Session title: Building Effective and Adaptive National Evaluation Systems: Best Practices and perspectives
Panel Discussion | Online
About the Event
This session "Building Effective and Adaptive National Evaluation Systems: Best Practices and Perspectives", co-hosted by NIGSD-Economic and Financial Center (EFC), IDEV/AfDB and Twende Mbele brings together practitioners, policymakers and evaluators from Africa and beyond to share hands-on experience on building resilient National Evaluation Systems (NES). Through concrete examples from Egypt, Kenya, South Africa and Colombia and insights from technical partners like IDEV, Twende Mbele, 3ie and CLEAR FA, speakers will explore what makes NES work and how systems can adapt to deliver fast, policy-relevant evidence in times of crisis, political change and instability.
Speakers
| Name | Title | Biography |
|---|---|---|
| Dr. Doha Abdelhamid | Senior Advisor to the CEO, National Institute of Governance and Sustainable Development (NIGSD), Egypt | Senior Advisor to Egypt's NIGSD CEO and member of Egypt's Presidential Scientific Advisory Council, Dr. Abdelhamid is an international economic policy and evaluation expert with nearly four decades of experience. She has led high-impact evaluations for IFAD, AfDB-IDEV, UNDP, and IsDB, and serves on the boards of 3ie and the International Evaluation Academy |
| Edoé Djimitri Agbodjan | Director, CLEAR Francophone Africa | Associate Professor, CESAG Business School, Dakar, Senega | Director of CLEAR Francophone Africa and Associate Professor of Economics at CESAG Business School in Dakar, Edoé brings 20 years of expertise in evaluation capacity development. He has advised governments, parliaments, and civil society across Francophone Africa on M&E systems and policy reform. He holds a PhD in Development Studies from IHEID Geneva |
| Anca Dumitrescu | Lead Evaluation Specialist, 3ie | Director, West Africa Capacity Building and Impact Evaluation (WACIE) Program | Lead Evaluation Specialist at 3ie with over 15 years of experience in evidence use and international development. She leads the WACIE Program, strengthening evaluation systems and institutional capacity across West Africa. She also created the WACIE Helpdesk, delivering rapid evidence for policymakers. She holds an MSc from the London School of Economics. |
| Jayne Musumba | Division Manager Knowledge Management, Outreach & Capacity Development, IDEV.3, African Development Bank Group | She is a Division Manager at IDEV, African Development Bank Group, leading knowledge management, outreach, and evaluation capacity development. Previously a Knowledge Management Specialist at UNDP, Jayne holds a Master of Science in Management from New York University and is an alumna of executive programmes at Harvard Kennedy School. |
| Ms. Thokozile Molaiwa | Head of Evaluation, Department of Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation (DPME), South Africa | Head of Evaluation at South Africa's DPME since 2020 and a pillar of South Africa's National Evaluation System since 2012, Thoko has over 25 years of experience evaluating development programmes. She chairs the Twende Mbele Technical Committee and is a leading voice on transformative, participatory, and decolonised evaluation practice across Africa. |
| Dr. Thina Nzo | Programme Manager, Twende Mbele African M&E Partnership, Wits University | Programme Manager of Twende Mbele at Wits University, Dr. Nzo leads a Pan-African partnership building institutional M&E and evidence-use capabilities in 10 African countries. An experienced academic and researcher in policy and governance, she was previously the head of the Local Government Programme at the Public Affairs Research Institute (PARI). She holds a PhD in African Studies from the University of Edinburgh. |
| Mr. Alfaxad Omwenga | Chief Economist, Monitoring and Evaluation Directorate, National Treasury, Kenya | Chief Economist in Kenya’s National Treasury M&E Directorate under the State Department for Economic Planning, Alfaxad Omwenga, brings over 18 years of public service experience across national planning, evidence-based policy, and programme evaluation. He holds a Master’s degree in Economic Policy Management from the University of Nairobi. |
| Jeff Vargas-González | Head of National Evaluation Agenda, National Planning Department (DNP), Colombia | Head of the National Evaluation Agenda at Colombia's National Planning Department, Jeff leads the strategic use of evidence to improve development outcomes. With over 10 years of experience in public policy evaluation, he is a World Bank Government Analytics Fellow and holds a Master's in Public Policy from Universidad de los Andes. |
Moderators
| Name | Title | Biography |
|---|---|---|
| Ian Goldman | President, International Evaluation Academy | President of the International Evaluation Academy since 2022, Ian Goldman champions monitoring, evaluation and learning as tools for navigating global challenges. Formerly Deputy Director General in South Africa's Department of Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation, he established South Africa's National Evaluation System. He is Adjunct Professor at the University of Cape Town and co-steward of the Global Evaluation Agenda 2.0. |