Aid reform commitments in the 2005 Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness and the subsequent 2008 Accra Agenda for Action are said to be part of an international push for results in achieving international development goals such as the Millennium Development Goals.
Yet official monitoring and evaluation done ahead of the Fourth High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness in Busan, South Korea next month failed to measure the degree to which aid reforms contributed to the impact on the lives and potential of poor women, men and children.
A new report from the Reality of Aid (RoA) Network titled “Democratic Ownership and Development Effectiveness: Civil Society Perspectives on Progress since Paris” offers some evidence gathered by civil society organizations in 32 countries in Africa, Asia Pacific and Latin America on country-level progress in poverty reduction, gender equity and environmental sustainability.
RoA finds the lack of officially gathered evidence and country-specific analysis of impacts on development outcomes unacceptable.
The RoA 2011 Report thus calls for a comprehensive approach to results management for aid as well as new resources for examining country-level evidence on the development outcomes of reforms.
ROA is a nonprofit initiative of Northern and Southern non-government organizations focusing on poverty reduction and development assistance. The RoA 2011 Report was officially launched on October 5 at the OECD Conference Centre in Paris, France during the DAC Working Party on Aid Effectiveness Week.
Digital copies of the RoA 2011 Report can be downloaded here.