This brief provides an overview of the monitoring and evaluation (M&E) system of the CGIAR Research Program on Aquatic Agricultural Systems (AAS) and describes how the M&E system is designed to support the program to achieve its goals. The AAS program aims to improve the lives of 22 million people dependent upon aquatic agricultural systems by 2024 through research in development.
This facilitation guide was developed to support the training of scientists who are members of the CCAFS Working Group on impact pathways and M&E for results-based management. The group attended a highly participatory introductory training from 1-5th April 2014 in Segovia, Spain. The objectives of the workshop were: 1. To introduce working group members to outcome thinking; 2. To present elements of the CCAFS theory of change (TOC), impact pathway (IP) and monitoring and evaluation (M&E) framework; 3.
Capacity development is regarded by CGIAR as an effective vehicle for sustainable development, when embedded within broader CGIAR Research Programs (CRP). This document offers guidelines on how CGIAR and boundary partners (or those partners who take up and adapt research results for the next level of users) can successfully develop and implement strategies which support this process of integration.
In this paper the authors present the diagnosis and re-design of farm systems as part of an innovation process involving farmers and scientists to improve the sustainability of family farms in south Uruguay. Although were selected farms with a large variation in resource endowment, they shared the main critical points of sustainability: low productivity and deteriorated soil quality.
The Climate Change and Social Learning (CCSL) Initiative is a cross-organisation group working to build a body of evidence on how social learning methodologies and approaches contribute towards development targets. Together with a select number of participating initiatives from a variety of organisations, we are working towards establishing a common monitoring and evaluation (M&E) framework for new projects and programmes using a social learning-oriented approach.
The CGIAR research program on livestock and fish aims to sustainably increase the productivity of small-scale livestock and fish systems so as to increase the availability and affordability of meat, milk and fish for poor consumers across the developing world. The purpose of this document is to lay out a Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MEL) Framework for the program. The Framework provides a concise narrative of why the M&E system is important, how it operates, what kinds of data it will collect and who is responsible for data collection and analysis.
This tool will enable stakeholders in the countries’ organic agriculture movements to assess the functioning of national control systems (NCSs) for organic production and, with the assistance of IICA, to collaborate on the development of action plans to strengthen institutions and agencies involved in organic production control at a national level, thereby providing consumers in national and international markets with greater quality assurance for these types of products.
This study presents a quasi-experimental analysis of the impact of FairTrade certification on the commercial performance of coffee farmers in Tanzania. In doing so the study emphasises the importance of a well-contextualised theory of change as a basis for evaluation design. It also stresses the value of qualitative methods to control for selection bias. Based on a longitudinal (pseudo-panel) dataset comprising both certified and conventional farmers, it shows that FairTrade certification introduced a disincentive to farmers’ commercialisation.
This paper discusses a range of approaches and benchmarks that can guide future design of value chain impact evaluations. Twenty studies were reviewed to understand the status and direction of value chain impact evaluations. A majority of the studies focus on evaluating the impact of only a few interventions, at several levels within the value chains. Few impact evaluations are based on well-constructed, well-conceived comparison groups. Most of them rely on use of propensity score matching to construct counterfactual groups and estimate treatment effects.
This presentation refers to the Livestock and Fish partner meeting which has been held, under CGIAR Research Program on Livestock and Fish, in Addis Ababa, 5 November 2014, to review and advise on a gender capacity assessment methodology. The partners were the following ones: The International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA), The WorldFish Center, The International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), The International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT).