National Portfolio Formulation Exercises (NPFEs) are meant to serve as tools for enhancing country ownership in determining programming priorities in a given GEF replenishment period. The NPFEs are meant to also set forth country priorities for the use of GEF resource in a transparent manner for the benefit of all GEF stakeholders including the anticipated demand for resources, both from countries' national allocations under the System for Transparent Allocation of Resources (STAR) and outside these allocations. Another aim of the NPFE is to strengthen country capacity to coordinate ministries and other involved stakeholders from both private and public sectors. The implementation of NPFEs started in 2010. To date, approximately 40 countries have conducted NPFEs, of which 30 have been supported through GEF funding and 10 countries have funded the NPFEs using their own resources.
The GEF Council requested the Evaluation Office to undertake a mid-term evaluation of the NPFEs. To respond to the Council's request, the Evaluation Office conducted the Mid Term Evaluation of NPFE. The purpose of the mid-term evaluation was to provide the GEF Autumn Council 2013 with a comprehensive assessment of the NPFE initiative and to generate evaluative evidence for the Overall Performance Study for GEF-5 (OPS5), as well as to identify lessons on good practices to strengthen the NPFE program. The evaluation was completed in October 2013.