Ex-post Evaluation

Introduction

The objectives of the Study were to analyze the positive and negative impacts and effects of the actions displayed within the frame of the Integrated Rural Development Project in the Department of Paraguari, and to extract lessons from the experience that should be taken into consideration for the implementation of future rural development projects.

The Project goals were to improve the funding structure, increase the agricultural productivity, of the small industry and the craftsmanship, through the use of credit, the organizational promotion and the expansion of the infrastructure works (roads and rural electricity). In addition, it has been a central objective of the Project to extend the health and education services to the discriminated sectors and groups of the rural population.

The Project was designed and executed based in the structure of eight sub projects.

The central coordination and execution of the Project was assigned to Consejo de Fomento de la Producción Agrícola Nacional (CFPAN), which delegated its functions to a Central Coordinating Unit (UCC). An executing agency was assigned to each sub project.

Effect

In spite of some limitations found along the Project execution, it was concluded that, in general, the original Project goals had been satisfactorily accomplished and in some of the sub Projects, the previsions had been surpassed. The strongest positive effects have been the ones resulting from the carrying out of the infrastructure works and the use of its concomitant services. In this sense, the global result of the Project can be evaluated as the expression of a primary modernization.

Lessons learned

Within the most important lessons learned from the evaluation of the Project, it can be pointed out that it is fundamental that the main coordinating and executing institution counts with the necessary experience, the resources, and sufficient autonomy to be able to perform its work properly; it is important to demand and guarantee that the credit components and the technical assistance be designed and applied in a coordinated and complementary manner; it is necessary to prioritize the assistance and technical training actions together with the evaluation and monitoring tasks, with the purpose of avoiding the dispersion of efforts, increase accomplishments and minimize errors; and, last but not least, it is important to separate the monitoring and evaluation functions by having the former integrated to Project Management and the latter delegated to an independent institution.