CLEAR-AA and DEval Support Tanzania’s Country-Led Evaluation of Agricultural Development Program

A five-day workshop, held from February 17 to 21, 2024, brought together key government institutions to plan a country-led evaluation of Tanzania’s Agricultural Sector Development Programme Phase Two (ASDP II). The workshop aimed to finalize the evaluation’s terms of reference and strengthen the capacity of stakeholders to manage and commission evaluations as part of Tanzania’s national monitoring and evaluation system. 

The event was organized by the Prime Minister’s Office through its Division of Government Performance Monitoring and Evaluation (DPME), in collaboration with the Centre for Learning on Evaluation and Results – Anglophone Africa (CLEAR-AA), an implementing partner of the Global Evaluation Initiative (GEI), and the German Institute for Development Evaluation (DEval). 

Participants included representatives from key government ministries and agencies involved in agriculture, infrastructure, planning, natural resources, and rural development. 

The ASDP II evaluation forms part of a broader national effort, supported by GEI and its partners, to strengthen Tanzania’s National Evaluation System. The evaluation will contribute to more effective policy and decision-making and help drive better development outcomes across the agricultural sector. 

“When we don't rigorously evaluate public interventions, we can't tell if they succeed or fail, leaving us to govern by guesswork,” said Dr. Takunda Chirau, Acting Director of CLEAR-AA. 

Agriculture plays a central role in Tanzania’s economy. The sector employs approximately 65.5 percent of the labor force, supports the livelihoods of more than 70 percent of the population, and contributes 29 percent to gross domestic product. It also supplies 65 percent of industrial inputs, accounts for 30 percent of exports, and is largely driven by smallholder farmers, who manage more than 90 percent of cultivated land. 

ASDP II is a 10-year program launched in fiscal year 2017/18 and implemented in two five-year phases. It supports Tanzania’s efforts to achieve Sustainable Development Goal 2: end hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition, and promote sustainable agriculture.