Independent Evaluation of the Joint Programme on Integrated Social Policy funded by the Joint SDG Fund -3 months

Contract

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THE EVALUATION PURPOSE, OBJECTIVES AND SCOPE

Purpose

The evaluation will assess overall contribution of the JP to the strengthening of the social protection system in the country, particularly in the context of coordination, capacity strengthening, and policy development. It will also serve is to analyse to which extent the joint implementation has contributed to the success or failure of the JP (in terms of programme coherence and efficiency). The initial evaluability assessment will provide Participating UN Organizations (PUNOs) and partners with evidence on the extent to which results can be demonstrated based on quantitative and qualitative data.

Objectives

The objective of the evaluation is to assess the coherence, effectiveness, efficiency, sustainability and impact of the joint programme from its inception to its completion, with focus on its ability to respond to the needs of the most vulnerable households and hence its contribution to the reduction of disparities and inequalities at all levels through the full participation of vulnerable and prioritized groups to social protection services and basic social services. To accomplish this, the evaluation will need to examine the following:

• Accomplishment of the main expected results and its sustainability: inform the achievement of the program against the designated main transformative results, outcome and output indicators as defined in its Overall Results Framework, and their sustainability in the medium/long-term.
• Contribution to improving the situation of vulnerable groups identified in the JP document (ProDoc) through the assessment of evidence from programme experiences and approaches that have proven effective in meeting the needs of vulnerable households.
• Contribution to SDG acceleration through the assessment of JP underlying Theory of Change (ToC) based on the integration and coordination of different interventions to jointly strengthen a common database (Social Registry, SR) of vulnerable families that will have priority access to social protection programmes and social services.
• Contribution to UN reform (UNCT coherence) through the review of the joint implementation of the programme, including its governance and monitoring and reporting arrangements, to gather lessons learned that can help better design joint initiatives.
• Lessons learned, good practices and innovations to better inform the sustainability of the joint program for its upscale.
• To provide a set of forward-looking and actionable recommendations to strenghten programmatic strategies in the design of the next JP taking into account national priorities and the national 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development in the country

• JP focus on disability to assess to what extent the joint programme design, implementation, and monitoring have been inclusive of persons with disabilities (accessibility, non-discrimination, participation of organizations of persons with disabilities, data disaggregation) and has effectively contributed to their socio-economic inclusion by providing income security, coverage of health care, and disability-related costs across the life cycle.

  Scope of the work

The summative evaluation will provide an independent assessment of the joint programme, and it will be forward-looking by reinforcing good practices, identifying areas for improvement, and providing conclusions and recommendations. It will be conducted to assess progress made and provide recommendation for future programmes.

The evaluation will attempt to assess the approach taken by UNICEF, UNDP, WHO and ILO, on whether the assumptions made in the ToC are appropriate, whether activities and interventions are indeed contributing to progress within the framework of the ToC, whether the proposed approach is scalable and to determine why or why not progress is occurring. Of course, where the evaluation does yield evidence in relation to impact and outcomes, these will be reflected upon in the evaluation report.

The evaluation will cover:

• Temporal Scope: January 2020 to May 2022
• Geographic Scope: national (excluding Principe)
• Programmatic Scope: Theory of Change and Results framework – The evaluation will focus on the 4 transformative results stated in the Project Document
• Cross-cutting themes Scope: disability focus and leave no one behind principle
• Strategic Scope: Contribution to UNDAF, agencies comparative advantage and value added, and contribution to SDG acceleration
• Operational Scope: use of resources for impact (more efficient together or alone?), complexity in terms of management (more efficient alone or together?) as well as evidence generation for JP performance measure

EVALUATION CRITERIA AND PRELIMINARY EVALUATION QUESTIONS

Summative evaluation evidence will be judged using modified Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development/Development Assistance Committee (OECD/DAC) criteria of relevance, effectiveness, efficiency, and sustainability as well as equity, gender equality and human rights considerations. Key evaluation questions might include the following:

Impact of JP: strengthening the social protection system form a cross-sectorial coordination and capacity strengthening:

• Are the activities and outputs of consistent with the national priority and the attainment of its objective?
• Did the interventions contributed to develop the foundation to make the social protection system more inclusive and sustainable?
• To what extent is the Social Registry and its interoperability with DHIS2 relevant to reach out to the most vulnerable households?
• Have the capacities of front-line workers been enhanced to improve service delivery to meet the needs of vulnerable households through the Parental Education Programme?
• Have the capacities of youth to work for social sectors and social entrepreneurship been enhanced to prepare them to be fully integrated into the job market and act as change agents within their communities?
• Are the activities and outputs of the joint programme consistent with the intended plan?

Please see below the ToRs attached for full information:

Evaluation TOR for STP_REV 1_23 March 2023_Clean to publish (1).pdf