|
Background
The 2005 Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness and the 2006 Recommendations of the WTO Task Force on Aid for Trade emphasise the importance of monitoring and evaluating the results of development co-operation, including trade-related assistance, and adopting the principle of “mutual accountability” (between the partner country and donors) for achieving development results.
Monitoring and evaluation of trade-related assistance is not just essential for accountability purposes but also for enabling a re-adjustment of ongoing projects and programmes (if needed) and improving the quality of future assistance by taking account of lessons and recommendations emerging from the evaluations.
Several bilateral donors and regional and multilateral agencies have undertaken evaluations of their trade-related assistance. Assessing the effectiveness of such assistance and its impact on development and poverty reduction is however often difficult, due to the lack of clear and measurable project or programme objectives and performance indicators in programming documents. In addition, it is often difficult to attribute changes at the macro-level (e.g. changes in a country’s export performance or overall policy-making) to micro-level interventions (due to attribution and time lag problems).
Ongoing work
As part of its 2005/6 programme of work, the OECD Secretariat summarised key findings, lessons learned and recommendations emerging from ten selected thematic evaluations of trade-related assistance. The objectives are to gain a better understanding of donor performance in this area; assess factors that have contributed to the success (or failure) of past activities and provide guidance for enhancing the effectiveness and impact of future trade-related assistance on development and poverty reduction. This is particularly relevant in the context of the WTO Aid for Trade discussions and might help identify approaches to strengthen the effectiveness of aid for trade.
Trade Related Assistance: What do Recent Evaluations Tell Us? has just been published.
Click here to download the brief. To access the evaluations reports on which this paper relies, please go to the DAC Evaluation Research Centre .
|
