IEG Independent Evaluations & Annual Reviews
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Independent Evaluation Group (IEG) publications assess what works, and what does not; how a client plans to run and maintain a project; and the lasting contribution of the World Bank Group to a country's overall development. The goals of evaluation are to learn from experience, to provide an objective basis for assessing the results of the World Bank Group's work, and to provide accountability in the achievement of its objectives. IEG superseded the former Operations Evaluation Department.
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Publication Leveraging Imagery Data in Evaluations: Applications of Remote-Sensing and Streetscape Imagery Analysis(World Bank, 2024-03-05) Ziulu, VirginiaImagery data offer the potential to answer critical questions regarding the relevance and effectiveness of development initiatives, providing a factual basis for decision-making and the refinement of policies and programs. Imagery data, encompassing a diverse array of sources from remote-sensing imagery to digital photos, offer a vast and underused resource for understanding the dynamics of change in urban development and other geospatial phenomena. Despite their ubiquity, imagery data remain relatively neglected in the evaluation of international development interventions, primarily on account of perceived barriers in relation to computation and expertise. However, recent advances in machine learning and increased computational resources have made imagery data more accessible. This paper explores the potential of imagery data in evaluations and presents various data types and methodologies, demonstrating their advantages and limitations. An Independent Evaluation Group case study on a World Bank urban development project in Bathore, Albania, illustrates the practical application of different imagery data and methodologies. By leveraging imagery data, evaluators can gain insights into the geographical impact of development interventions. Moreover, integrating imagery data with other information sources, such as surveys and socioeconomic statistics, offers strong potential for deepening the understanding of complex phenomena.Publication World Bank Support to Jobs and Labor Market Reform through International Development Association Financing: A First-Stage Evaluation(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-01-16) World BankThis evaluation is the first stage of the Independent Evaluation Group’s assessment of the World Bank’s support for more, better, and more inclusive jobs through International Development Association (IDA) financing, and it assesses the implementation of IDA-supported interventions directly supporting its jobs objectives across the three Replenishment cycles from fiscal years 2015 to 2022. Supporting the creation of more, better, and more inclusive jobs is critical towards achieving the goals of poverty reduction and shared prosperity in countries. This is especially true for countries that are eligible for International Development Association (IDA) financing. Since 2014, IDA has included jobs as a special theme, and subsequent IDA replenishments have had what this evaluation calls an ‘IDA jobs strategy.’ This strategy included explicit objectives, a series of policy commitments to achieve them, and results indicators to track them. This evaluation represents the first stage of the Independent Evaluation Group’s assessment of the World Bank’s performance in supporting more, better, and more inclusive jobs through IDA financing. It assesses the implementation of IDA-supported interventions that directly supported its jobs objectives across the three Replenishment cycles from fiscal years 2015 to 2022. The evaluation answers two questions: (i) To what extent IDA’s strategy on jobs was grounded in sound analytics, adaptive, and operationally relevant (ii) To what extent the strategy has been translated into relevant and effective jobs interventions that directly address the objectives of more, better, and more inclusive jobs The scope of the evaluation is limited to the three main channels for achieving IDA jobs objectives: acting on labor demand, increasing labor supply, and improving labor market flexibility and geographic mobility.The report offers recommendations for further strengthening of the IDA jobs agenda towards the objective of supporting more, better, and more inclusive jobs.Publication Nepal Country Program Evaluation: World Bank Group Support to Nepal, Fiscal Years 2014–23 (Approach Paper)(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-01-16) Independent Evaluation GroupThis Country Program Evaluation (CPE) will assess the performance of the World Bank Group’s support to Nepal in achieving its development objectives between 2014 and 2023. The evaluation will focus on the Bank Group’s support to Nepal as it tackled its long-term development challenges while undertaking political and institutional reforms relating to the shift to federalism and responding to multiple shocks and disasters. This period covered by this evaluation spans the last two country strategies—the FY14–18 Country Partnership Strategy (CPS) and the FY19–23 Country Partnership Framework (CPF). The CPE will assess the adaptive relevance and coherence of the Bank Group–supported program by examining how the Bank Group has adapted its support over time in response to changing conditions and priorities. This will include an examination of the Bank Group’s response to the 2015 earthquakes and the COVID-19 pandemic. The evaluation will assess the Bank Group’s work in three important thematic areas—resilience to natural disasters, federalism, and jobs and private sector development—in greater depth.Publication A Focused Assessment of the International Development Association’s Private Sector Window: An Update to the Independent Evaluation Group’s 2021 Early-Stage Assessment(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-01-16) World BankThe private sector is essential for creating jobs and prosperity in poor countries, but developing it is challenging, especially in fragile and conflict-affected situations (FCS). The IDA Private Sector Window (PSW) is a blended finance facility that enables the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA), and third-party private sector investors to conduct high-risk transactions in International Development Association (IDA) countries and FCS countries. This evaluation aims to assess the usage, market development potential, and enabling factors of the PSW. The evaluation assesses how the usage of the PSW has changed from its inception in 2017 to 2023 and explores its potential market development effects and its enabling factors, namely concessionality (for IFC and MIGA) and additionality (for IFC). Concessionality is the level of subsidy needed for IFC and MIGA to offer transactions in PSW-eligible countries at market prices. Additionality is the unique support IFC brings to private investments (on a project basis) that is not offered by commercial sources of finance. It comprises financial and nonfinancial additionality. This evaluation assesses the PSW across three IDA cycles: IDA18, which covers FY18–20; IDA19, which covers FY21–22; and IDA20, which covers FY23–25. It updates the 2021 IEG early-stage assessment of the PSW (FY18–20) and complements the IDA20 PSW Mid-Term Review, which was prepared jointly by IDA, IFC, and MIGA.Publication Ethiopia Country Program Evaluation (Approach Paper)(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-01-16) Independent Evaluation GroupThe objective of this Country Program Evaluation (CPE) is to assess how well the World Bank Group supported Ethiopia in addressing key challenges that constrained its development and how that support adapted over time to respond to changing circumstances, an evolving relationship, and lessons from experience. The evaluation will cover fiscal years (FY)13–23. The time period is selected to include the last two Bank Group strategies to support Ethiopia and coincides with the period of theprevious two political administrations. The evaluation aims to inform the next Bank Group–supported Country Partnership Framework (CPF) for Ethiopia expected in FY25.Publication Results and Performance of the World Bank Group 2023(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2023-12-31) World BankIEG’s Results and Performance of the World Bank Group 2023 report, also known as the RAP 2023, examines the evolution of project-level results and performance of the World Bank Group, including the World Bank, comprising the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, the International Development Association (IDA), the International Finance Corporation (IFC), and the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA). The report also analyzes the project development outcomes that underlie project performance ratings, and the validity of the monitoring and evaluation (M&E) frameworks tasked with measuring them. This is the first RAP with a substantial number of projects that were implemented during the COVID-19 pandemic. World Bank, IFC, and MIGA projects faced many obstacles during implementation, especially disruptions associated with the COVID-19 pandemic. The report examines the factors that shaped the implementation and performance of these projects, particularly in the context of the pandemic. In terms of methodology, the report incorporates novel data and evaluation methods, including supervised machine learning, and conducts similar analyses across the different Bank Group Institutions while taking into account each institution’s different evaluation and rating methods. The RAP updated project performance rating trends - covering World Bank lending projects, IFC investment and advisory projects, and MIGA guarantee projects - from fiscal year (FY)12 to FY 22. It used in-depth analyses to examine the evolution of development outcomes, how they relate to project performance ratings, and what factors influenced the implementation and performance of Bank Group projects within the context of the pandemic. The report offers future directions of travel for the three institutions across the World Bank Group.Publication An Evaluation of World Bank and International Finance Corporation Engagement for Gender Equality over the Past 10 Years: Approach Paper(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2023-11-14) Independent Evaluation GroupThis Approach Paper proposes an independent evaluation of the results achieved by the World Bank and the International Finance Corporation (IFC) in supporting countries (understood as governments, private sector, civil society, and citizens at large) to address gender inequalities and the contribution of the gender strategy for fiscal years (FY)16–23.Publication Learning and Adapting for Outcomes through the Management Action Record 2023: A World Bank Group Management Report on Implementation of IEG Recommendations(Washington, DC, 2023-10-30) World BankThe Management Action Record (MAR) provides Management’s annual self-assessment of World Bank Group (WBG)-wide progress in implementing recommendations from the Independent Evaluation Group's (IEG) major evaluations to deliver outcomes in key priority areas. The MAR is an important vehicle for monitoring the uptake of IEG evaluations; it aims to ensure that recommendations lead to targeted actions that help shape the WBG’s strategic directions, improve its development effectiveness, and ultimately help countries achieve their development goals. This year’s MAR report provides updates on 59 recommendations from 22 IEG evaluations issued between FY19 and FY22, covering a diverse range of areas of strategic importance to the WBG. Building on progress achieved over the previous reporting cycles since the 2020 MAR Reform, this year’s MAR process featured enhanced candor in the self-assessment, a broader evidence base, and a widening of the teams involved in providing feedback to IEG for richer reporting. During this year’s MAR update cycle, Management continued its more intensive engagement approach, with more touchpoints, to enhance the MAR’s learning focus and build understanding between evaluators and technical staff. This has included the facilitation of dozens of evaluation-specific working meetings with IEG, involving over 130 participants from across the WBG, with representation from all relevant WB Global Practices, IFC, and MIGA regional and industry teams.Publication Independent Evaluation Group Validation of the Management Action Record 2023(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2023-10-30) Independent Evaluation GroupThe report provides the Independent Evaluation Group’s (IEGs) validation of World Bank Group management’s report Learning and Adapting for Outcomes through the Management Action Record 2023: A World Bank Group Management Report on Implementation of IEG Recommendations for the period July 2022 to June 2023. The purpose of the Management Action Record (MAR) assessment system is to support accountability, learning, and adaptation for the Bank Group’s implementation of recommendations from IEG evaluations. This validation document presents IEG’s assessment of progress toward achieving the intended outcomes of evaluations and the evidence in management’s MAR report. The Bank Group made steady progress in implementing IEG recommendations through delivering internal products and adapting processes; in some cases, it has achieved meaningful change of direction that shows that the outcomes of recommendations are being achieved. The validation assessed the evidence for all 22 IEG evaluations included in the MAR, that is, all evaluations reviewed by the Board Committee on Development Effectiveness (CODE) between FY19 and FY22. These 22 evaluations contain 59 recommendations.Publication Evaluation Insight Note: Elements that Enhance Institutional Capacity Development in World Bank Projects and Country Partnerships in Sub-Saharan Africa(Washington, DC, 2023-10-18) World BankEvaluation Insight Notes (EIN) offer new insights from existing evidence on important strategic and operational issues. This EIN draws on Independent Evaluation Group evidence to identify lessons for addressing institutional capacity development needs in Sub-Saharan Africa. Institutions shape how countries foster poverty reduction, support sustainable growth, and respond during crises. World Bank projects and country partnerships operating in challenging contexts in Sub-Saharan Africa routinely integrate and show results in institutional capacity development. Addressing institutional challenges in these and similar contexts involves multiple organizations and is like running through a labyrinth because of the need for quick decisions, unclear processes, shifting objectives, and trial and error. The cases reviewed for this EIN consistently supported institutional reforms in a variety of challenging contexts with, for example, compromised financial systems, corruption, and civil conflict. To help navigate institutional capacity development, this Evaluation Insight Note (EIN) answers the question: How can the World Bank help address institutional capacity development needs in Sub-Saharan Africa based on the body of work of the Independent Evaluation Group (IEG) from 2008 to 2022 Although an overall framework has not been defined to guide institutional capacity, the World Bank has often usefully diagnosed and addressed institutional capacity development needs by applying the Institutional Change Assessment Method. Using this method helps harness four elements that can enhance both the process and the results of institutional capacity development: (i) Routine integration of institutional capacity development in World Bank projects provides multiple entry points for enhancing processes of institutional change. (ii) Interventions with better institutional capacity development results tend to have higher outcome ratings. This implies that analyses from the Institutional Change Assessment Method can be used to adapt country portfolios in a way that improves outcome ratings. (iii) Because strengthening the ownership of interest groups is the most important dimension of institutional change in World Bank projects and country programs, its prioritization can help enhance results. (iv) Support for commitment, coordination, and cooperation helps improve institutional capacity development processes. (v) Support for commitment, coordination, and cooperation helps improve institutional capacity development processes.