IDEV contributes to the 9TH AfrEA International Conference

Venue: African Development Bank HQ and Hotel Sofitel, Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire.

The African Evaluation Association (AfrEA) will hold its 9^th biennial International Conference from 11-15 March 2019 in Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire, on the theme of “Accelerating Africa’s Development: Strengthening National Evaluation Ecosystems.”

Objectives

AfrEA conferences are the foundation for promoting and advocating its “Made in Africa” evaluation approach. This year’s conference will enable knowledge sharing, collaboration and networking among a wide range of international organizations and individuals. The conference aims to:

• Support evaluations that contribute to real and sustained development in Africa.
• Promote Africa-rooted and Africa-led evaluation through sharing African evaluation perspectives.
• Encourage the development and documentation of high quality evaluation practice and theory.
• Support the establishment and growth of national evaluation associations or VOPEs.
• Facilitate capacity building, networking and sharing of evaluation theories, techniques and tools among evaluators, policymakers, researchers and development specialists.

The theme of the 9^th AfrEA International Conference is in line with its vision for an African continent that has a deeply rooted evaluation culture - a key ingredient for improved governance and evidence-based decision-making within public institutions. This resonates with the African Development Bank’s High-5 priorities and its Ten Year Strategy, and IDEV’s mandate to promote an evaluation culture in the Bank and its member countries. The theme is also well aligned to the United Nations’ Agenda 2030 and the African Union’s Agenda 2063, as they aim to advance and enhance the use of evaluation to inform and shape policy, improve oversight, and drive good governance to achieve meaningful transformation in the continent.

The conference provides an invaluable opportunity for IDEV to share its extensive evaluation knowledge and its evaluation capacity development work, and to network and strengthen relationships with other evaluators and development agencies.

Participants

The five-day event will draw together individual and institutional members of AfrEA, representatives from governments, parliaments, development partners, civil society, researchers, academia, private sector, and practitioners, and will offer insightful dialogue, theoretical and practical knowledge exchange, as well as networking opportunities.

Activities

IDEV is supporting AfrEA in helping to organize the first three days of the conference, a series of professional capacity development workshops at the African Development Bank (AfDB) HQ. Following these workshops, the main plenary and parallel sessions of the conference will be held from 13 to 15 March at Hotel Sofitel. The main conference sessions will revolve around 12 strands or themes:  

1. Improving agriculture and food security through impact evaluations.
2. Towards a more transformative approach in integrating gender and equity in evaluation.
3. Evaluating education policies.
4. Ensuring good health and well-being: New approaches and methods in evaluation.
5. The role of the judiciary, executive and legislature in evaluation: Responsive national evaluation systems.
6. Climate change interventions: The use of evaluative evidence for sustainable development: SDGs/ planning /adaptation.
7. Integrating Agenda 2063 and Agenda 2030: Implications for evaluation in Africa.
8. Facilitating professional pathways for Young and Emerging Evaluators (YEE): Strengthening evaluation through mentoring.
9. The role of capacity development in strengthening the evaluation ecosystem.
10. Presidential strand: Realizing the vision of “Made in Africa” evaluation.
11. Evaluation in humanitarian, governance and conflict situations.
12. The fourth industrial revolution and its impact on development and the implications for African evaluation.

IDEV and other Bank staff will be substantively contributing to a number of the conference activities, including participating in a workshop on the follow-up of the Colombo Declaration and providing a workshop on learning-oriented evaluative approaches to accelerate Africa´s development; as well as organizing, chairing and participating in various panel discussions in conference strands 1, 2, 5, 6, 10 and 11. IDEV will also have a knowledge stand at both HQ and the Sofitel to disseminate its knowledge products.

The AfDB has collaborated with AfrEA since the association was established. Bank colleagues have participated in AfrEA conferences over the years as speakers, panelists, discussants, hosts of conference sub-themes as well as providing financial support to aid the organization of the conference – particularly sponsoring the participation of African parliamentarians and young African evaluators in the event. The Bank has also contributed to AfrEA’s flagship publications as contributing authors and/or reviewers.

For more information about the Conference, please visit the event website.