International Economics, through its CEO, is conducting a mid-term evaluation of UNDP’s Regional AfCFTA project, to assess achievements so far including through the partnership with the AfCFTA Secretariat, highlight lessons learnt and recommend strategies for greater impacts.
The UNDP’s Regional AfCFTA Project provides dedicated support to the African Union organs and regional institutions and the Mid-term Evaluation is being funded by the UNDP’s Regional Service Center for Africa.
The African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) is a significant trade agreement that aims to create a single African market of 1.5 billion people with a combined GDP of USD 3.1 trillion. The agreement aims to promote economic empowerment, sustainable development, and poverty reduction by eliminating tariffs and non-tariff barriers. The UNDP’s AfCFTA Regional Project (2022-2025) provides interventions at national, regional, and continental levels to strengthen institutional capacities and create an inclusive environment for the AfCFTA. The project’s goals include promoting trade as a stimulus for structural economic transformation, increasing youth and women employment and empowerment, and addressing issues such as natural resource governance, sustainable energy, climate change, and peace and security.
Against this backdrop, International Economics is conducting a comprehensive mid-term evaluation of UNDP’s Regional AfCFTA project. The primary objective of this evaluation is to critically assess the project’s achievements and progress to date, including its collaborative efforts with the AfCFTA Secretariat, and to distill key lessons learned. Furthermore, the evaluation will provide strategic recommendations to maximize the project’s impact, inform future programming, and ensure that it remains aligned with the UNDP’s development priorities in Africa.
International Economics will assess progress toward project outputs and outcomes and evaluate the results of the partnership between UNDP and the AfCFTA Secretariat as outlined in their MoU. The evaluation will emphasize a theory-based approach, focusing on the project’s theory of change and result framework to identify lessons learned for future implementation. The Team will assess the project’s relevance, effectiveness, efficiency, and sustainability using four OECD-DAC evaluation criteria. The Team will also explore ways to amplify the remaining phase of the project and provide recommendations for effective and efficient scaling up of the initiative. Additionally, cross-cutting issues such as gender equality, women empowerment, human rights, and human development will be addressed throughout the evaluation. For the AfCFTA Secretariat, the Team will assess the results of their partnership for implementing AfCFTA and highlight lessons on partnership management and delivery of support to inform future partnerships.
Governments, international donors, and the private sector face many important questions on the expected outputs and impact before, during and after the implementation of their projects. This is where International Economics’ team of experts, using innovative methodologies to collect and analyse data, can assist you in tracking the economic, social, and environmental aspects of your project.
Applying our analysis and research knowledge, we help our clients maximise efficiency and improve their development objectives. Through the lessons learnt and the feedback mechanisms we implement in our monitoring, evaluation, and learning (MEL) processes, we support institutional strengthening and the re-alignment of resources to ensure the sustainability and maximum impact of projects, helping our clients make well-informed strategic decisions.
