PC 89/4 |
|
PC 89/4 |
Eighty-ninth Session |
Rome, 5-9 May 2003 |
Priority Setting in the Context of Programme Planning |
BACKGROUNDWhat is priority setting?
What are the objectives of this document?
Why are we concerned with priority setting at FAO?CURRENT PRIORITY SETTING APPROACH
Components of the current approach
Top down direction from Members
Bottom up application of the analysis by criteria
Other factors influencing priority setting in FAOASSESSMENT OF CURRENT METHODOLOGY
FAO’s Current Approach
Learning from other priority setting experiences
Essential steps in the priority setting process
1. At the last Programme Committee and subsequently at the Council, some Members, particularly those from OECD countries, indicated their desire to see a more effective priority setting process in FAO.
2. The Joint Meeting of the Programme and Finance Committees said1:
7. The Committees recognized that the inter-governmental nature of FAO implied that priority-setting was essentially a political process, as members had to find a compromise in trying to reconcile necessarily diverging interests. At the same time, the Committees recognized that priority-setting in FAO context was a particularly complex matter in view of the many analytical dimensions involved and that it was also clearly dependent on the resource parameters being used. They recalled that the subject had been extensively discussed on many occasions, one of which had led to the agreement by Council of a set of general criteria which the Secretariat continues to apply systematically in the internal planning and priority setting process.
8. The Committees realized that bodies such as the Programme Committee itself and the Technical Committees of the Council in their respective sectors had a key role to play in supporting this political process by advising on priorities. However, the Committees felt that the search for common ground among Members on priorities had not been particularly effective ahead of Conference decisions, which had been dominated in the recent past by preoccupations with the overall budget level, often removed from the significance of the underlying priorities. The Committees discussed the proposal for an external expert group to review the priorities of the Organization as well as the priority setting methodology. However, the Committees agreed that it would be more useful for the Programme Committee to review arrangements for priority-setting in FAO at its next session, on the basis a document to be prepared by the Secretariat, with a view to identifying a more satisfactory approach.
3. This was confirmed by the Council2 which indicated that:
60. More generally, the Council felt that the Plan reflected the demands from the Membership. In this connection, the Council recalled the importance of balance between normative and operational activities, while ensuring adequate follow-up to the recommendations of evaluations. In recalling the difficulties inherent in priority-setting in the context of international organizations such as FAO, the Council requested further discussion of the matter in the Programme Committee at its next session, with the aim of identifying a more satisfactory approach. Some Members highlighted the responsibility of the Secretariat to assist them in identifying priority options, as well as the possibility of assigning certain tasks to outside experts when reviewing the arrangements for priority-setting.
4. Priority setting is a process of ranking activities and hence making choices which lead to the allocation of resources to selected programmes. It therefore includes the values, preferences, rationales and constraints that underline those decisions.
5. The inter-governmental nature of FAO implies that priority setting is essentially a political process, as Members have to find a compromise in trying to reconcile necessarily divergent interests. Moreover, priority setting at FAO is a particularly complex matter in view of its global coverage, the breadth of areas it works on, the types of products that it provides to member countries, and the difficulty of measuring their impact. For example, how does one compare the benefit of a CODEX standard to sub-sectoral policy advice to a Member Government to a publication on the safe use of pesticides? The wide variety of donor resources provided to the Organization also adds to the complexity of the exercise.
6. However, it is recognized that the Secretariat itself has a role to play in interpreting political preferences and in adding technical knowledge to the process of making choices. Senior management of the Organization should provide leadership to such a process and may sometimes need to arbitrate between competing programme activities with a view to deciding which should be part of the Director-General’s proposals to the membership.
7. This document examines existing approaches to priority setting in FAO as well as possible alternative frameworks which could be applied. At this stage the document does not recommend a particular approach - instead it ought to be seen as a means of initiating debate on the ways in which priority setting might to be approached at FAO.
8. While FAO has a global mandate for food and agriculture development issues and strives to meet the needs of all its member states, it has limited resources and is often faced with hard choices on what activities to pursue and what to forego.
9. In developing its work programme FAO has to decide on the relative emphasis it places on competing goals, competing objectives, competing outputs, and competing regions. A priority setting framework should assist the Organization to objectively assess the trade-offs involved and to make informed choices.
10. The Strategic Framework of FAO is a clearly articulated statement of its mission, goals, corporate strategies and strategic objectives. It provides a compelling vision of the reason for FAO’s existence and the way it chooses to conduct its business through the period 2015. However the link between the Strategic Framework and the Medium Term Plan of FAO is not articulated in a way which would allow the former to directly drive the priorities selected for the latter. An objective process by which the day to day operational and normative work of the Organization can be derived from its strategic goals and objectives would be extremely useful.
11. Because of the essentially political nature of the process, the Organization’s stakeholders need to participate in the setting of priorities. In addition to the membership, who are of course the primary stakeholder, consideration needs to be given to which other stakeholders are to be involved:
12. The debate which the reports quoted above reflect, is probably a consequence of a perception by the Membership that it is not actively involved in priority setting in FAO; that is, that this process is not sufficiently transparent and participative.
13. The current methodology as applied in FAO is a pragmatic combination of top down advice from the Membership as reflected in the reports of Governing Bodies and Technical Committees and a bottom up application of criteria which reflect the overall concerns of the Membership. There are then a number of other influences on the process which need to be recognized.
14. To arrive at the technical programme priorities of the Organization, the Secretariat currently follows the practice of reviewing all of the relevant Governing Body Reports for the previous two years and analyzing the requests in terms of the degree of support under five categories:
15. These are reviewed by the ADGs at a Senior Management Meeting to ensure that there is nothing obvious missing or any area misinterpreted and then become the approved basis for internal Policy Guidance and are published as such. Annex I provides a sample of the current list of priorities.
16. The description of the top down process provided above understates the extent of advice given by the Membership. For example, detailed technical priorities are heavily influenced by the work of the technical committees while regional priorities are expressed most clearly by the Regional Conferences.
17. This is an extensive self-appraisal process where every entity is subject to an analysis to determine it meets priority setting criteria based on those originally established by the Council in November 1995. It is carried out by the Programme Manager or the Programme Coordinator and is intended to ensure that in planning for an entity, the planner gives conscious attention to the overall concerns of the Council.
18. There are seven criteria dealing with:
19. This is a scoring process where the programme managers use the planning system to complete a multiple choice questionnaire which then automatically scores the entity in terms of the degree to which it meets the criteria. Annex II shows the multiple choice questions to be answered for each entity.
20. It is noted that this is an internal process within departments which does not result in comparable scores across the Organization. Its benefit is therefore in ensuring awareness of these important criteria and, through that, in influencing programme managers in the design of entities to better meet the criteria – this also indirectly influences resource allocation decisions at divisional and departmental level.
21. A negative factor in resource reallocation in organizations like FAO is their relative inflexibility driven to a large extent by the potential rigidness in career service staffing structures. Thus, a change in programme priorities may need to be matched by the necessary change in the available skills set. The Organization’s response to this is the strategy for Ensuring Excellence3 which includes a significant increase in resources for staff development.
22. A positive offsetting factor to the programme inertia, which can sometimes accompany a career service staffing structure, has been the introduction of the new programme model which has placed much of the Organization’s work under time-bound programme entities. A specific requirement is that all entities be subject to auto-evaluation close to the end of their planned life (or at least once every six years in the case of continuing programme activities) and that an explicit decision be made to terminate, modify or renew each entity as a part of the process. It is expected that this will encourage change and discourage the continuation of activities beyond their useful lives.
23. Further positive influences accrue from the results of evaluations and expert reviews. Such independent opinions inevitably cause programme managers to rethink approaches and reallocate resources.
24. The top down aspect of the current methodology has the advantage that it is very clearly driven by the Membership reflecting as it does the consensus as expressed in the official reports of Governing Bodies.
25. It can also be said to be an objective and transparent approach as it relies on the reported views of Members and not on the judgement of, for example, the Secretariat. It is very simple and does not result in significant incremental cost.
26. However, the approach has some significant conceptual problems:
27. The bottom up criteria analysis is a scored approach to the application of criteria for priority setting which were originally approved by the Council and hence give the approach a certain legitimacy. However, the current scoring method is not particularly objective and does not generate comparable scores across the Organization making it difficult to use the results at the corporate or Governing Body levels. Furthermore, the one question which tries to measure the focus of an entity on one or more Strategic Objectives has been found to be flawed, at least as currently posed because it automatically scores down all demand related entities (e.g. policy advice, technical support services etc.) as they cannot be focussed on a single Strategic Objective.
28. Despite these weaknesses, it should be recognized that the overall result has, in the main, been acceptable in the sense of the priorities chosen. Generally speaking, the body of the Membership endorses the priorities established in FAO’s planning documents such as the MTP and the PWB. In other words, Members may not be content with the process but the result seems to find consensus.
29. The Secretariat contacted the UN and all of the major specialized agencies seeking details of their priority setting methodologies. While not all of them replied, the conclusion is that that the essentially political nature of the process means that there have been very few attempts at using formal methods for assessing and ranking priorities. Most UN agencies use a process that is similar to the one currently being used by FAO – relatively informal and pragmatic. Some have used questionnaires to Members but these methods lack the dialogue which is essential to ensure effective understanding of the issues.
30. The CGIAR system has experimented with several priority setting methods with mixed results. The commodity centres of the CGIAR such as CIMMYT, IRRI, IITA, ILRI, etc. have been fairly successful in using stakeholder fora for defining their long-term strategic goals and objectives and in identifying a range of outputs that the centres ought to pursue. The centres have also used a wide variety of methods for prioritizing among the identified outputs. The following is a brief review of the methods used by the CGIAR centres in their attempts at deriving a prioritized work plan that is based on the centre strategic plan. The material presented below draws from Alston et al. (1995) and Thorton et al. (2000).
31. Precedence: Previous year’s funding is used as the base for the subsequent year, with incremental changes only. The advantage of this method is that it is simple and quick, and it does not require extensive data or analysis. The disadvantages are that it is supply driven and that it contains an inherent inertia to entertain new priorities or to terminate unproductive ones.
32. Peer Review: Individuals or groups are asked to assess alternative proposals and rank them according to their preferences. This technique may be more useful for decisions about individual operational projects rather than broad programmes. It may also be best for assessing the technical merits of the proposals rather than their impacts.
33. Congruence: Research resources are allocated across research areas in proportion to the value of agricultural production. It is reasonably simple to conduct and a useful starting point in assessing priorities. However, it ignores other factors that condition the return to research investments such as the probability of success, likely adoption and differential productivity gains. It assumes that the productivity to each incremental dollar of investment is the same across commodities and regions.
34. Scoring Methods: Proposed outputs are scored relative to multiple objectives specified in the strategy by using a set of criteria and measurable indicators. Delphi techniques are used to derive the values of the indicators and weights used in the scoring. Composite scores that combine various objectives using agreed upon weights are often used to decide on an overall score. The approach is simple to use and very participatory, but it tends to be arbitrary in the choice of criteria used and subjective in the values used for the indicators and weights.
35. Economic Surplus: This approach is preferred by economists, the essence of the approach is to measure the extent to which research success and subsequent adoption of the product improves on-farm productivity and hence reduce unit costs of production. Economic surplus models measure the size of the productivity gains by quantifying the value of production, various market parameters, probabilities of research success, the ceiling levels of adoption achieved and the time it takes to reach them. Benefit cost assessment is an integral part of the process. This approach is very demanding in terms of data, analytical skills and staff time. It is easier to apply this approach to specific commodity outputs, such as seeds, rather than to policy analysis or capacity building.
36. Modified Economic Surplus: The modified economic surplus approach tries to reduce the data requirements of the economic surplus approach by using the Delphi method to arrive at the various parameters for which readily available data is not available. It also combines scoring and peer review methods in the process of arriving at a set of agreed upon outputs and for ranking them. The modified methods also address non-productivity concerns such as poverty reduction, food security, and environmental sustainability by using appropriate modifiers to the values derived from the economic surplus calculations. The modified economic surplus methods are the ones most often used in the CGIAR system today, centres that have recently used such methods are CIMMYT, ILRI, and ICRISAT.
37. While, the above experiences ought to be seen as a starting point for FAO, none of them provide us with the perfect recipe for priority setting. The comprehensiveness of FAO’s mandate and the complexity of decision making in a multi-lateral agency implies that the methods developed by the CGIAR would need to be significantly modified to fit FAO’s needs. The lessons that FAO can learn from its own experiences and those of others are that successful priority setting models should be:
38. The following steps are generally part of any planning and priority setting process:
39. Step 1, establishing goals and objectives, has already been completed in FAO. The Strategic Framework was developed as the product of an Organization-wide strategic planning exercise conducted with the active involvement of its stakeholders including first and foremost, its Members, but also IFIs, UN system bodies, NGOs, civil society organizations, etc. The resulting Strategic Framework of FAO is clearly articulated, and the goals and strategic objectives specified in the document continue to be extremely relevant today.
40. Steps 2 and 3 are articulated in the MTP preparatory process. The formulation technique explicitly requires the definition of the development problem to be addressed, the proposed contribution to problem resolution and the intended end beneficiaries and the benefit. It includes identification of the Corporate Strategies and Strategic Objectives to which the programme entities and major outputs contribute respectively.
41. Step 4 is, at least theoretically, already in place through the development of the Council’s criteria for priority setting, now further expanded upon in Annex II. However, as noted under the “Assessment of Current Methodology” above, some of the criteria or their related measurement factors are flawed. This is probably the first area that needs to be improved, in particular, in the definition of the criteria and also in the manner in which one or more of them establish the link between proposed programme activities and the objectives in the Strategic Framework.
42. Step 5, analysis and ranking, would need to be re-examined in the light of the criteria selected. The current scoring technique is neither objective nor participative, while the process itself is not transparent to the membership. The solution may vary by criteria as the nature of the criteria will drive the method of ranking. For example, the contribution of an entity to Strategic Objective C2 Appropriate technology to sustainably intensify production systems could presumably include quantifiable factors such as production efficiency. On the other hand, criteria related to FAO’s comparative advantage might need to be ranked based upon the judgement of a peer group scoring methodology, ideally, although perhaps impractically, involving other external competitors in the same field. The design of this step cannot be anticipated until the criteria in Step 4 have been established (at least, provisionally).
43. Steps 6 and 7 do not have a formal equivalency in the current methodlogy; that is, the decision making process on priorities is not formalized through an analysis of trade-offs but is rather a political process involving iterative steps between Governing Bodies and the Secretariat with progressively more refined proposals being developed for eventual approval by the Conference.
44. It should be noted that the methodology itself is not intended to and cannot provide final decisions – these have to be arrived at through political judgement which should be well informed by the results of the methodology.
45. The document did not set out to propose a specific solution to the problem of how to best address priority setting in FAO. In fact, the Secretariat is not ready to make a proposal which could eventually bring together the best elements of several methodologies. Rather, it is intended to report progress that has been made in examining possible approaches to the problem, and to raise a number of issues for discussion by and guidance from the Programme Committee.
46. Do paragraphs 4, 5 and 6 above provide a reasonable definition of what is meant by “priority setting” and of the problem to be addressed?
47. Do members the Committee believe that the attributes of a good priority setting process as listed under paragraph 37 are complete and appropriate?
48. What are the key criteria for setting priorities which Members feel should be taken into account in this process – paragraph 18 and Annex II may provide a framework for a reply?
49. The Strategic Framework was approved by the Conference in November 1999 – how do members of the Programme Committee see it being related to the priority setting process and at what level of the framework (the prototype of the alternative approach uses the three global goals but there are also the five Corporate Strategies, the twelve Strategic Objectives and more than fifty strategy components)?
50. The Strategic Framework had as one of its underlying premises, the concept of partnerships - does the Programme Committee envisage that other stakeholders should be actively involved in priority setting:
51. Even if an objective goal-oriented priority setting methodology were to be implemented – it is likely that Members will continue to express their preferred priorities in the reports of Governing Body meetings. These may not necessarily align themselves well to the results of the methodology. How would the Programme Committee envisage that such contradictions be handled?
52. What other advice and guidance has the Programme Committee to offer in particular as regards its needs in advising the Council on the priorities proposed in planning documents?
Priority Areas |
Comments by Developing Countries or Groups |
Comments by Developed Countries or Groups |
Corporate Strategies | ||||
A |
B |
C |
D |
E | |||
Category 1 - General Priorities, i.e. supported by a broad spectrum of Members, including both developing and developed countries | |||||||
IPPC – strengthen to allow 4 standards per annum |
Raised and widely supported at 123rd Session of the Council |
Supported by nearly all OECD Members, but particularly strong support by USA, Australia |
100% |
||||
Codex and food standards bearing in mind the outcome of the evaluation |
Most often stressed from the point of view of facilitating their participation |
Universal support |
16% |
84% |
|||
EMPRES including the outcome of the evaluation of the Locust programme and the recommendation for an additional post for the central region |
Fairly general support |
Fairly general support, particularly for the animal health component |
100% |
||||
Category 2 - High Priority areas, supported by the majority of developing country Members, but not necessarily by those from developed countries | |||||||
TCP |
Obviously, the area most emphatically supported by all developing countries, at times accompanied by recommended targets |
While virtually none would advocate openly a net reduction under Chapter 4, this may be hinted at by inviting a stop to TCP growth |
ü | ü | ü | ü | ü |
SPFS |
Fairly general support, South-South component often emphasized by concerned parties |
Generally supported only by the few who are current donors (e.g. Japan) |
100% |
||||
Category 3 - High Priority areas, supported by the majority of developed country Members, but not necessarily by those from developing countries | |||||||
FAOSTAT modernization |
Not generally mentioned |
Fairly general support |
100% | ||||
Category 4 - Priorities underlined by the Members of a specific region, while not falling under 1 to 3 above | |||||||
Trypanosomiasis and support to PATTEC |
Self-evidently, supported by Africa group members |
No comment excepting EU concerning the potential budgetary implications of the Resolution |
ü | ||||
New FAORs |
Especially by Near East members, on behalf of Central Asian countries or by the latter themselves |
In relation to FAORs, some developed Members may call for generic reductions, particularly the USA, Australia |
ü | ü | ü | ü | ü |
Declaring 2003 as World Rice Year |
Several Asian countries (Thailand, Vietnam, Pakistan, Philippines, Sri Lanka) |
Not commented on |
ü | ||||
Category 5 - Priorities supported by one of more countries, but not explicitly by at least one regional group | |||||||
Sub-Committee on Aquaculture (to be adequately resourced) |
China (supported by others) |
ü | |||||
Enhanced BSE monitoring in Eastern Europe and work on ecological farming |
Czech Republic |
ü | |||||
Global Perspectives Studies and GIEWS to take account of Eastern Europe specific circumstances |
Poland |
ü | |||||
Study of links between biotechnology and trade |
USA |
ü | |||||
2XXA9 – Title
a) Conformity to the Organization’s mandate and relevance to the strategic objectives of the Organization as specified in the Strategic Framework
In the following table, please the tick line which best reflects the case of the entity or output being appraised:
| □ | inside FAO mandate but very poorly focussed on the Strategic Objectives (claims to address more than five) |
| □ | inside FAO mandate but poorly focussed on the Strategic Objectives (claims to address more than three) |
| □ | making a significant contribution to one or two Strategic Objectives |
| □ | making a very substantial contribution to one or two Strategic Objectives |
| □ | focussed on a single Strategic Objective and an absolute priority without which it cannot be adequately implemented |
b) Expressed priority and usefulness to a broad section of the membership or to special groups identified by the Governing Bodies, e.g. least developed countries, the small island developing states
In the following table, please tick the line which best reflects the case of the entity or output being appraised:
Expressed priority and usefulness to a broad section of the membership
| □ | useful to only a few countries (e.g.1-4 countries) |
| □ | useful to a sub-region or equivalent (e.g. 5 to 20 countries) |
| □ | useful to a region or equivalent (e.g. 21 to 50 countries) |
| □ | useful to a very broad section of the membership (e.g. all developing countries) |
| □ | useful to all or almost all members |
Expressed priority and usefulness to special (i.e. vulnerable) groups identified by the Governing Bodies, e.g. least developed countries, the small island developing states
| □ | not applicable or relevant to special groups of vulnerable countries |
| □ | less relevant to vulnerable countries than for middle income or developed countries |
| □ | equally relevant to vulnerable and middle income or developed countries |
| □ | more relevant to vulnerable countries than to middle income or developed countries |
| □ | relevant only to special groups of particularly vulnerable countries |
c) FAO’s comparative advantage in terms of potential for synergies through collaboration with partners, track record, avoidance of duplication with the work of other institutions and internal capacity
In the following table, please tick the line which best reflects the case of the entity or output being appraised:
FAO’s comparative advantage in terms of potential for synergies through collaboration with partners and avoidance of duplication with the work of other institutions
| □ | FAO the sole significant player |
| □ | FAO is regarded as a leader in this area |
| □ | partners look to FAO for a significant contribution in this area |
| □ | others seeking to compete with FAO on a par |
| □ | FAO providing these outputs in strong competition with other, further advanced or leading development partners |
FAO’s comparative advantage in terms of track record and existing internal capacity
| □ | FAO working for more than 10 years, with a proven track record of achievements and/or an established role as repository of information with an extensive internal capacity (e.g. a service or equivalent) |
| □ | FAO working in this area for more than 10 years with adequate internal capacity (involving several professional staff) |
| □ | FAO working in this area for 5 to 10 years with some level of internal capacity (at least one fully qualified staff member) |
| □ | FAO working in this area for less than 5 years, but some level of internal capacity has already been developed |
| □ | FAO working in this area for less than 5 years, and proposes to develop capacity |
FAO’s comparative advantage in terms of the need for neutrality and global outreach
| □ | FAO strengths in terms of neutrality and/or global outreach not helpful for this particular work |
| □ | FAO strengths in terms of neutrality and/or global outreach moderately helpful |
| □ | FAO strengths in terms of neutrality and/or global outreach clearly helpful |
| □ | FAO strengths in terms of neutrality and/or global outreach will be of real advantage and brought to bear significantly |
| □ | FAO strengths in terms of neutrality and/or global outreach are critical to the successful completion of this particular work |
d) Quality of programme design, including clarity of the causal link between the inputs provided and planned outputs and objectives
In the following table, please tick the line which best reflects the case of the entity or output being appraised:
Quality of programme design: Rationale including statement of the problem, the benefits to be created and the beneficiaries concerned concentrating on the ends-means structure
| □ | problem is either minor in nature or largely undefined |
| □ | problem is defined but the benefits and beneficiaries are unclear as is the means to ends linkage |
| □ | problem, benefits and beneficiaries are clearly defined but means to ends linkage is unconvincing |
| □ | problem, benefits and beneficiaries are clearly defined and means to ends linkage is clear but there exist doubts about credibility |
| □ | problem is clear and severe and its resolution in terms of benefits and beneficiaries is entirely credible |
Clarity of definition of programme entity objective including expected benefits for beneficiaries and timing for their delivery
| □ | objective not stated in terms of expected results and secondary users not defined |
| □ | while objective is stated there is a lack of clarity in the expected results and/or secondary users |
| □ | entity objective clearly defined as are the secondary users but the timescale for their delivery unclear |
| □ | entity objective clearly defined with a time specific statement for the delivery of expected results to defined secondary users |
Clarity of major output definition including products of services to be produced, the users and the outcome and timing
| □ | major outputs not defined as products or services |
| □ | major outputs defined as products or services but users and their use of the outputs as well as the timeframes unclear |
| □ | major outputs defined as products or services as are users but their use of the outputs as well as the timeframes are unclear |
| □ | major outputs defined as products or services, users and timeframes clear but the outcome (i.e. their use of the output) is unclear |
| □ | major outputs defined as a product or a service, outcome (i.e. what the output will be used for) and users and timeframes clearly stated |
e) Extent to which the achievement of Objective (Outcome) can be evaluated through the criteria and indicators proposed
In the following table, please tick the line which best reflects the case of the entity or output being appraised:
Extent to which achievement can be evaluated through the indicators and targets proposed: programme element objective
| □ | indicators, means of verification and targets undefined |
| □ | indicators defined but not directly pertinent to the objective |
| □ | pertinent indicators defined but unconvincing means of verification and/or unstated targets |
| □ | pertinent indicators defined, means of verification and targets stated but not sufficiently specified |
| □ | realistic indicators defined, credible and practical means of verifications stated, and quantitative targets established |
Extent to which achievement can be evaluated through the indicators and targets proposed: major output outcome
| □ | indicators, means of verification and targets undefined |
| □ | indicators defined but not directly pertinent to the outcome |
| □ | pertinent indicators defined but unconvincing means of verification and/or unstated targets |
| □ | pertinent indicators defined, means of verification and targets stated but not sufficiently specified |
| □ | realistic indicators defined, credible and practical means of verifications stated, and quantitative targets established |
f) Probable cost-efficiency of the programme entity in mode of operation, including the use made of internal and external partnerships
In the following table, please tick the line which best reflects the case of the entity or output being appraised:
Probable cost-efficiency of the programme entity in mode of operation, including the use made of internal and external partnerships with respect to a) clear and efficient managerial arrangements; b) least-cost resource mix; c) leveraging through use of partnerships; d) concentration of effort/critical mass/fragmentation
| □ | weak on all factors |
| □ | weak on any three of the factors or particularly weak on two factors |
| □ | weak on any two of the factors or on leveraging through use of partnerships |
| □ | could be improvement but all factors efficient |
| □ | all factors very efficiently designed |
g) Likelihood of achieving desired Objective (Outcome) and substantive and sustainable impact
In the following table, please tick the line which best reflects the case of the entity or output being appraised:
Likelihood of achieving desired Major Output Outcomes and Programme Entity Objectives in a substantive and sustainable manner
| □ | very high risk that one or more of the desired outcomes/objectives will not be achieved |
| □ | there are a number of unknowns/uncertainties which give rise to doubts about achieving outcomes/objectives |
| □ | at least a substantial part of the outcomes/objectives are likely be achieved. Alternatively there are a number of unknowns/uncertainties which give rise to doubts about achieving outcomes/objectives, but the action is justified by the importance of the problem |
| □ | there is full expectation the planned outcomes/objectives are very likely to be achieved |
_________________________________
1 CL123/9 paragraphs 7 and 8
2 CL 123/REP paragraph 60
3 CL 123/7 MTP 2004-09 paragraphs 793-803