Monitoring & Evaluation System: the Experience of the Millennium Challenge Account (MCA) Armenia.

Shushan Kurkchiyan, MCA-ArmeniaYerevan, Armenia

June 20, 2011

MCC’s Core Principles

3. Poverty Reduction through Economic Growth

4. Good Policies Matter5. Country Ownership6. Focus on Results

“Focus on Results” means…

1) Integrating monitoring and evaluation into project design and implementation

2) Holding implementers accountable for achieving results

3) Using analysis and lessons learned for decision-making

Monitoring and Evaluation: A Partnership between MCC and MCA

4

Economic and beneficiary analysis

Monitoring

How much will farmer income

increase over time?

Irrigation Infra: How many kilometers of

tertiary canals are being rehabilitated?

WtM: How many farmers are being

trained?

Did farmer income

increase relative to

comparison group?

Evaluation

Economic Analysis: What is an ERR?

• Comparison of the costs and benefits of a public investment

• People often focus on the benefits, but forget about costs

• Way to utilize scarce resources cost effectively to improve peoples’ economic well-being (i.e. design and select projects)

With a higher than 12.5% ERR, benefits

outweigh costs:

Total Cost = 100

Total Benefit = 170

Beneficiary Analysis

MCC’s Definition of a Beneficiary

• Anyone who receives assistance

• Anyone who realizes increased income

• Anyone who lives in Armenia

ProcessMilestones

Outputs

Outcomes

Goals

Time

Lev

el o

f In

dica

tor

Imp

lem

en

tatio

nR

esu

lts

(early in implementation)

(later or after end)

Indicators in M&E Plan

MCA-Armenia Program Objectives

MCA-Armenia Program Logic

Monitoring

• In MCA-A M&E Plan has 2 types of monitoring indicators: Process Milestones and Outputs

• Process looks at progress in terms of contract signing, disbursements and important deadlines, i.e. milestones

• Output looks at direct results such as number

of farmers trained, number of pump stations renovated, kilometers of canals rehabilitated, etc.

Evaluation

• Outcome and Goal indicators look at what happens after the program or program component is implemented.

• Through evaluations we try to understand whether the program had the intended impacts on its intended beneficiaries.

• Did farmer income increase? Did farmers move from

growing lower value crops to growing higher value crops?

Indicator Tracking Table  Compact Year 1

  (Oct 2010 to Sept 2011)

        Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4

Yearly Target

% Complete

Indicator Level Indicator Unit Baseline

Oct 2010 - Dec 2010

Jan 2011 - Mar 2011

Apr 2011 - Jun 2011

Jul 2011 - Sep 2011

Activity 1 : Centralized Irrigation System Rehabilitation 

Outcome Hectares under improved or new irrigation*,†

Hectare 0         0

Output Centralized irrigation systems rehabilitated*

Number 0         0

Process Milestone

Value of irrigation feasibility and/or detailed design contracts signed‡

US Dollars 0         3,600,000  0%

Process Milestone

Value of contracted irrigation feasibility and/or design studies disbursed

US Dollars 0         1,800,000  0%

Process Milestone

Percent of contracted irrigation feasibility and/or design studies disbursed†

Percentage 0%         50%  0%

Changing Indicators

• New indicators may be added

• Indicator information (definition, data source, etc) may be revised as necessary

• Indicators may be deleted if:

– The cost to collect the data is greater than the benefit

– The Project design changes such that the indicator does not measure the intended outcome

Changing Targets

• MCC’s preference is to not change targets

• Interim targets may be changed as long as end of Compact targets does not change

• For end of Compact targets, the modified targets will be analyzed to assess whether they maintain the integrity of the original ERR

Revising the M&E Plan

• Any changes should be documented with appropriate justification

• All revisions must be approved by MCC

• Revision of the M&E Plan of the MCA-Armenia.

THANK YOU!