Carlo Carugi, Senior Evaluation Officer of the GEF IEO, participated at the 2018 American Evaluation Association (AEA) Conference in a panel session (#1816) on Lessons from applying Rapid Impact Evaluation.
Rapid Impact Evaluation (RIE) relatively new theory-driven approach to evaluating impacts based on triangulation of expert judgments. RIE introduces new approaches to counterfactuals and to measuring impacts that can also be used as part of any mixed methods evaluation. RIE has been piloted by the Independent Evaluation Office (IEO) of the Global Environment Facility (GEF), and by the Treasury Board Secretariat (TBS) and the Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) of the Government of Canada, among others. These pilots have proved instructive and have provided insights into the utility and implementation of RIE in different evaluation settings. This panel discussion will reflect on these pilots, identify the challenges of applying RIE in different settings and discuss the advantages that RIE brings to evaluating impacts.
During the session, the GEF IEO presented Applying Rapid Impact Evaluation to Assess Impacts of the GEF-UNIDO Energy Efficiency Program in South East Asia.
The Independent Evaluation Office (IEO of the Global Environment Facility (GEF) has used Rapid Impact Evaluation (RIE) for one out of a total of four impact assessment case studies in the context of the Evaluation of Programmatic Approaches in the GEF. This evaluation applies a mixed-methods approach that use a variety of quantitative and qualitative data gathering and analyses. Impact assessment through case studies was conducted using geospatial analyses to observe environmental change over time for land degradation and biodiversity conservation programs, measured in terms of changes in forest cover and in vegetation density. RIE was chosen in the case of the energy efficiency program as an alternative method for the estimation of GHG emission reductions, a variable that is not easily measurable through other techniques. This presentation describes our experience with the RIE application and its utility in the context of a large mixed-methods evaluation.