Project: Bytes Without Borders in Morocco
Evaluation Date: September 2018
Report: [report link]
Lesson Learned:

The capacity-building process is a marathon, not a sprint. It must involve regular coaching of trainees and performance monitoring in order to ensure sustainability. In order for capacity-building activities to achieve their intended results, one must ensure the activities are inclusive to all, including the vulnerable and illiterate. The use of audio-visual approaches in social media has proved to reach a larger number of people than the ‘class-format’ approach.

Theme: Media
Project: Creative Communication of the Nigerian Budget
Evaluation Date: July 2018
Report: [report link]
Lesson Learned:

While civil society organizations are interested in budget monitoring and are seeking to build their capacities in this area, the project did not succeed in engaging them with project implementation activities with communities. However, the project did succeed in enhancing skills and capacities of the grantee. Positive outcomes for the grantee include the winning of a proposal to conduct a budget tracking activity on nutrition with UNICEF. In this way, UNDEF funds helped to enhance the grantee’s network with other UN organizations.

Theme: Media
Project: Strengthening Human Rights Protection Through Legal Education in Haiti
Evaluation Date: June 2018
Report: [report link]
Lesson Learned:

The project did not have particularly innovative features and the initial project document submitted to UNDEF was weak in terms of indicators for measuring results. The targets were difficult to measure and the baseline was not calculated with fact-based figures, so efficiency was difficult to assess. The final approved document was the result of a considerable number of exchanges between UNDEF and the grantee which, sadly, appear to have not been sufficiently owned by the implementing institution.

Theme: Rule of law
Project: JOINT Contribution to Strengthen and Expand Democracy in Mozambique
Evaluation Date: June 2014
Report: [report link]
Lesson Learned:

The main partner NGOs in Manica and the grantee designed the project collaboratively. The NGOs in Manica were concerned that their capacity would be stretched by the ambitious expected project outcomes. Their concerns were not reflected in the design, and the final proposal to UNDEF maintained the three-pronged approach of NGO capacity building, government dialogue and legal aid. The capacity building provided to NGOs was essentially on specific rights awareness and governance skills, but was not designed to address NGOs’ structural/operational weaknesses.

Theme: Community activism