Rolling Five-Year Development Evaluation Work Plan

2015-2016 – 2019-2020

June 2015

Deputy Head Confirmation Note

I approve Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development Canada’s (DFATD) international development related departmental evaluation plan (DEP) for the fiscal years 2015-2016 to 2019-2020, which I submit to the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat as required by the Policy on Evaluation.

As per sections 6.1.8 of the policy, I confirm that the following evaluation coverage requirements are met and reflected in this five-year DEP:

• all ongoing direct program spending is evaluated every five years;
• all ongoing programs of grants and contributions are evaluated every five years, as required by section 42.1 of the Financial Administration Act;
• the administrative aspect of major statutory spending is evaluated every five years;
• programs that are set to terminate automatically over a specified period of time, if requested by the Secretary of the Treasury Board following consultation with the affected deputy head;
• specific evaluations, if requested by the Secretary of the Treasury Board following consultation with the affected deputy head.

As per section 6.1.7, I confirm that this five year DEP:

• aligns with and supports the departmental Management, Resources and Results Structure; and
• supports the requirements of the Expenditure Management System, including spending reviews.

I will ensure that this plan is updated annually, and I will provide information about its implementation to the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat, as required.

List of Abbreviations

Executive Summary

The Rolling Five-Year Development Evaluation Work Plan (hereafter, the Plan) identifies corporate evaluations scheduled for FY 2015-2016 to FY 2019-2020, with a focus on FY 2015-2016. The Plan also includes a list of Branch-led evaluations planned for FY 2015-2016.

In January 2015, the Development Evaluation Division (PCE) conducted a review of DFATD’s evaluation universe ^{Footnote 1} in order to ensure full evaluation coverage of the Department’s direct development program spending over 5 years. The plan has been developed to achieve that requirement.

Planned Evaluation Work – FY 2015-2016

In FY 2015-2016, PCE will initiate and/or complete the following evaluations:

• Development Countries of Focus and Regional Programs: PCE will complete the country program evaluations of Mozambique/Tanzania; Bangladesh; and the Canada Investment Fund for Africa. It will initiate program evaluations of the Vietnam and Regional Programs.^{Footnote 2}
• Development Partner Countries (formerly Countries of Modest Presence): The evaluation of development partner countries with modest Canadian development assistance in the Americas, Asia and Middle East^{Footnote 3} will be completed. An evaluation of development partner countries with modest Canadian development assistance in Africa^{Footnote 4} will be initiated.
• Fragile States: The South Sudan country program evaluation will be completed.
• Global Issues and Development: The development effectiveness review of the United Nations Population Fund will be completed. Review of the International Organisation de la Francophonie will be launched.
• Partnerships for Development Innovation: The evaluation of the Partners for Development Program will be completed.
• Corporate Evaluations: The meta-evaluation^{Footnote 5} of Branch-led evaluations will be launched.
• Thematic Evaluations: The formative evaluation of Canada’s contribution to the Maternal, Newborn and Child Health Initiative will be completed. An evaluation of extractives programming will be initiated.

Further, the Development Evaluation Division will:

• Participate in the Multilateral Organisation Performance Assessment Network (MOPAN) Technical Working Group and Steering Committee. It will continue to provide technical inputs to both the MOPAN and DAC EvalNet networks on the integration of their approaches to assessing multilateral organisations;
• Produce a report on the state of performance measurement;
• Jointly with the Foreign Affairs and Trade Evaluation Division (ZIE) commission a neutral assessment of the evaluation function, as required by the 2009 Treasury Board Policy on Evaluation;
• Complete the Development Evaluation Quality Assurance Tools and Guides Suite intended to facilitate the execution of Branch-led evaluations by DFATD staff, and support Branch-led evaluation strategic planning and knowledge management (e.g. providing training to Partnerships for Development Innovation regarding thematic evaluations);
• Provide technical advice on evaluation matters to the Authorized Programming Process (APP) and accompanying e-RoadMap;
• Conduct a revew of best practices in other government departments to identify opportunities to improve the division’s approach to engaging program and policy branches and to fostering learning; and,
• Serve as Secretariat for DFATD’s Development Evaluation Committee.

Resources

If fully executed, this work plan would require an operations and management (O&M) budget of $2.0 million for FY 2015-2016, and a salary budget of $1.7 million for 15 full-time equivalents (FTEs).  

In FY 2015-2016, the Development Evaluation Division will undergo a significant staff transition. Workplanning will take account of this temporary period of reduced capacity by delaying initiation of certain evaluations to later in the fiscal year when new staff will be in place. This work plan puts forward the completion of 16 corporate evaluations in 2015-2016, 9 of which were initiated in 2014-2015.

1.0   Background

1.1     Introduction

The scope and content of this Plan is consistent with the requirements of the 2006 Financial Administration Act (FAA) and the 2009 Treasury Board (TB) Policy on Evaluation. The Plan positions DFATD’s Development Evaluation Division to achieve 100% evaluation coverage of development grants and contributions and direct program spending as required by the FAA and the 2009 TB Policy on Evaluation, while contributing to the Department’s learning and decision making needs. ^{Footnote 6}

1.2     Context

Strong demand for credible evaluation of the results of international aid expenditures remains a priority for expert constituencies and the general public. Responding to this fundamental accountability requirement will remain a central purpose of the development evaluation function.

At the same time, the Government of Canada continues to encourage departments to use evaluation to strengthen programs. There is an increasing commitment to innovation and learning in DFATD’s development programming - a purposeful effort to design, pilot and scale up the most effective and cost efficient ways of supporting poverty reduction. In this context, program planners and managers need feedback on what works well and why. Facilitating such learning is increasingly an important aim for both corporate and Branch-led development evaluation at DFATD.

1.3     International Year of Evaluation – 2015

EvalPartners, ^{Footnote 7} the global movement to strengthen national evaluation capacities, declared 2015 as the International Year of Evaluation at the Third International Conference on National Evaluation Capacities held in São Paulo in 2013. It was later endorsed by the United Nations Evaluation Group (UNEG) and acknowledged by United Nations General Assembly in a standalone resolution, titled"Capacity building for the evaluation of development activities at the country level" adopted in December 2014.
EvalPartners’s Guiding Principles for the International Year of Evaluation are:

• inclusion where everyone has a role to play: civil society, governments, international partners, academia, and individuals;
• innovation at many levels: methods of engagement and capacity building, peer-to-peer exchanges, use of technology for communications and scale up, and involvement of new partners; and
• strategic partnership of committed individuals and organizations around the world for coordinated action to promote evaluation as a catalytic intervention for better human development.

This renewed emphasis on evaluation has particular implications for the Development Evaluation Division. There will be an expectation of increased engagement with developing country evaluation practitioners in executing DFATD development evaluations. There will also be an increasing number of country-led and joint evaluations, in line with the 2005 Paris Declaration principles. Other global trends include enhancing both donors and partners’ evaluative capacities and adhering to recognized international standards (such as the OECD/DAC and UNEG) in evaluation.

In 2015, countries also came together to begin work on a Post-2015 Development Agenda. This Agenda will address the unfinished business of the MDGs, and integrates social, economic and environmental priorities. As of January 2015, formal intergovernmental negociations have started, and will culminate in a UN Summit in September 2015, where a global Agenda is expected to be set out. ^{Footnote 8}

2.0   DFATD’s Development Evaluation Function

2.1     DFATD Context

The Development Evaluation Division is part of DFATD’s Strategic Policy Branch. It leads corporate evaluations that provide Canadians, Parliamentarians, Ministers, central agencies, partners, beneficiaries and DFATD’s management with credible, evidence-based assessments of the relevance and performance of the Department’s development strategies, programs and projects.

DFATD’s Development Evaluation Committee is comprised of six external experts and four DFATD senior executives (including the Deputy Minister of International Development, who chairs the committee). The Committee acts as an advisory body to the Deputy Minister on development evaluation activities.

Program branches fund and manage their own project level and thematic evaluations (i.e. Branch-led or Program-led). The Development Evaluation Division provides technical advice and quality assurance services for branch-led efforts. These evaluations typically cover investments below the sub-program level of the Program Alignment Architecture, and because they are intended to benefit development partners, are funded from the department’s aid rather than operating budget, as per DFATD’s Terms and Conditions for International Development Assistance.  

Both corporate and branch-led evaluations use external consultants for aspects of evaluation execution. In the case of corporate evaluations, consultants are primarily used for data gathering and analysis, while overall design, final reports and recommendations are generally prepared in-house.

2.2     Responsibilities of the Development Evaluation Division

The Development Evaluation Division is responsible for:

• developing, in coordination with the respective Branches, the Rolling Five-Year Development Evaluation Plan;
• ensuring that corporate development evaluations are neutral, rigorous and cost-effective;
• developing and implementing an approach to ensure that evaluative knowledge is disseminated across the Department to promote organizational learning;
• instituting a systematic approach to track the implementation of recommendations in management responses and action plans;
• providing technical advice, training/coaching and quality assurance services to Branches in support of the evaluations they and/or their partners are managing;
• reviewing and providing advice on the accountability and evaluation aspects included in Treasury Board Submissions and Memoranda to Cabinet;
• forging and maintaining beneficial strategic alliances with key stakeholders, inside and outside the Department; and,
• providing secretariat support for the Development Evaluation Committee.

2.3     Responsibilities of Program Branches

Program branches are responsible for:

• preparing multi-year evaluation work plans for inclusion in DFATD’s Rolling Five-Year Development Evaluation Work Plan;
• ensuring that sufficient performance information is available to effectively support evaluations;
• providing comments on corporate evaluation deliverables (e.g. work plans, reports) and preparing management responses and action plans;
• managing their evaluations as set out in their multi-year evaluation work plans;
• accessing evaluation tools, technical advice, training/coaching and quality assurance services from the Development Evaluation Division in support of their evaluations;
• implementing approved management responses and/or action plans; and,
• disseminating evaluation results for learning and following-up actions on recommendations, and to ensure transparency for corporate evaluations.

3.0   Developing the Work Plan

3.1    Key considerations

The following considerations were taken into account when developing this plan: 

• the FAA requirement that “every department conduct a review every five years of the relevance and effectiveness of each ongoing program for which it is responsible”; and the 2009 TB Policy on Evaluation requirement to achieve 100% evaluation coverage of direct program spending, also over 5 years; 
• the results of the recent Review of DFATD’s General Approach and Compendium Tools for Country Program Evaluations, ^{Footnote 9}
• the emphasis on the use of evaluation findings for program improvement and decision making; and
• the need to ensure that the approaches and methodologies used in DFATD evaluations take into account evolving best practices in development evaluation, including the recent Treasury Board guidance on theory-based evaluation.

3.2     Coverage, Sequencing and Risk Analysis

In January 2015, the Development Evaluation Division conducted a review of DFATD’s development evaluation universe in order to ensure full evaluation coverage of the Department’s direct developmental program spending over 5 years.

At the same time, an examination of the sequencing of evaluations was undertaken so that their usefulness and value would be optimized. As recommended by the Treasury Board Secretariat, sequencing was informed by considering a combination of needs and evaluation risks.^{Footnote 10} The proposed sequencing of evaluations in the current five-year cycle is outlined in Annex 1. A description of the Department’s evaluation universe can be found in Annex 5.

3.3     Ongoing Evaluations

Some evaluations are implemented over multiple fiscal years, sometimes due to scale and/or complexity. In addition to the planned evaluations described in Section 4 of this document, the Development Evaluation Division will complete several ongoing evaluations. These include:

4.0  New Evaluations for FY 2015-2016

4.1  Country Program Evaluations

In FY 2015-2016, PCE will initiate the country program evaluation for Vietnam and an evaluation of development partner countries in Africa.^{Footnote 13} An evaluation of Regional Programs covering the Inter-American, Pan-African and Southeast Asia regions will be initiated in late 2015-2016.

4.2  Multilateral and Global Organizations Evaluations

In recent years, PCE has used the OECD-DAC EvalNet methodology, intended to be done jointly among donors, to assess the development effectiveness of multilateral organizations. Canada is also playing an active role in a multi-donor network – the Multilateral Organisation Performance Assessment Network (MOPAN). In 2015, the OECD-DAC Evalnet and MOPAN methodologies will be integrated to ensure greater coordination and reduce the evaluation burden on international organizations. 

Following this integration, MOPAN will increase the number of organisations it assesses to approximately 12-14 organisations over two-year periods. Decisions about which organizations will be assessed from 2015 onwards will be taken in 2015-2016.

As it will not be assessed by MOPAN, an evaluation of the International Organization of La Francophonie will be carried out in collaboration with the Foreign Affairs and Trade Evaluation Division using a jointly agreed-upon methodology in FY 2015-2016.

4.3  Meta Evaluations

In 2015-2016, a meta-evaluation to assess the quality of Branch-led evaluations will be initiated. As well, the annual report on the State of Performance Measurement will be prepared.

4.4     Thematic Evaluations

Following the recent Portfolio Review of DFATD’s Natural Resource Governance Projects and the evaluability assessment of Canada’s development assistance on extractives and sustainable development, an evaluation on this theme will be initiated in late 2015-2016.

5.0  Additional Development Evaluation Division Activities for FY 2015-2016

5.1     Support to Branch-led Evaluations

The Development Evaluation Division will:

• Develop up-to-date tools and guides for the Evaluation Quality Assurance Tools and Guides Suite and finalize guidelines to support Branch-led evaluation strategic planning and knowledge management;
• Continue to provide technical advice and quality assurance services to program branch employees at headquarters and in the field, and on the Authorized Programming Process (APP) and the accompanying e-RoadMap;
• Finalise and maintain a database to house all branch-led evaluations; and
• Ensure that the Department has continuous access to external development evaluation consultants via contractual mechanisms in collaboration with the Grants and Contributions Management Bureau;

5.2     Evaluation Requirements in Treasury Board Submissions

Over the past few years there have been several evaluation-related requirements articulated in Treasury Board Submissions. Six of theses 31 evaluation requirements, articulated to Treasury Board between 2006-2007 and 2014-2015, are the responsibility of the Development Evaluation Division. The remaining 25 are the responsibility of the implicated program branches. Annex 4 provides a list of these evaluation requirements. 

5.3     Optimizing the Use and Knowledge Benefits from Evaluations

Development evaluations at DFATD create a source of information to inform decision making on investments and program improvement, but also to feed into strategic reviews, renewals of terms and conditions, Treasury Board submissions, the Report on Plans and Priorities (RPP), the Departmental Performance Reports (DPR), and Memoranda to Cabinet.

While DFATD has traditionally benefited from an evaluative culture, there remains a need to optimize the use of findings, recommendations and lessons learned from evaluations. The Development Evaluation Division will review its approach to the use and dissemination of evaluation knowledge. It will implement a new Standard Operating Procedure for finalising evaluations through increased engemeent with the department, and it will refine a guide that seeks to increase the use of evaluation findings, recommendations and lessons learned. A meta-synthesis of corporate and decentralised evaluations will also be conducted in order to provide input to medium term planning processes.

A Report on Lessons Learned from Development Evaluations will be produced in order to ensure the wide dissemination of evaluation knowledge in 2015. This report communicates key lessons derived from corporate evaluations. 

In 2015-2016, the Development Evaluation Division will:

• Promote evaluation knowledge and lessons learned by revising the Approach to the Dissemination of Evaluation Knowledge to include an emphasis on the use of evaluation findings;
• Provide guidance to Branches on the preparation of evaluation summaries;
• Use DFATD’s knowledge networks and corporate committees to share findings and lessons from evaluations; and,
• Contribute to events to be conducted by the Canadian Evaluation Society and others during 2015, which is the International Year of Evaluation.

5.4     Neutral Assessment of DFATD Evaluation Functions

In 2015-2016, a neutral assessment of the DFATD’s evaluation functions will be carried out as part of the Department’s compliance with the TB Policy on Evaluation. It will examine the level of compliance with the Policy.

5.5     Corporate Engagement

Input will be provided to corporate initiatives, such as: the Departmental Performance Report (DPR); the Report on Plans and Priorities (RPP); and Management Accountability Framework (MAF). DFATD’s Program Committee will be engaged in periodic review of the status of implementation of corporate evaluation plans and recommendations.

5.6     Strategic Networks and Country Capacity

Constructive working relationships with the Foreign Affairs and Trade Evaluation Division, and the Treasury Board Secretariat’s Centre of Excellence for Evaluation (CEE) will be maintained. Dynamic participation in the Government of Canada’s EvalConnex’s group, which is a working space for the federal evaluation community managed by CEE, will be undertaken. More active participation in the Canadian Evaluation Society (CES) will also be pursued.

Internationally, the Development Evaluation Division will continue its engagement with the Network on Development Evaluation of the Development Assistance Committee (of the OECD) in order to remain abreast of emerging thinking in the field of international development evaluation. It will also play an active role in the Multilateral Organisation Performance Assessment Network (MOPAN) as a member of its Technical Working Group and Steering Committee, with a view to promoting the uptake of an integrated methodology to assess the development effectiveness of multilateral organizations.
On-going relationships with the Nordic + Evaluation Group and 3ie (a network on impact evaluation) will continue to be pursued. The EvalPartners initiative to build evaluation capacity in developing countries will be monitored.

Ongoing engagement with these communities of practice is important to maintain and strengthen PCE’s expertise and value-added through continued exposure to leading development evaluation practices and approaches. 

6.0   Program-Led Evaluation Plans for FY 2015-2016

Program branches conduct evaluations to improve the effectiveness of their projects and programs, to the benefit of developing countries and institutions.  

The following section describes the evaluation activities planned by programming branches during FY 2015-2016. Branch-led activities complement the Development Evaluation Division’s work.

6.1     Geographic Branches – Evaluations Planned for FY 2015-2016

Evaluations in the geographic branches are mainly mid-term or final project evaluations. However, these branches are increasingly using innovative approaches such as clustering projects/countries and thematic evaluations to be able to respond to their needs.
The list below provides the plan for geographic branches for FY 2015-2016:

6.2     Partnerships for Development Innovation – Evaluations Planned for FY 2015-2016

The Partnerships for Development Innovation Branch (KFM) maintains its own Rolling Four-Year Evaluation Plan (2014-2015 - 2017-2018) which focuses on Branch-specific thematic and project evaluations. 

Thematic evaluations examine several development interventions under a specific theme (e.g., capacity building, innovation and local governance) to identify successful models of intervention and share lessons. This method allows for a comparative evaluation of a mix of small and large projects in various countries, many of which would have never been evaluated due to resource constraints and other operational issues.

Project evaluations assess the performance of projects in progress (formative) or completed (summative) in terms of producing anticipated results and value for money. This approach is more appropriate for larger investments and those subject to Treasury Board evaluation requirements.

For FY 2015-2016, KFM plans to execute the following evaluations:

Thematic Evaluations

• Community-based interventions in Maternal, New born and Child Health
• Canada Fund for Africa Climate Resilience

Project Evaluations(as per TBS requirements)

• Formative evaluation of Aga Khan’s Partnership for Advancing Human Development in Africa and Asia
• Summative evaluation of Right to Play’s Play to Learn Program
• Summative evaluation of Francophonie Scholarships
• Summative evaluation of the Canadian International Food Security Research Fund (Phase 1)

6.3     Global Issues and Development – Evaluations Planned for FY 2015-2016

Global Issues and Development Branch (MFM) engages in three distinct types of programming and therefore engages in three distinct approaches to evaluations.

Long-Term Institutional Support – Canada, both as a member of the governing board and through direct consultation with the institution, participates actively alongside other donors in evaluation processes of multilateral organisations, including reviewing evaluations and providing direction on recommendations. Key evaluations being completed in 2015-2016 by multilateral organisations we support include:

• Global Fund to Fight for AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria
  Mid-Term Evaluation of the Progress Made Against the Objectives of the Global Fund’s 2012-2016 Strategy
• Global Partnership for Education
  Independent Evaluation of the Global Partnership for Education
• World Bank
  World Bank’s Evaluation of World Bank Support to Early Childhood Development
• Consultative Group for International Agricultural Research
  Evaluation of CGIAR Research Program on Agriculture for Improved Nutrition and Health
• Commonwealth of Learning
  Commonwealth of Learning Evaluation of the 2012-2015 Strategic Plan
• United Nations Population Fund
  Evaluation of support to adolescents and youth
• United Nations Development Programme
  Evaluation of support to gender equality
• UNICEF
  Evaluation of strengthening national health systems and capacity

As noted earlier, overarching assessments of key partners will be done through MOPAN and multi-donor Development Effectiveness Reviews.

Global Initiatives – Each global initiative supported by DFATD has a strong monitoring and reporting component. These evaluations generally take the form of mid-term and final evaluations. In most cases, the evaluation is conducted by the partner. DFATD, and other donors, frequently play a role in the process but the relationship is supportive rather than prescriptive. In a few instances, DFATD conducts the evaluation. Examples of evaluations of global initiatives taking place in 2015-2016 supported by MFM include:

• Helen Keller International & UNICEF
  Scaling-up Nutrition through Integrated Life-Saving Interventions
• World Health Organisation
  Global Polio Eradication Initiative
• World Health Organisation
  Accelerating Nutrition Improvements in Sub-Saharan Africa (ANI)

International Humanitarian Assistance – Although DFATD supports evaluations conducted by our humanitarian partners on their programming, DFATD also supports system-wide initiatives to asses how the humanitarian response system as a whole is meeting identified needs. The Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) conducts evaluations to promote transparency, accountability and learning through systematic and objective judgments about the relevance, efficiency, effectiveness and impact of humanitarian interventions.

DFATD also supports specific learning and evaluation mechanisms, such as the Active Learning Network for Accountability and Performance in Humanitarian Action (ALNAP). In almost all instances, DFATD’s NGO partners include monitoring and evaluation as part of their projects – this pertains to both emergency response and complex humanitarian initiatives. In some cases, DFATD conducts an evaluation. In addition to real-time evaluations following a crisis, examples of evaluations being undertaken in 2015-2016 include:

• Evaluation of the World Food Programme (WFP) Nutrition Policy
• Whole of System Review: Protection in the Context of Humanitarian Action

There are also occasions when, above and beyond Canada’s governance role in multilateral and global institutions, MFM carries out branch-led evaluations. In particular, MFM has developed the Gender Equality Institutional Assessment (GEIA) methodology to facilitate assessments of our partners’ ability to plan, achieve, monitor and report on gender equality results. The list below provides an evaluation plan for FY 2015-2016 evaluations that MFM is leading.

Evaluations led by MFM

• Mid-Term/Project Evaluation of DFATD-Canadian Red Cross Society (CRCS) Strategic Partnership: Monitoring and Evaluation Initiative
• Final Evaluation of the Renewed Efforts Against Child Hunger and Undernutrition (REACH)
• Gender Equality Institutional Assessment of the Global Partnership for Education (GPE)
• Gender Equality Institutional Assessment of Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance and/or the World Health Organization (WHO)
• Gender Equality Institutional Assessment of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD)

7.0   Budget

In 2015-2016, the Development Evaluation Division will undergo a significant staff transition. Workplanning has taken account of this temporary period of reduced capacity by delaying initiation of certain evaluations to later in the fiscal year when new staff will be in place.

For 2015-2016, a total of 16 evaluations are planned, comprising 9 ongoing and 8 new evaluations. Although this is slightly lower than in the previous year (18), given the human resources transition this remains a high degree of productivity.

An operations and management (O&M) budget of $2.0 million is planned for FY 2015-2016, along with a salary budget of $1.7 million and a staff complement of 15 full-time equivalents (FTEs) in order to implement ongoing and new evaluations.

Annex 1 - On-going Program of Grants and Contributions

Select Organization: Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development Canada (incl. EDC)
Identify PAA used: 2015-2016
Spending Source Used (include Year): Main Estimates (2015-2016)
Identify total organizational spending ($) (e.g. Total Budget Main Estimates, Total Expenditures of the Public Accounts, etc.): 2,745,392,615

Annex 2 - Five-year Evaluation Schedule

Annex 3 - Resources Dedicated to the Evaluation Function

Annex 4 - Evaluation Requirements to TBS^{Footnote 23}

The table below presents specific evaluation requirements indicated in the TB Submissions that were approved between FY 2007-2008 and FY 2014-2015. It excludes evaluation requirements already completed.

Note: * PB: Program Branch             PCE: Development Evaluation Division

Corporate/Department Wide

TB Submission (abridged title): Muskoka Initiative

Lead*: PCE

Evaluation Requirements made to TBS and TB Conditions: Formative evaluation initated in 2014-2015, and to be completed in 2015-2016.

Country Programs

Partnerships for Development Innovation

Global Issues and Development

Annex 5 - Establishing the Evaluation Universe

For FY 2015-2016, the Development Evaluation Division reviewed its evaluation universe to taking into consideration the new thematic DFATD’s program activity architecture (PAA, FY 2015-2016), the Performance Measurement Frameworks approved by Treasury Board Secretariat, and the commitments made in Treasury Board Submissions.

The chart below provides an overview of the evaluation coverage under the new thematic PAA. Following discussions with Treasury Board Secretariat’ Centre for Excellence in Evaluation, it was decided to keep the same approach used under the previous PAA to evaluate programming. Therefore, country program evaluations will be undertaken for this fiscal year, with a caviat that a particular country programming can be associated to more than one PAA Sub-Programs as illustrated below.

Based on these considerations and following consultations across the Department, the Development Evaluation Division arrived at a tentative evaluation universe for coverage for the following five (5) year period ^{Footnote 24}. Through consultation with the Treasury Board Secretariat, it was determined that there is no obligation to evaluate sunsetting programs. 

In planning and revising the sequence of evaluations, the Development Evaluation Division consults across the Department to ensure that user and corporate needs are being met and that ongoing programs are being evaluated every five years as per Treasury Board Secretariat requirements. Further, the Development Evaluation Division ensures that the timing of evaluations feed into the key decision making processes, such as the replenishment of multilateral funds.