OECD Policy Coherence Scan of Austria

4. Evaluation and reporting

Abstract

This chapter examines reporting and evaluation practices through the policy coherence for sustainable development lens. It highlights strengths such as Austria’s comprehensive regulatory impact assessment framework, its joint evaluation policy for development co‑operation, and inclusive reporting processes involving civil society and other stakeholders. The chapter also identifies opportunities to strengthen the integration of coherence considerations into reporting and evaluation practices by strengthening capacities across ministries, systematically assessing transboundary and long-term impacts, increasing partner-country engagement and improving the use of evaluation findings for decision making.

This chapter examines Austria’s approach to assessing and addressing policy impacts through reporting and evaluation policy and practices, with a focus on development policy. The OECD Recommendation of the Council on Policy Coherence for Sustainable Development (PCSD) emphasises the need for responsive and adaptive tools to anticipate, assess and mitigate domestic, transboundary and long-term policy impacts to advance sustainable development (2019[1]).

Evaluation plays a vital role in shaping effective, accountable and transparent development policy. As defined by the OECD Recommendation of the Council on Public Policy Evaluation, it refers to “the structured and evidence-based assessment of the design, implementation or results of a planned, ongoing or completed public intervention. It assesses the relevance, coherence, efficiency, effectiveness, impact and/or sustainability of a policy based on its objectives” (OECD, 2022[2]).1 As such, evaluation serves as a strategic tool for refining approaches, reallocating resources and informing future decision making. It also plays an increasingly important role in responding to public demands for accountability by demonstrating results and the value for money of international aid (OECD, 2023[3]). Evaluation also refers to the process of determining the added value or significance of an intervention. In contrast to monitoring, evaluation is conducted at a specific point in time, going beyond the regular documentation of measures, outputs and outcomes, and requiring good monitoring systems and data as the basis for reliable evaluation findings (OECD, 2023[4]).

Closely linked to evaluation, reporting provides a transparent means to assess policy alignment with sustainable development objectives, identify gaps and potential negative impacts, and support informed decision making. It also fosters inclusive dialogue among the government, civil society and the private sector on how policies are being implemented. Beyond its accountability function, reporting can serve as a dynamic tool for continuous improvement. It encourages collaboration across sectors, promotes innovative ideas for further policy direction and supports whole-of-government action. This is particularly relevant for delivering effective, coherent and impactful development policy.

This chapter identifies strengths and key opportunities to strengthen Austria’s existing evaluation and reporting processes including evaluation mechanisms embedded in the Three-Year Programme on Austrian Development Policy (Dreijahresprogramm der österreichischen Entwicklungszusammenarbeit, 3YP). It concludes by offering recommendations to strengthen the use of reporting and evaluation as tools for enhancing coherence, accountability and effectiveness, in line with OECD best practices.

Strengths in Austria’s reporting and evaluation practices and emphasis on policy coherence

A well-structured, systematic approach to assessing policy impacts at the legislative level

Austria’s Impact-Oriented Regulatory Impact Assessment (Wirkungsorientierte Folgenabschätzung, WFA) introduced as part of the second phase of the last Federal Budget Law reform in 2013, represents an outcome-oriented framework for assessing potential impacts. It mandates federal ministries to assess the expected impacts of legislative and regulatory proposals, as well as administrative measures of exceptional financial significance (BKA, 2013[5]).

The WFA follows a two-stage process. An initial materiality check (Wesentlichkeitsprüfung) determines whether impacts in each dimension are significant enough to require further analysis. If so, an in-depth assessment (vertiefende Abschätzung) is conducted. Ministries are required to formulate four-year strategies with measurable outcome objectives (Wirkungsziele) and to align their legislative and administrative actions accordingly. Every WFA must include a plan for internal evaluation, to be completed no later than five years after the measure’s implementation. These evaluations assess whether the intended outcomes were achieved and identify any unintended effects. The Federal Performance Management Office (Wirkungscontrollingstelle), a department in the Federal Chancellery (BKA), oversees the quality and consistency of the WFA, provides implementation guidance through handbooks and tools, and consolidates evaluation findings for reporting to the National Council. Fully embedded within Austria’s broader performance management system, the WFA accompanies policy initiatives from formulation through parliamentary procedures to post-implementation evaluation, allowing for continuous assessment and refinement throughout the policy cycle.

A key strength of Austria’s approach lies in its comprehensiveness structure. The WFA systematically examines a wide range of impact dimensions, including financial, economic, environmental, social, consumer protection and gender equality impacts, ensuring that legislative proposals are grounded in a multidimensional understanding of their impacts. Climate was introduced as a new dimension in 2024 through the Accompanying Budget Act 2025 (Budgetbegleitgesetz 2025). The process is further supported by a standardised information technology system which streamlines analysis through structured questionnaires and ensures a consistent and replicable application.

By integrating cross-cutting impacts into decision making, Austria’s impact assessment framework promotes policy transparency and raises awareness of cross-sectoral effects within the public administration. By assessing effects beyond primary objectives, it also strengthens legislative processes and contributes to the development of more effective and coherent legislation. Further, its embedded evaluation function fosters institutional learning and policy refinement over time.

Institutional co‑ordination is another cornerstone of the system’s effectiveness. The Federal Performance Management Office within the BKA, in co-operation with the Federal Ministry of Finance and line ministries, supports the quality and consistency of assessments through training, consultation and user-friendly guidance materials. This infrastructure strengthens administrative capacity and fosters a culture of informed policymaking.

Austria’s commitment to evidence-based policymaking is reflected in the scale and scope of its recent evaluations. In 2024 alone, 73 policy initiatives across 13 ministries were evaluated under the WFA framework. Of these, 70% fully met or exceeded their intended impacts and 22% were assessed as mostly successful. These measures span key policy areas such as education, employment, taxation, climate policy and public administration reforms. A 2024 report on the impact-oriented assessment by the BKA highlights the WFA’s alignment with PCSD and the SDGs. Ministries can, on a voluntary basis, link initiatives to specific SDGs, with 51 out of 73 initiatives indicating at least one SDG connection. Overall, initiatives contributed to 16 out of 17 SDGs, with SDG 4 (quality education), SDG 8 (decent work and economic growth) and SDG 9 (industry, innovation and infrastructure) being the most frequently supported goals. Nevertheless, voluntary SDG mapping primarily improves transparency and visibility; it does not, in itself, demonstrate that SDG interactions, trade-offs or transboundary effects informed policy choices. Similarly, the WFA’s contribution to policy coherence depends not only on whether assessments are completed, but on whether their findings are used systematically in decision making, parliamentary deliberations and future policy adjustments. Further standardisation in how SDG links, negative impacts, trade-offs and transboundary impacts are assessed could strengthen the WFA’s role as a tool for more coherent policymaking (BKA, 2025[6]; Austrian Parliament, 2024[7]).

In this context, the Outlook chapter of Austria’s second voluntary national review (VNR) highlights plans to further integrate the 2030 Agenda into the WFA. Efforts to link impact assessments with PCSD and the 2030 Agenda are also supported by innovative tools at the subnational level. For example, the N-Check-Strat process in Lower Austria, developed by the regional SDG Advisory Board, provides a participatory and evidence-based mechanism for assessing the alignment of provincial strategies and projects with sustainable development objectives (Republic of Austria, 2024[8]). By enabling structured SDG assessments at the administrative level, this tool complements national-level efforts and enhances vertical coherence.

While the WFA provides a strong institutional and methodological framework, its effectiveness ultimately depends on the extent to which it is used to inform decision making in practice. Ensuring a systematic use of findings – for example in parliamentary deliberations – and strengthening feedback loops – for example to inform revisions of existing measures or related initiatives – are key to maximising its impact beyond formal requirements. As highlighted by parliament, this could be supported by better contextualising individual assessments within broader strategic framework, strengthening the analysis of negative impacts and trade-offs and improving the overall quality of impact assessments. This includes, for example, clearer presentation of underlying assumptions, greater use of ex ante/ex post comparisons and increased use of external evidence for complex reforms (Austrian Parliament, 2024[7]).

Joint evaluation framework of Austrian development co-operation

The Evaluation Policy of the Austrian Development Cooperation serves as the reference and framework for all federal actors within the scope of the 3YP. Developed jointly by key actors, including the Federal Ministry for European and International Affairs (BMEIA), the Austrian Development Agency (ADA), the Federal Ministry of Finance (BMF), the Development Bank of Austria and the former Federal Ministry for Sustainability and Tourism, it provides the foundation for a whole-of-government approach to evaluation, encouraging joint evaluations and a culture of evidence-based decision making.

It establishes a framework for assessing the impact and effectiveness of its interventions, with independence, transparency and quality as core principles. The policy emphasises independent and impartial evaluations through the use of external evaluators, peer reviews and reference groups, ensuring credibility and robustness of findings.

Evaluations under this framework aim to perform three interconnected functions (BMEIA, 2019[9]):

• Learning: Contributing to ongoing improvement, institutional learning and optimisation of the quality and effectiveness of Austrian development co-operation.

• Steering: Supplying reliable findings to underpin evidence-based planning and strategic decision making both at the objective-setting and operational levels.

• Accountability and communication: Supporting transparent accounts of the use of public funds and their related impacts to partners, donors and the public at large.

One of the policy’s main strengths is its commitment to high-quality evaluations and alignment with international best practices, particularly the OECD Development Assistance Committee (DAC) evaluation criteria (relevance, coherence, effectiveness, efficiency, impact and sustainability). The coherence criterion looks at how well interventions or policies fit in the broader policy context, promoting alignment across sectors and co‑ordination with other actors and reinforcing a whole-of-government approach. Austria’s evaluation policy is also expected to make evaluations more relevant for monitoring progress on the SDGs and to ensure they assess how well different policies are aligned and mutually reinforcing. The policy further promotes learning and the practical use of evaluation findings, including through management responses and strategic evaluations. Guidelines for management and staff on carrying out independent, credible and useful evaluations further aim to improve the evaluation culture and foster greater understanding of coherence.

Another notable strength of the policy is the engagement of key stakeholders, including partner countries and civil society organisations (CSOs), throughout the evaluation process. This participatory approach enhances ownership and use of evaluation findings. The policy also mandates public access to evaluation reports, further reinforcing transparency and accountability.

This framework is underpinned by the legal provisions of the Federal Act on Development Co-operation, which mandates the evaluation of development co-operation activities. The law allows the federal government to commission evaluations within the framework of 3YP (Section [§] 5(2)) and requires ADA to maintain a system for assessing the effectiveness and target achievement of its activities (§ 9(5)). In addition, the 2025 agreement between the BMEIA and ADA confirms that strategic, programme and project evaluations form an integral part of their co‑operation.

The 2025-2027 3YP reinforces this approach by promoting joint evaluations across departments aligned with the 3YP’s thematic and geographical priorities. This aims to generate cross-departmental insights into the relevance, coherence, efficiency, impact, effectiveness and sustainability of Austrian development policy.

Lastly, the 2025-2027 3YP foresees a review of the implementation of the evaluation policy and standards over its application period, thereby laying the groundwork for a stronger culture of collaboration, continuous improvement and strategic learning. In this context, the planned review of the evaluation policy in 2026, as outlined in the Strategic Evaluation Plan 2025-2027, provides a timely opportunity to address remaining challenges (discussed in the next section).

Joint reporting on Austria’s SDG implementation, with strong stakeholder engagement

Austria’s joint SDG reporting, co‑ordinated by the Inter ministerial Working Group on the Implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (Interministerielle Arbeitsgruppe zu den Nachhaltigkeitszielen, IMAG on SDGs), provides a structured mechanism for assessing federal policy alignment with the SDGs. While primarily focused on domestic SDG implementation, the IMAG on SDGs promotes a broader cultural shift within the Austrian federal administration towards integrated reporting, cross-sectoral collaboration and whole-of-government action. It also fosters inclusive dialogue on sustainable development priorities across government and with stakeholders.

The preparation of Austria’s second VNR in 2024 reflects this inclusive approach. Building on the framework of its first VNR, over 60 organisations contributed to the process, co‑ordinated by a steering group led by the BKA and BMEIA, with key involvement from: the former Federal Ministry of Social Affairs, Health, Care and Consumer Protection (BMSGPK); the Federal Ministry for Climate Action, Environment, Energy, Mobility, Innovation and Technology (BMK); and the Federal Ministry of Labour and Economy (BMAW).2 The VNR Stakeholder Forum engaged actors from federal ministries, federal provinces, municipalities, cities, parliament, social partners, civil society, business and science, and the platform SDG Watch Austria was instrumental in facilitating civil society input.

Austria’s VNR process also supports international mutual learning and PCSD through peer exchanges with countries such as Switzerland (2022) and Bhutan (2023), as well as engagement in European Union (EU) and global platforms. In addition, the process enables the identification of gaps, inconsistencies and priority areas, such as those outlined in the Outlook chapter of Austria’s second VNR, serving as both an accountability tool and a mechanism for continuous learning and improvement (Republic of Austria, 2024[8]).

Opportunities to strengthen the evaluation framework of Austrian development co‑operation

Including specific requirements on PCSD in existing reporting mechanisms

Austria recognises the need for a whole-of-government approach to ensure all policy areas contribute to implementing the 2030 Agenda and to manage transboundary impacts effectively. Its second VNR acknowledges the importance of considering global interdependencies as part of SDG implementation and stresses the value of enhancing PCSD to avoid negative social, economic and environmental impacts on third countries, in line with Austrian development policy. This presents an opportunity to strengthen national SDG reporting mechanism – such as through the IMAG on SDGs – by including requirements to report on policy interactions, trade-offs, transboundary effects and follow-up actions. This would support a more systematic identification of potential policy contradictions and impacts, particularly on developing countries.

Austria’s VNR process is highly structured and collaborative, offering a foundation for going beyond sharing best practices and integrating a more critical reflection on PCSD challenges. Although CSOs have raised the importance of coherence – for instance, in a round table organised by the Global Responsibility Working Group, which explored mechanisms for improving PCSD (e.g. assessing the impact of laws on Global South countries before adoption) – there is potential to formalise these discussions and include them in official reporting.

The government’s request for technical support on PCSD, which informs this report, also reflects the country’s commitment to work with international partners to promote PCSD within its administration and enhance its capacity to identify and address policy interactions, trade-offs and transboundary effects more systematically. This provides a valuable opportunity to integrate coherence considerations more firmly into reporting processes.

Addressing the limited capacity to evaluate policy impacts across ministries

Some ministries, particularly those directly involved in environmental or social policy, or with strong ties to academia, generally demonstrate a stronger familiarity with policy coherence concepts and cross-sectoral impact assessment and have more experience with cross-sectoral collaboration. Others exhibit a lower awareness of the potential impact of their policies on other countries or the need to consider these when evaluating their sectoral policies.

While some ministries have made efforts to consider policy impacts, the current absence of standardised reporting that includes coherence across policies, as discussed in the previous section, means coherence-related challenges are often overlooked or inconsistently addressed. Developing uniform guidance on how to systematically consider transboundary and intergenerational impacts could support ministries to integrate policy coherence considerations into their policymaking processes. Expanding opportunities for cross-ministerial learning and capacity building on policy coherence could further enhance understanding of coherence-related challenges and facilitate knowledge exchange. Co‑ordination mechanisms such as the IMAG on SDGs and the WG 3YP are well positioned to play a more strategic role in building practical capacity for policy coherence reporting. While policymakers face challenges in reporting on policy impacts due to limited data availability and technical capacity, this presents an opportunity to invest in tools, training and methodologies that enable a systematic integration of policy interactions and contradictions including those with cross-border or intergenerational implications into reporting processes.

Addressing these challenges would require enhanced capacity building across ministries, promoting a shared understanding of policy coherence and its relevance for development policy and sustainable development, the added value of PCSD for other sectoral priorities and the potential costs of inaction or fragmented policymaking. Austria’s collaboration with the OECD presents a timely opportunity to build capacity and strengthen the use of evaluation processes to support policy coherence, strengthening its overall approach to achieving the 2030 Agenda.

Greater involvement of partner countries in strategic evaluations

To maximise the effectiveness of development policy and development co-operation activities, it is important to consider the needs, perspectives and priorities of partner countries. ADA has taken several steps to ensure that these insights are reflected in its evaluation processes. For example, programme and project evaluations are typically led by the partner and the ADA Evaluation Unit organises regular training. This training helps partners apply ADA evaluation standards and guidelines, thereby strengthening the quality and relevance of findings emerging from programme and project-level assessments.

In contrast, strategic evaluations of development co-operation remain donor-led and, consequently, reflect donor-centric perspectives. While this ensures alignment with donor priorities and overall strategic policy objectives, it may reduce the extent to which contextual insights and priorities of partner countries are captured. Austrian embassies and ADA co‑ordination offices in the partner countries serve as a channel for engaging in policy dialogue with partners and gathering regional perspectives. This approach can be strengthened by broadening the channels through which partner-country perspectives are collected and communicated back to the policymaking process to support a deeper and more consistent inclusion of local communities in evaluation processes.

Whereas national experts are typically included in evaluation teams, stepping up the involvement of national and subnational institutions as well as CSOs in partner countries can lead to more accurate, grounded and actionable findings. Investing in the capacity of these organisations would not only strengthen the quality of their contribution to evaluation processes, but also reinforce their ownership, accountability and long-term sustainability of development interventions. Overall, institutionalising local engagement could offer a pathway to more comprehensive and contextually relevant impact evaluations.

Strengthening the use of official development assistance and total official support for sustainable development statistics for reporting and evaluation exercises

Austria’s official development assistance (ODA) and total official support for sustainable development (TOSSD) statistics play a key role in providing systematic, comparable and evidence-based data on financial flows supporting the SDGs. Beyond fulfilling OECD DAC reporting obligations, the systematic use of these data can also inform evaluations and evidence-based policymaking.

ADA already analyses its investment portfolio using international statistical methodologies and sources such as OECD Creditor Reporting System (CRS) and TOSSD. This provides an overview of how and where resources are allocated across projects, sectors and countries and supports the selection and design of strategic evaluations, including the formulation of terms of reference. Integrating these statistical insights more systematically into reporting and evaluation processes could help to better assess the coherence, effectiveness and impact of Austria’s development policy. This would be consistent with the objectives of the 2025-2027 3YP which highlights the importance of recording financial flows for transparency, analysis and comparability. It would also allow evaluations to more effectively determine whether Austria’s development finance aligns with strategic priorities of development policy, the SDGs and other relevant national policy objectives.

To strengthen the utility of ODA and TOSSD statistics, institutional linkages between the statistical function (e.g. Statistics Austria, ADA) and evaluation units (e.g. within-ADA) could be reinforced. This would ensure that data systematically feed into policy reviews and performance assessments, support the analysis of cross-sectoral impacts and track whether development finance contributes to multiple sectoral policy objectives, thereby improving both strategic learning and PCSD.

A more integrated evaluation framework of development co-operation

While the Evaluation Policy of the Austrian Development Cooperation provides a solid foundation, its application remains uneven. Currently, various institutions administering Austrian ODA funds are encouraged – but not legally required – to apply the evaluation policy to its own initiatives, and central accountability mechanisms are limited. As a result, evaluation standards and practices vary widely, which can limit comparability, consistency and the potential for sharing learning across the system. Establishing a central repository for synthesising findings could promote cross-institutional learning and accountability. More broadly, the development of a joint monitoring and evaluation system in the medium/long term – as recommended by an evaluation and evidence synthesis of the whole-of-government approach in Austrian development policy – could strengthen co‑ordination, commitment and joint management of the actors involved (ADA, 2021[10]). In this context, the matrix in Annex 1 of the current 3YP could be further developed into a more operational tool to support both monitoring and evaluation efforts.

The policy’s emphasis on strategic evaluations offers a pathway to strengthen the evidence-base for decision making at a higher level. These evaluations are typically managed by ADA and carried out by independent external evaluators commissioned specifically for each evaluation. They also benefit from external peer review and the implementation of recommendations is monitored over a three-year period. Strategic evaluations aim to go beyond individual projects, examining broader strategies, institutional effectiveness and the coherence of policy implementation. Institutions are encouraged to develop strategic evaluation plans that prioritise interventions of significant scale or strategic relevance, with a view to informing steering, accountability and learning. To safeguard independence and credibility, internal evaluation units oversee the process while independent evaluators conduct the analysis and are supported by reference groups and external reviewers for quality assurance. Findings are expected to trigger actionable management responses, with clearly defined follow-up measures and responsibilities. Yet, because institutions independently determine what to evaluate and when, important areas may be overlooked and similar issues may be assessed differently across institutions, making it harder to compare results and ensure a consistent approach across the broader development system.

Similarly, parliamentary engagement in the development-related committees could play a stronger oversight function. Strengthening formal reporting obligations to the parliament or another appropriate body could help translate evaluation findings into concrete improvements in Austria’s development policy and ensure greater ownership of policy outcomes. Establishing an independent evaluation body within the parliament, responsible for evaluating Austria’s development policy initiatives, could also support parliamentary oversight, democratic legitimacy of development policy evaluations and send a strong signal of accountability and transparency to citizens. However, such a reform would require careful design to ensure manageable implementation within existing procedural frameworks and to maintain a focus on learning and results, rather than solely on control.

Looking ahead, the voluntary and decentralised nature of the evaluation system presents a structural barrier. Advancing sustainable development requires a more integrated, whole-of-government approach to evaluation and strategic learning. Without central co‑ordination, binding requirements or mechanisms to synthesise and apply evaluation findings across institutions, Austria risks missing key opportunities for cross-sectoral learning, evidence-based policymaking and coherent engagement with partner countries. Establishing an independent evaluation body at the federal level could address these gaps by ensuring institutional independence, avoiding conflicts of interest with implementing bodies and providing greater flexibility in recruiting specialised staff and developing innovative evaluation methods. Alternatively, creating an independent evaluation unit within the BMF, BKA or BMEIA could help maintain close links to Austria’s foreign policy priorities while ensuring that development policy evaluation findings directly inform strategic planning and policy formulation.

Streamlining reporting and improving the use of reported information

During the OECD fact-finding mission to Vienna in 2024, stakeholders reported concerns including redundancy and lack of co‑ordination in reporting processes. Reporting was widely seen as an administrative burden rather than a tool for informing decision making and improving policy design and implementation. Ministry staff often reported having to repeat similar information in multiple questionnaires or with different colleagues. This duplication of effort suggests inefficient knowledge-sharing practices and weak co‑ordination mechanisms across the government. This presents an opportunity to streamline processes so that reporting can evolve from a bureaucratic exercise to a meaningful evaluative tool. Clearer workflows, more flexible reporting timelines and simplifying excessive reporting requirements could also help free up time and transform reporting obligations into an opportunity for thorough reflection, stakeholder engagement, assessments of policy impacts or areas for improvement.

Different capacities across ministries to work with data and evaluation tools further illustrate the potential to invest in training, technical support and capacity building. While some ministries already demonstrate strong skills in defining objectives, identifying stakeholders and measuring impacts and target outcomes, others lack structured frameworks or established practices and focus narrowly on budgetary expenditures without linking them to broader policy objectives.

Encouragingly, despite these challenges, stakeholders generally acknowledged the value of assessing policy impacts. To improve effectiveness, co‑ordinating and harmonising reporting processes, reducing duplication and establishing standardised guidelines would be beneficial. Providing additional resources and training could also help ensure that all ministries have the capacity to engage meaningfully with data and evaluation practices. Last, shifting the perception of reporting from a burdensome requirement to a valuable tool for improving policy coherence and decision making is essential.

Box 4.1. Country examples of good practice on evaluation systems

Costa Rica: Leveraging participatory mechanisms to strengthen evaluation practices

Costa Rica’s National Evaluation System strengthens the efficiency and effectiveness of public policies by generating evidence on the results of government programmes and uses participatory governance to improve the quality, relevance and use of evaluations. The system is co‑ordinated by the Ministry of Planning and Economic Policy (MIDEPLAN), which acts as the central authority responsible for planning, monitoring and evaluation of government strategies and policies.

At its core, the National Evaluation Platform (NEP) brings together around 35 institutions from government, academia, congress, international organisations, judiciary and civil society. It serves two main functions: i) co-developing and validating NEP action plans; and ii) promoting technical dialogue and knowledge exchange. By engaging diverse actors into the evaluation process, the platform strengthens ownership, improves relevance of evaluations and promotes institutional learning, thereby strengthening the overall quality and use of evaluation findings (de la Garza Navarrete, 2025[11]).

Spain: Institutionalising evaluations through legal mandates and capacity building

Spain’s Law 27/2022 on the Institutionalisation of Public Policy Evaluation establishes a common understanding of evaluation responsibilities across government and strengthens the shift from a fragmented to a more systematic approach to evaluations. The law requires line ministries to create dedicated evaluation co-ordination units and entrusts the Independent Fiscal Institution with conducting ex post evaluations through spending reviews. This institutionalisation improves the consistency, comparability and reliability of evaluation results across government (OECD, 2025[12]).

The law also supports developing evaluation capacity within the civil service. It introduces a public policy evaluation competence framework that defines core skills, job categories and levels of expertise. Based on this framework, the National Institute for Public Administration and the Spanish Institute for Public Policy Evaluation intend to develop tailored training for each job category, self-assessment tools and broader upskilling initiatives across government. These measures help ensure that civil servants are equipped with the skills and competencies needed to manage and carry out evaluations, improve the quality of evaluations and raise awareness of the added value of evaluation practices and the evidence they generate (OECD, 2025[12]).

Sources: de la Garza Navarrete, T. (2025[11]), The Costa Rican National Evaluation, EvalConnect and Costa Rican Ministry of National Planning and Economic Policy; OECD (2025[12]), Implementation Toolkit for the OECD Recommendation on Public Policy Evaluation, https://doi.org/10.1787/77faa4fe-en.

To strengthen the contribution of evaluation and reporting to policy coherence in Austrian development policy, the recommendations in Box 4.2 could be considered.

Box 4.2. Opportunities to strengthen evaluation systems

• Strengthen institutional capacity for evaluation and learning: Invest in targeted capacity building, peer learning and technical support across ministries to increase competence in assessing policy impacts, working with data and using evaluations as a strategic tool to inform decision making and improve coherence and policy outcomes.

• Embed coherence considerations in existing reporting frameworks: Integrate explicit requirements to assess coherence, transboundary effects and trade-offs into existing SDG and ODA reporting mechanisms, including assessment of transboundary, intergenerational and cross-sectoral impacts, for example through the WG 3YP. Develop uniform guidance for ministries on how to systematically integrate coherence considerations into reporting exercises. This could also include harmonising reporting formats and requirements across ministries to improve consistency, avoid or reduce duplication and enable comparability of results.

• Promote the strategic use of evaluations across Austria’s development policy system: Consider establishing a central independent evaluation body with a clear mandate to ensure consistent application of evaluation standards, co‑ordinate and synthesise findings across development policy actors and facilitate strategic learning to inform evidence-based policymaking. It could also include a central repository of evaluation results to enhance transparency and cross-institutional learning; stronger institutional links between bodies involved in evaluation and statistics to combine technical expertise and enhance strategic use of data collection exercises; and involvement of the parliament in evaluation exercises to strengthen democratic oversight and ownership of policy outcomes.

• Scale up partner-country engagement in evaluation processes: Establish processes that systematically involve partner-country stakeholders, both governmental and non-state actors, including CSOs, local stakeholders and communities in evaluation design, implementation and follow-up to integrating partner-country perspectives. Support capacity building for local stakeholders to ensure meaningful participation and inclusion of diverse perspectives.

References

[10] ADA (2021), Evaluierungs- und Evidenzsynthese des Whole-of-Government Ansatzes (WGA) in der österreichischen Entwicklungspolitik, Austrian Development Agency, https://ada.kontainer.com/folder/1878478#token=qQ9Of0LrMyVCfy079qFM5yQpAk3QYZrt&type=shared.

[7] Austrian Parliament (2024), Bericht über die Wirkungsorientierte Folgenabschätzung 2024 - Analyse, https://www.parlament.gv.at/dokument/budgetdienst/wirkungsorientierung-gleichstellung/BD-Bericht-ueber-die-Wirkungsorientierte-Folgenabschaetzung-2024_BF.pdf.

[6] BKA (2025), Bericht über die Wirkungsorientierte Folgenabschätzung 2024, Austrian Federal Chancellery, https://oeffentlicherdienst.gv.at/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/250520_EvalWFA-2024_WEB.pdf.

[5] BKA (2013), Handbuch Wirkungsorientierte Folgenabschätzung - Arbeitsunterlage, Austrian Federal Chancellery, https://oeffentlicherdienst.gv.at/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/Handbuch-Wirkungsorientierte-Folgenabschaetzung.pdf.

[9] BMEIA (2019), Evaluierungspolicy der österreichischen Entwicklungszusammenarbeit, Austrian Ministry for European and International Affairs, https://www.bmeia.gv.at/fileadmin/user_upload/Zentrale/Aussenpolitik/Entwicklungszusammenarbeit/Web_Evaluierungspolicy.pdf?1579891837.

[11] de la Garza Navarrete, T. (2025), The Costa Rican National Evaluation, EvalConnect and Costa Rican Ministry of National Planning and Economic Policy.

[12] OECD (2025), Implementation Toolkit for the OECD Recommendation on Public Policy Evaluation, OECD Public Governance Reviews, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/77faa4fe-en.

[3] OECD (2023), Evaluation Systems in Development Co-operation 2023, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/a255365e-en.

[4] OECD (2023), Glossary of Key Terms in Evaluation and Results Based Management for Sustainable Development (Second edition), OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/632da462-en-fr.

[2] OECD (2022), Recommendation of the Council on Public Policy Evaluation, OECD/LEGAL/0478, https://legalinstruments.oecd.org/en/instruments/OECD-LEGAL-0478.

[1] OECD (2019), Recommendation of the Council on Policy Coherence for Sustainable Development, OECD/LEGAL/0381, https://legalinstruments.oecd.org/en/instruments/oecd-legal-0381.

[8] Republic of Austria (2024), Österreich und die Agenda 2030. 2. Freiwilliger Nationaler Bericht zur Umsetzung der Agenda 2030 und der Nachhaltigen Entwicklungsziele / SDGs in und durch Österreich (FNU), https://www.bundeskanzleramt.gv.at/dam/jcr:2622dbec-f1bc-45c7-8788-a3d67036e145/Agenda-20230--2-FNU-Oesterreichs--2024.pdf.

Notes

← 1.  These six evaluation criteria provide a normative framework used by the OECD to determine the merit or worth of a development intervention (policy, strategy, programme, project or activity) and serve as the basis upon which evaluative judgements are made. More information can be found at: https://www.oecd.org/en/topics/sub-issues/development-co-operation-evaluation-and-effectiveness/evaluation-criteria.html.

← 2.  Please note that, following the last reorganization, the names and portfolios of the respective ministries has changed.