Summarizes preliminary or “shakedown” external evaluation of a project to increase the capacity of NGO”s in Malawi to implement development activities in the areas of agriculture, off-farm employment, and health. The evaluation, conducted in 2/92, covered the first 17 months of the project, which is being implemented by Experiment in International Living (EIL). The project has gotten off to a promising start despite delays and initial differences in viewpoints on the part of USAID/M and the EIL-coordinated Project Management Unit (PMU). USAID-PMU relationships have been poor, but with recent staff changes should improve dramatically. The project has established visibility, credibility, and good working relationships with its NGO clientele and other donors. It has recruited talented and hardworking Malawian staff. As a result, the PMU is becoming increasingly effective as a mechanism for providing the fledgling Malawian NGO community with guidance and TA. While outputs for organizing and establishing the project are largely accomplished, the process of reviewing subgrant proposals and awarding grants is lagging. Actions to facilitate the process without lowering quality should be a priority. Indeed, improvements are expected as project participants gain experience, learn to work together better, and improve administrative procedures (in line with recommendations of the evaluation). Subgrant procedures can be improved in several ways. Most important is that NGO”s come to recognize that subgrant ceilings are not targets, and that their budget proposals should reflect actual needs, not aspirations. Also, additional attention should be given to the financial sustainability of the proposed activity and the NGO. Other recommendations are to (1) streamline the subgrant concept paper format; and (2) implement a subgrant monitoring and evaluation system which includes gender disaggregated data as well as aggregated impact data. EIL has a $130,000 budget overrun for the first 12 months of the project. Actions to reconcile this will have to be implemented. The relationships between the project and the Government of Malawi have worked out pretty much as expected, but it is obvious that the GOM continues to feel uneasy about an undertaking that is quite out of step the government”s typical top-down approach. Maintenance of the current arrangement — in which the GOM acknowledges but does not directly control NGO activities — is crucial to project success. EIL”s strategy of carefully moving ahead with implementation, allowing only a limited degree of GOM involvement, appears to be a good one. In sum, the project shows much promise. Yet developing effective and sustainable NGO”s in a society where literacy rates and incomes are extremely low will be difficult and management intensive.
