Program_strategy_workshop_MandE

(//This work stream was run by Carlo Azzarri)//

//See the file of this session://

-SI indicators -FtF and custom indicators -beneficiary tracking system -agronomic-biophysical data **Feedback from the session participants** **October 8, 2015** **Feedback from the session participants** There was a discussion about the upcoming FTF indicator submission.
 * Plan for phase 2:**
 * Have a more decentralized M&E.
 * DC team to focus more on evaluation, which will become crucial during scaling phase, and less on monitoring. IFPRI team has comparative advantage and incentives to work on socio-economic research.
 * Transfer funds to each mega-site to hire a data manager/M&E project coordinator who will be in charge of insuring the regular monitoring and data sharing. He will collect data from research teams, both on indicators for the PMMT and agronomic/biophysical data for CKAN, communicate on the usefulness of the tool and share evaluation results from IFPRI. He will be the connection between the M&E team and the country teams.
 * The 2 new M&E local project coordinators (in ETH and WA) should be mid-level staff with technical skills, who can take care of field activities (BSc., locally recruited)
 * Monitoring will focus on:
 * The local coordinator can also help each team define custom indicators for their own goals and measures of success. S/he will make sure that they are regularly uploaded in the PMMT as custom indicators.
 * The team has not tackled E yet, but it has focused mostly on M.
 * The research teams would like to know better about which are the learning points from phase 1 that came out of the evaluation effort.
 * The research teams need a change of mindset about data management (sharing, uploading, etc.), with the process facilitated and guided by the M&E team.
 * IFPRI could communicate better on the common benefits of the sharing platform and to establish a two way support relationship. Some researchers felt that IFPRI requests for sharing data were a bit “extractive”.
 * The M part depends a lot, and puts great burden, on scientists. The main problems experienced by the scientists so far have been:
 * o oversimplification/underestimation of the efforts required to collect information
 * o disconnect between log frames and monitoring requirements
 * o challenges in learning
 * For phase 2 It would be good that the M&E team communicates early on which data will be asked and what is the use / usefulness of them for the project
 * One of the problems during phase 1 was the mismatch of expectations. Deliverables of the M&E team should be clearly communicated at the beginning of phase 2 (especially what will be delivered and the expected timeline).
 * It would be good to have a platform where M&E updates and information are shared with the rest of the Africa RISING teams, a blog?
 * PMMT training was deemed positive but quite some colleagues could not attend. It would be a good idea to improve the video tutorial with the basic information on how to upload data into the PMMT and CKAN.
 * Some researchers are not clear on the difference between M and E.
 * Consistency across SI projects on M&E, and between Humidtropics and Africa RISING. Avoid too many data collections with similar questions – would be good to integrate them.
 * M&E system (and its responsibilities) needs to be clear from the onset, and resources must be made available.
 * Researchers need to have feedback from IFPRI based on the ARBES data, especially looking at some output (tables, graphs, maps).
 * A data confidentiality issue was raised regarding CKAN.