Integrated natural resource management (INRM) and íntegrated pest management (IPM) take a holistic- rather than reductionist-approach to research. Both approaches see innovation as a social process in which people construct solutions to their problems. Once one accepts that users modify technologies and their own systems to accommodate new technologies, and that these adaptations affect adoption rates and the distribution of benefits, one must also accept that technological change is an immensely complex process with a high degree of non-linearity. Currently, the 'best practice' economic evaluation methods, commonly used in the CGIAR system, struggle as they attempt to establish a linear link between a project's outputs and wider level impacts. Hence IPM and INRM require a different type of evaluation approach that can bridge this attribution gap. cccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccc In this paper we look outside the CGIAR system to leam lessons from the broader field of social program evaluation and incorporate experience of the German development organization GTZ: (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit GmbH). We fínd that a two-stage program theory evaluation (PTE), guided by an impact model developed by GTZ, is better matched to the needs of IPM and INRM. This type of evaluation is guided by an explicit theory or model of how a research project achieves impact. In other words, PTE is based on a map of the impact pathway(s).||In the first stage of evaluation, the research project begins by developing a program theory for itself and then conducts its own self-evaluation, guided by the program theory, to the point of establishing direct benefits of its pilot site(s) outputs. Self-evaluation and the learning it engenders contribute to adaptive project management, which is crucial to successful INRM and IPM. Based on this learning, the program theory evolves to map out, in greater detail, how the project's direct benefits can later be scaled-up.||The second stage, conducted some time after the project has finished, is an ex-post impact assessment in which the project's wider benefits are independently measured. This begins by establishing the extent to which the program theory was valid in the pilot site(s) and the extent to which scaling up has occurred. It is the job of the impact assessor to build a plausible and persuasive case for a link between the project outputs and general level developmental changes, using case study methodology.||We illustrate the usefulness of the 2-stage PET through two examples: an ongoing project to develop integrated management options for the control of Striga spp (a parasitic weed) with farmers in northern Nigeria and a completed, integrated crop management project in Indonesia.

English

0310|AGRIS 0301|AL-Economics Program|R01PROCE

Juan Carlos Mendieta

CIMMYT Publications Collection