Monitoring, Evaluation and Reporting of UAE Foreign Aid
At the request of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the United Arab Emirates (MOFA-UAE), UNITAR sought to leverage its extensive international experience and expertise in designing and implementing training programmes for government officials. UNITAR’s portfolio of course material and certified trainers were made available to MOFA-UAE participants through this programme.
Utilising the location of the UNITAR Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific in Hiroshima, Japan, the programme requested support from Japan’s International Cooperation Agency (JICA) in order to gain access to an expert on the Monitoring and Evaluation of Japanese foreign aid.
The practical elements of the programme examined aid magnitudes and the behaviour of donors and recipients of aid, as well as the myriad motivations and objectives of aid, including those that may conflict. A focus was also be made upon the empirical evidence on the relationship between aid and growth as well as some of the key challenges in making aid more effective.
Held in Abu Dhabi between 22 and 25 April 2012, the UNITAR Monitoring, Evaluation and Reporting of UAE Foreign Aid Programme aimed to examine the state of the art in regards to these critical elements of foreign diplomacy. It provided participants with an overview of the monitoring and evaluation (M&E) framework, with practical exercises on implementing monitoring, conducting evaluations and developing action plans. In addition, this programme sought to provide exposure to best practices in implementing foreign aid strategies.
- To further strengthen the institutional capacity and strategic focus of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the United Arab Emirates;
- To strengthen the knowledge and expertise of participants in regards to foreign aid monitoring and evaluation thereby improving the aid effectiveness of the United Arab Emirates for beneficiary countries.
- Describe the main steps of the logical framework approach (LFA) and formulate results statements for development interventions.
By the end of the Session, participants were to be able to:
- Identify internationally recognised norms, standards and criteria for evaluation.
- Describe three ways to use evaluation data and three ways to present evaluation results.
- Identify three types of Organisational Needs Assessment.
- Identify the key steps in developing an action plan.
A four-day long Workshop for 24 participants, this programme aimed at strengthening capacity and enhancing the effectiveness and professional skills of a core group of senior government officials working at MOFA-UAE. Participants were exposed to a combination of lectures, group discussions and practical exercises.
The substantive topics presented included:
- The history of Japan's ODA and JICA's overall operation
- JICA’s Monitoring and Evaluation Frameworks
- Foreign Aid as an Instrument of Development
- The Evolution of Monitoring and Evaluation
- Increasing the Effectiveness of Monitoring
- Increasing the Effectiveness of Evaluation
- Multilateral Diplomacy and Foreign Aid
- Data and Data Collection
- Communication and Reporting M&E Results
- Efficiency in Foreign Aid
- Developing an Organisational Needs Assessment
- Identifying and Integrating Stakeholders
- Action Plan Development
Representatives of the Ministry of Foreign Affars of the United Arab Emirates