GOVERNMENT OF INDIA
OVERVIEW
The fourth edition of annual gLOCAL Evaluation Week, a global monitoring and evaluation (M&E) knowledge-sharing movement convened by the Global Evaluation Initiative will be taking place virtually between May 30 and June 3, 2022. gLOCAL Evaluation Week brings together regional, national, and international partners and serves as a synchronised, collaborative, and widely accessible inter-regional space to promote evaluation discussion and debate. DMEO is participating in gLOCAL this year, as a part of the global M&E movement of over 350 organisations pushing the boundaries of the understanding and use of monitoring and evaluation in evidence-based decision making. This year's overarching theme is “EvalEvolve: The evolution of M&E in the 21st century”, where how the field is changing to meet current realities and future needs will be explored.
Learnings from India’s data maturity assessment model (DGQI) for improving administrative data for M&E
Administrative data forms the backbone of decentralized monitoring and evaluation systems. It plays a crucial role in enabling regular monitoring of government programmes and using evidence to make mid-course corrections. With the rapid pace of digitisation of government services across the world, administrative data can also be efficiently used along with survey data for cost and time effective concurrent evaluations.
Ensuring relevant, high-quality and reliable administrative data for effective data use by various stakeholders is hence of immediate importance. Further, it is crucial to ensure that these data systems allow for easy data sharing and use while taking care of data security and privacy to move from siloed data systems to more integrated data ecosystems.
In this context, to enable this transition in a smooth manner, it is important to undertake comprehensive review of existing data systems via data maturity assessments. This assessment can then become the basis for building frameworks, policies and action plans to pivot the quality of administrative data for effective M&E.
The session aims to focus on the importance of data maturity assessments by governments to drive reforms for improving data use for effective M&E. It will highlight recent attempts by the Government of India to undertake a comprehensive review of data maturity level of over 70+ Ministries/Departments in the form of Data Governance Quality Index (DGQI) from 2020 onwards.
Nurturing Evaluation Systems in Indian States
Presence of strong and robust evaluation systems is a critical enabler of evidence-based policy making. India, with a federal set-up of government, has diverse evaluation capacities across its 36 States/UTs. Since, the inception of State Planning Departments in mid-60s, some States have emerged as front runners, others are aspiring to augment their evaluation potential. It is however clear that each state is different and unique and thus requires customised intervention for strengthening their evaluation systems.
With this backdrop, the Development Monitoring and Evaluation Office (DMEO), NITI Aayog brings together experts in the domain of institutionalising evaluation ecosystem. Through this discussion, the panel will explore different approaches that may be adopted for strengthening the evaluation systems at disaggregated levels. With the help of case studies, panelists will entail some of the key points on best practises adopted in nurturing evaluation systems.
Skill-Building Workshop on Designing Evaluations for Food Safety Net Interventions
Reduction in food insecurity, hunger, and malnutrition plays a pivotal role in achieving sustainable development. Recent evidence finds that the COVID-19 pandemic has slowed down the progress towards achieving Zero Hunger by 2030. Nearly 811 million people faced hunger in 2020. This was 161 million more than in 2019. In response, governments across the globe have implemented new or increased investment in existing mega food safety nets (FSN) to safeguard the poor and vulnerable populations. In India alone, the FSN has been used extensively to deliver subsidized and free dry grains to nearly 800 million beneficiaries. Need of the hour is to strengthen the measurement and tracking of FSNs and provide continuous feedback on outcomes and “what works” to decision-makers.
Knowledge on the various concepts of methods, instruments, and indicators is a necessary pre-condition for choosing the evaluation approach and analyse the situation of a given area. Designs of FSN also vary across settings, ranging from conditional cash transfers to the supply of subsidized dry rations or cooked meals. Hence, information on plausible pathways of change, appropriate evaluation designs and analytical frameworks is needed to help ascertain the effectiveness of FSN.
Open call for Data-powered papers on Monitoring and Evaluation
In the past five years, the role of M&E and its practice have been evolving. The global pandemic has only accelerated innovations in the M&E practice. Applications driven by development in technology and the advancement of mobile communications has generated a “data gold mine”. Telecommunications, along with advancements in cloud computing and storage techniques has boosted Big Data adoption. In line with developments scientific paradigms have also evolved through empirical science, theoretical science, and computational science. Now we are at the stage of data-intensive science - the latest approach to discover knowledge or extracting value through derivatives of technology- Data. Usage of data can generate economic and social value far beyond anticipation. Building on the existing definition of Information Management that focuses on ICT4D, we aim to take forward a strategic initiative with a particular focus on big data and technology use in the M & E space.
The use of artificial intelligence and integrating machine learning and big data into outcome and impact evaluations are supporting administrative data and survey-based methodologies.
For this upcoming gLocal event DMEO invites data driven policy briefs that empirically address a pertinent policy research question.
Innovations in Food Security and Nutrition Tracking
To combat today’s hunger challenges and reach Sustainable Development Goal-2 (SDG-2) on Zero Hunger, it is vital to decision-makers with the most accurate and up-to-date information on food security and nutrition during normal times (BAU) as well as crisis situations. Evidence systems during BAU require systematic transformations to enable capturing of production, supply, demand, intake, and quality of food for vulnerable individuals and communities. Furthermore, evidence systems can gain from an additional layer of crises-proofing to provide reliable, uninterrupted, and actionable information during situations such as natural disasters and pandemics.
With this backdrop, the World Food Programme (WFP) and Development Monitoring and Evaluation Office (DMEO), NITI Aayog, Government of India, brings together international experts and government partners to discuss the innovations in tracking systems for normal times and during crises. Through a discussion with experts, the panel will explore the potential of technology innovations in remote tracking and analytical solutions for food security and nutrition from a farm-to-fork lens. Using case studies, the panel will also explore the question of “what it takes” to introduce and sustain such innovations within governments and non-government organizations, especially in low and middle-income economies.
