The IEO team supported the African Evaluation Association (AfrEA) as it marked its 25th anniversary with an event in Addis Ababa from 16-18 June 2025. AfrEA is one of the oldest evaluation organisations in Africa – and IEO took the opportunity to learn more about context-specific approaches to conducting evaluations in the African context; to build partnerships with other African organisations present; and to share our experience and knowledge of our own evaluations in the continent and global south more generally.
Highlights of IEO’s engagement include remarks at the event opening by Mr. Manas Puri, Senior Professional at IEO, who laid out how IEO’s customisation to the local context is so very important for our evaluation approach (see our Evaluation Manual for more information here), and how we see the likes of AfrEA as able to help us enhance our knowledge and capacity in this area for our evaluation work in Africa; and participation by IEO staff in three key sessions: on the subject of Working with the Governments Development Assistance Organizations and Development Partners; on Cooperation, collaboration, and localization: towards a new paradigm for development evaluation in Africa; and on Lessons Learned from Independent Evaluations of International Financial Institution-financed Climate-Smart Development Projects, which was a joint panel session with the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD). The panel, chaired by Dr. Indran Naidoo, Director of IFAD’s Independent Office of Evaluation, also featured Dr. Zenda Ofir, member of the NDB High-Level Evaluation Advisory Committee (HLEAC) – and panellists discussed how evaluation can help improve NDB’s project design and performance, which cutting-edge methodologies can be used to enhance complex, climate oriented strategy and operations, and ways to help evaluations capture holistic impacts from fragmented data sources.