except inside the micro-zones.

Recommendations: project planning should be more firmly rooted in the existing economic and environmental environment, capitalizing upon available potential, fostering the integration of small entrepreneurs and smallholders in the economy, mobilising local resources and skills, and, in the long run, ensuring that investments prove sustainable. Local stakeholders should receive support in preparing strategies based on a holistic vision of land use development, enabling them to take part in project planning, implementation and monitoring activities.

Agreed follow-up: IFAD and the Government will define the new strategy and, to a greater extent, the mechanisms, to allow future projects to develop cooperation and partnerships with local stakeholders, strengthen the sectoral and trade associations, and gain insight into markets, identifying the most promising marketing opportunities. They will look at the conditions and mechanisms needed to involve local development councils in the process of devising, implementing and monitoring local development strategies.

Extending institutional arrangements to the various local stakeholders: the organizational framework of these projects has closely followed government institutional changes, with the CRDA having become the main institution responsible for project implementation. The increasing incorporation of project units into the CRDA has favoured the incorporation of project activities into the regular programmes of their technical sections. The vertical organization of the CRDA, together with weak internal and external mechanisms for coordination, has tended to compartmentalize operations. Whereas the CRDA have made little use of the methodological innovations contributed by the projects in domains not covered by these compartmentalised technical sections.

Recommendation: to consolidate the expansion of these approaches and interventions, and the participatory approach in general, future projects should be based on participation, partnership and cooperation with the various local stakeholders such as the social and trade associations, technical ministries, the private sector, financing institutions, and NGOs. Three levels of intervention are recommended depending on investments and activities. One level should be based on close proximity, such as the social/territorial unit or imadat. A second would be the délégation – the expanded local development council, and a third would correspond to the region. Intervention should also be closely linked to central policy formulation to make the most of any new innovations developed. Future institutional arrangements should be adapted to these functions. They should therefore: (i) be based on a detailed analysis of the organizations and institutional capacities of the various stakeholders; (ii) define the responsibilities of the stakeholders involved, and, (iii) identify the institutional support needed to implement these responsibilities and to ensure better coordination of the CRDA and project teams. A suitable framework for NGO participation should also be sought.

Agreed follow-up: in preparing the new strategy, IFAD and the Government will define the best institutional arrangements to boost local stakeholder participation, develop local and regional coordination and partnerships, and ensure capitalization of the new approaches at the national level, based on an in-depth institutional review.

Open project mechanisms. Strictly formulated project planning has proved incompatible with the participatory approach, hindering its development and responding poorly to a diversified and changing environment.

Recommendation: to facilitate and boost the participation of local stakeholders in project planning and ensure project mechanisms are best tailored to local conditions, projects should (i) set work programmes to be more compatible with the participatory approach, while maintaining cost-effectiveness, (ii) address smaller geographic areas than in the past, (iii) make programmes indicative and more flexible, (iv) include a set of rules for local stakeholders to follow in identifying and planning activities as and when the project unfolds, with financing ensured by IFAD or sought from other sources. Flexible management mechanisms for IFAD and government administration will also be needed, especially for procurement and disbursement.

Agreed follow-up: IFAD and the Government will define the process and outline the broad picture of project formulation so as to ensure full participation by local stakeholders and the best possible adaptation to local conditions. This will include a framework for intervention, and a description of the methods and means of intervention.

Capacity-building for women and young people. The projects have helped to improve women's living conditions through activities open to everyone. However, despite the fact that the major role of women in running farms is widely recognized, these projects have shown little interest in women's special constraints, especially those concerning training and input access, other than through very narrow project components with low budgets and limited-impact.

Recommendation: future projects should consider the specific roles and needs of men and women at all stages of project design and execution, setting forth clear objectives concerning the integration and participation of women, and young people, in local development dynamics, especially with reference to access to extension, advisory and support services, training, sources of financing, and participation in rural organizations and local cooperation agencies. An overall strategy of for integrating women and young people will be adopted to allow them to participate in projects on an equal footing and – where necessary - to overcome constraints that are specific to them.

Agreed follow-up: in the context of the new country strategy, IFAD, in collaboration with the Government and other partners, will devise measures designed to enhance the integration and preparedness of women and young people.

Support to project implementation: the projects did aim to promote approaches which were new and unfamiliar to the project teams and CRDA staff, but sometimes failed to include the necessary backstopping.

Recommendation: if projects are to implement the most innovative approaches, they will need diversified support mechanisms, including (i) competent staff, identified on the basis of a prior institutional review and suited, in numbers and skills, to the demands of the project's approach, size and available financing; (ii) training programmes based on an evaluation of existing capacities; (iii) recourse to technical and methodological assistance; (iv) M & E systems instrumental in providing guidance and making the most of results to monitor material and financial achievements and evaluate their impact (especially on the most vulnerable groups), involving local stakeholders in their definition and implementation; (v) regular supervisory missions, appropriately skilled and covering every aspect of monitoring, including the methodological and technical sides, based on cooperation and partnership; (vi) implementation handbooks; (vii) systematic mid-term evaluation missions.

Agreed follow-up: in their future strategy, IFAD and the Government will specifically define the implementation support measures necessary for new approaches planned for future projects. IFAD and the Government will include the resources needed to backstop national project implementation capabilities. IFAD will further ensure an appropriate programme of supervision and monitoring for each project, and a contribution to support for project execution. Specifically, IFAD, in accordance with the cooperating agency, will provide a detailed description of the ground to be covered by supervision, including methodology and the technical issues, as will as the frequency and duration of supervisory missions.