Thank you for bringing up such an important topic and all the insights from the COP members. I am offering insights from CGIAR, a consortium of 13 agricultural research centers which are primarily based in the global South. Through and with partners, including national agricultural research systems, CGIAR centers work collaboratively and evaluations of CGIAR’s portfolio then prioritize approaches and methods to capture elements of, albeit not necessarily in the context of a formal SSTC framework.
Guidance or tools for such evaluations: CGIAR’s evaluation policy (link) includes the Quality of Science eval criterion, at its core- ‘legitimacy’ through ethical research practices- a designated evaluation guidance was developed (link, also in Spanish). To operationalize QoS, process/performance evaluations often involve analyzing collaborative research, capacity-building, and knowledge exchange among researchers in the global north-south, and of research done in the global South- (see brief on partnerships). Among the specific tools tailored to SSTC, Social Network Analysis (SNA) has proven to be a useful tool (see SNA Guide from CGIAR, and example of report).
Challenges and facilitators faced in evaluating SSTC initiatives: Common challenges include monitoring data scarcity, lacking documentation such as MOUs, attribution complexities in contexts of multiple interventions by CGIAR centers, and external partners to CGIAR, and limited ability to comprehensively capture depth of diversity of stakeholder perspectives. On the other hand, designated Partnerships Frameworks and Strategies greatly facilitate evaluability of such efforts.
Evaluators can facilitate learning by adapting approaches and tools to contexts, promote transparency and accountability, and highlight best practices. They can also advocate for integrating SSTC evaluation results into strategic planning processes to maximize development impact and foster sustainable partnerships (see example of a Partnershp report)
RE: Maximizing the impact of South-South and Triangular Cooperation in a changing aid architecture through evaluation.
Italy
Svetlana I Negroustoueva
Lead, Evaluation Function
CGIAR
Posté le 26/05/2025
Dear colleagues,
Thank you for bringing up such an important topic and all the insights from the COP members. I am offering insights from CGIAR, a consortium of 13 agricultural research centers which are primarily based in the global South. Through and with partners, including national agricultural research systems, CGIAR centers work collaboratively and evaluations of CGIAR’s portfolio then prioritize approaches and methods to capture elements of, albeit not necessarily in the context of a formal SSTC framework.
CGIAR’s evaluation policy (link) includes the Quality of Science eval criterion, at its core- ‘legitimacy’ through ethical research practices- a designated evaluation guidance was developed (link, also in Spanish). To operationalize QoS, process/performance evaluations often involve analyzing collaborative research, capacity-building, and knowledge exchange among researchers in the global north-south, and of research done in the global South- (see brief on partnerships). Among the specific tools tailored to SSTC, Social Network Analysis (SNA) has proven to be a useful tool (see SNA Guide from CGIAR, and example of report).
Common challenges include monitoring data scarcity, lacking documentation such as MOUs, attribution complexities in contexts of multiple interventions by CGIAR centers, and external partners to CGIAR, and limited ability to comprehensively capture depth of diversity of stakeholder perspectives. On the other hand, designated Partnerships Frameworks and Strategies greatly facilitate evaluability of such efforts.
Watch out or a designated gLOCAL session from CGIAR on use of SNA to evaluate partnerships. : https://zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_k-2ak4d9Rjef_KLo_yS6XQ Top of Form
Svetlana Negroustoueva -Lead, Evaluation Function, The Independent Advisory and Evaluation Service, CGIAR.