The Inquirer
Monrovia, Liberia

Distributed by

The Perspective
Atlanta, Georgia

Posted May 13, 2004

A one-day workshop organized by UNICEF/Liberia to build up the monitoring and evaluation capacities of its implementing partners has ended in Monrovia. The workshop which was held at the Monrovia City Hall on Wednesday, brought together 29 participants from GOL, INGOs, and NGOs.

According to the chief facilitator of the workshop, Mr. Emmet Watson, the objective of the workshop was to help improve the capacities of UNICEF’s implementing partners in the area of monitoring and evaluation since these are essential components to the implementation of any assigned project.

Mr. Watson, who is also UNICEF’s Project Officer/Monitoring and Evaluation, said his agency expects the participants to develop efficient monitoring and evaluation system within their respective organizations.

He said a follow-up to the workshop will be held in June for partners who did not attend the just ended workshop. Reason for this, Mr. Watson added, is for all UNICEF’s 60 implementing partners to benefit from the training exercise so that they can double-up their speed in writing efficient monitoring and evaluation reports.

Mr. Watson also disclosed that UNICEF will pay a field visit to all of its partners’ offices with the aim of assessing how well they are coping with what they have learnt at the workshop.

The participants are expected to have learned what monitoring and evaluation are all about, using the requisite tools, the indicators of project(s); the importance of monitoring and evaluation, developing a monitoring plan and checklist; and the difference between monitoring and evaluation.

In an interview with some of the participants, they expressed thanks and appreciation to UNICEF for holding the workshop, adding, “some of the basic techniques and methodologies needed in writing monitoring and evaluation reports were lacking in us. So from this workshop, at least, we have learned something and we can say our reports to donors from now on will be properly written to meet their expectations”.

They then recommended the holding of similar workshops at least three times a year to refresh their minds adding, “our donors should feel obligated in building our capacities at all times.”

UNICEF’s Child Info. Consultant Joseph Nyan also served as one of the facilitators.