Norad NorCross cooperation agreement 2017-2020 Overall Report

Background:
The evaluation was conducted as an end-of-project evaluation, designed to both fulfil the requirement of the the 2017-20 grant agreement with Norad and to capture learning to be brought forward. The 2017-20 grant agreement coincides with the previous NorCross international strategy 2017-20.

Purpose/objective:
The purpose was to “Evaluate the impact, efficiency, and sustainability of the projects in view of both the country specific goals and outcomes and the overall goal and outcomes of the grant agreement”. In addition, NorCross was interested to gather learning around risk management, program delivery and added value.

Methodology:
The evaluation was conducted by a 2-person core evaluation team from Healthmatch with support from national experts in Guatemala, Pakistan and Burundi as travel was not possible due to C19. Based on an evaluation framework, data collection took place between December 2020 and March 2021 and was based on both qualitative and quantitive data. The national experts conducted most of the interviews in-country (KIIs) at (sub)national levels and held Focus Group Discussions (FGDs) with volunteers and beneficiaries.

Key findings:
The below table summarises the main findings of the report as per the evaluation criteria.

Further to this, a number of findings relating to the evaluation questions described above was identified in the areas of result-based management and PMER, organisational development, HR and working with volunteers, NorCross role in the health sector, efficency, sustainability and risk management.

Recommendations:

The recommendations, focusing on addressing the findings mentioned above, include:

• To maintain and further develop capacity to support National Societies (NS) in the field of Finance Development over various program cycles
• Consider developoing Theories of Change as a starting point for a Result-Based Management (RBM) process for longer term programs
• Limit the scope and complexity of RBM, risk management and other monitoring tools, improve the balance between investing in RBM as an National Society Development (NSD) component and as a monitoring tool for NorCross’ programming, improve the result framework with quality indicators for public services, NSD and DAC criteria, reconsider the use of baseline- end line population-based surveys in favour of other overarching surveys, and engage in a dialogue with donors on RBM reporting requirements
• Implement the framework for health further by defining and providing the organisational expertise required to support Country Programme Managers (CPMs) and NS in design, training and quality assurance in CBHC, MNCH and WASH in stable and conflict situations
• Fine tune the relationship between NS, CPM and regional office, establish and implement an effective retention policy for current CPMs, and create a support system for CPMs
• Define cost-benefit criteria and reflect on efficiency