As GEI begins planning this year's gLOCAL Evaluation Week, we reflect on the value that the event brings to participants. CLEAR-SA recently spoke with Good Business Lab (GBL), a not-for-profit labor innovation organization that has been an active partner of gLOCAL in South Asia.

The availability of trained local M&E professionals is one of the critical factors to strengthening monitoring and evaluation (M&E) systems in developing countries.

Evaluation can help us to be more effective in curbing climate change and environmental degradation. But this requires evaluation to take a new, broader perspective.

The Footprint Evaluation Initiative is an international collaboration grounded on the premise that all evaluations should include consideration of environmental sustainability, even when this is not a stated goal of the intervention.

Takunda Chirau, Deputy Director of the Center for Learning on Evaluation and Results for Anglophone Africa (CLEAR-AA), reflects on CLEAR-AA's journey to a systems-based approach for strengthening M&E in the countries where the Center works.

When we talk about a monitoring and evaluation (M&E) system, what sort of system are we thinking about? Do we have a narrow or broad understanding? And how should we design, plan and implement a system that effectively supports monitoring, evaluation and evidence use?

If diagnostics are important to address the complexity in sports competitions, then they are certainly crucial in public policy – including the development of monitoring and evaluation (M&E) systems.

While the data revolution is unlikely to fundamentally transform the field of evaluation in the next few years, in many ways it will change the way evaluations are conducted and how data are used. What are some of the implications for evaluation training and professional development?

Working in partnership with the Rio Grande do Sul State Government and local stakeholders, the CLEAR-LAB team supported policymakers in upgrading the Primeira Infância Melhor Program (PIM) in response to the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic.

When the focus is on helping get food to the hungry, providing basic services to displaced populations, or restoring peace and dealing with the devastating consequences of war, how important could it be to focus on M&E?