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Background

The Ecological Organic Agriculture (EOA) Initiative is an African Union-led continental undertaking established in 2013 and currently implemented in eight countries (Benin, Ethiopia, Kenya, Mali, Nigeria, Senegal, Tanzania, and Uganda). It is implemented under the guidance and oversight of the AU chaired Continental Steering Committee (CSC) to establish an African organic farming platform based on available best practices, and to develop sustainable organic farming systems and improve seed quality. Its mission is to promote ecologically sound strategies and practices among diverse stakeholders involved in the production, processing, marketing, and policy-making to safeguard the environment, improve livelihoods, alleviate poverty and guarantee food security among farmers in Africa. The goal is to contribute to mainstreaming of Ecological Organic Agriculture into national agricultural production systems by 2025 in order to improve agricultural productivity, food security, access to markets and sustainable development in Africa. In addition, these efforts are hoped to reduce exploitation of the organic farmers in Africa.

The initiative embraces holistic production systems that sustain the health of soils, ecosystems, and people, and relies on ecological processes, biodiversity, and cycles adapted to local conditions rather than reliance on the use of external inputs with adverse effects on people’s total health (human, animal, plant and environmental). The EOA initiative was started in response to the African Union Heads of State and Government’s call for the promotion of organic farming in Africa. The African Union Commission, in collaboration with several civil society organizations supporting ecological organic agriculture, organized an inception workshop in May 2011 in Thika Kenya, with financial support from the Swedish Society for Nature Conservation (SSNC) to discuss how to implement this decision. The workshop successfully resulted in a roadmap, concept note and an African Organic Action Plan to mainstream ecological organic agriculture into national agricultural production systems. The action plan was later submitted to donor agencies for financial support and SSNC responded by supporting a pilot project undertaken in six countries (Eastern Africa: Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda; Southern Africa: Zambia; and Western Africa: Nigeria) while Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) came on board to support baseline studies in Benin, Mali,and Senegal with coordination by Biovision Africa Trust (BvAT). Further planning meetings were held culminating in the development of an 8-country project proposal supported by SDC for an initial period of 5 years (2014-2018) while SSNC with funding from the Swedish International Development Cooperation (Sida) supports the EOA Initiative in some Eastern Africa through civil society organizations from 2014 to date. The African Union also supports EOA through funds provided by the European Union .
The Initiative’s five-year Action Plan and implementation has been anchored on six interrelated pillars:

• Research, training and extension, 
• Information and communication,
• Value chain and market development,
• Networking and partnership, 
• Policy and programme development, and
• Institutional capacity development. In the current SDC contribution, the initiative is driven by the first three technical pillars and the fourth one for coordination, management, and networking, basically integrating and So far, the four objectives of the EOA Initiative are:
  • To increase documentation of information and knowledge on organic agricultural products along the complete value chain and support relevant actors to translate it into practices and wide application.
  • To systematically inform producers about the EOA approaches and good practices and motivate their uptake through strengthening access to advisory and support services.
  • To substantially increase the share of quality organic products at the local, national, regional and global markets.
  • To strengthen inclusive stakeholder engagement in organic commodities value chain development by developing national, regional and continental multi-stakeholder platforms to advocate for changes in public policy, plans, and practices.

This evaluation is coordinated by Biovision Africa Trust (BvAT) on behalf of the CSC and SDC which has the twin functions of being the interim Continental EOA Secretariat and Executing Agency for the EOA Initiative (under SDC’s support).

Purpose and Objectives of the External Evaluation

With all the interventions of the EOA Initiative having been undertaken since 2014, it was anticipated that an evaluation of the initiative is done in the 8 countries and on the institutional structures established to drive agenda of mainstreaming EOA at country, regional and continental levels in terms of policies, plans, strategies, and programmes.

The purpose of this evaluation is therefore to:

• Assess the achievements and impacts of the initiative resulting from interventions by the partners (CLOs and PIPs) and institutional structures (Continental Steering Committee, AfroNet, Regional Steering Committees, National Steering Committees, and Executing Agencies) in order to strengthen accountability to stakeholders.
• Foster learning across partners and institutional structures to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of the EOA initiative interventions, and

Provide recommendations on actions required to increase EOA-I effectiveness, impact, and promotion to countries not covered by the current EOA-I and its funding, with a particular view towards designing the next EOA-I phase under SDC support.
The EOA external evaluation for Phase I should be designed to show what has worked and not worked in mainstreaming EOA in various dimensions of research, value chain development promotion, and policy, etc at in relation to the project objectives and as driven by the current partner and institutional setup arrangements. Results and recommendations of the evaluation will inform the designing (including impact generating incentive-setting), programming and management of the upcoming Phase II, starting in December 2018.

Objectives of the Evaluation

• To assess the extent to which the relevance, effectiveness, and efficiency of mainstreaming EOA into national policies, plans, strategies, and programmes have contributed to expected outcomes and sustainability of the project.
• To review the effectiveness and efficiency of the EOA-I structural set up of EOA implementing partners (CLOs and PIPs) and institutional support structures (the AU-Chaired Continental Steering Committee, AfroNet, Regional Steering Committees, National Steering Committees, Executing Agencies and overall M&E systems) in delivering concrete results based on their mandates.
• To determine the number (or percent) of households who have been reached by the EOA project and in what ways.
• To assess effectiveness and efficiency of EOA pillar interventions in influencing farmers’ knowledge, attitudes and uptake of EOA practices and/or technologies , and the mechanisms by which this occurred.
• To assess the extent to which pillar interventions have contributed to key project outcomes including increased agricultural production, productivity, food security, income and farmer welfare.
• To assess the extent to which gender equality and access by the youth and other vulnerable groups were considered in the project budget and implementation.
• To draw key lessons learnt from Phase 1 of the EOA-I to inform recommendations and actions for addressing the weaknesses and challenges experienced, most appropriate and motivating funding support arrangements, future programming, implementation, monitoring & evaluation and reporting on a sustained basis at all key levels (country, regional, continental platform and AU).

The Evaluation Deliverables/Outputs

The evaluation’s findings and recommendations will be discussed with the AUC, the Continental Steering Committee (CSC) and Implementing partners (CLOs and PIPs). The consultant will submit a draft final report in both hard and soft copy at the end of the evaluation
The expected key outputs of the evaluation are:

• An inception report: Elaboration of the external evaluation methodology and tools including a detailed schedule of activities to be undertaken across the eight countries and institutional structures (work plan).
• An Aide Memoire (intermediate report with key findings and recommendations). This will be presented to the CSC in May 2018.
• The External Evaluation Draft and Final Reports: The report should be logically structured including the executive summary, intervention description, assessment purpose, assessment methodology, findings, conclusions, lessons and recommendations, and annexes (key officials interviewed, documents consulted, and data collection instruments). The report should respond in detail to the key focus areas described above. It should include a set of specific recommendations for each EOA implementing partner, and identify the necessary actions to be undertaken as advice in “Way Forward”

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Purpose and Objectives of the External Evaluation

• With all the interventions of the EOA Initiative having been undertaken since 2014, it was anticipated that an evaluation of the initiative is done in the 8 countries and on the institutional structures established to drive agenda of mainstreaming EOA at country, regional and continental levels in terms of policies, plans, strategies, and programmes.
• The purpose of this evaluation is therefore to:
• Assess the achievements and impacts of the initiative resulting from interventions by the partners (CLOs and PIPs) and institutional structures (Continental Steering Committee, AfroNet, Regional Steering Committees, National Steering Committees, and Executing Agencies) in order to strengthen accountability to stakeholders.
• Foster learning across partners and institutional structures to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of the EOA initiative interventions, and
• Provide recommendations on actions required to increase EOA-I effectiveness, impact, and promotion to countries not covered by the current EOA-I and its funding, with a particular view towards designing the next EOA-I phase under SDC support.
• The EOA external evaluation for Phase I should be designed to show what has worked and not worked in mainstreaming EOA in various dimensions of research, value chain developmentpromotion, and policy, etc at in relation to the project objectives and as driven by the current partner and institutional setup arrangements. Results and recommendations of the evaluation will inform the designing (including impact generating incentive-setting), programming and management of the upcoming Phase II, starting in December 2018.