Mid-term evaluation of the National Initiatives on Sustainable Palm Oil

DevLearn conducted a mid-term evaluation of the National Initiatives on Sustainable and Climate Smart Oil Palm Smallholders (NI-SCOPS) Programme, active in Indonesia, Malaysia, Nigeria, and Ghana.

Our methodology combined Contribution Analysis and Collaborative Outcome Reporting Technique (CORT) to gather participatory stories of change through the NI-SCOPS programme, and bring them together to understand what had changed in relation to NI-SCOPS’ theory of change.

IDH and Solidaridad implement the National Initiatives on Sustainable and Climate Smart Oil Palm Smallholders (NI-SCOPS) Programme in Indonesia, Nigeria, Ghana, and Malaysia.

DevLearn was commissioned to conduct a mid-term evaluation, with the aim of learning from the first half of programme implementation and providing relevant recommendations to guide the remainder of the project. Our work included:

• Theory of change review. We brought together stakeholders to review and update the theory of change, to understand how the programme was expected to achieve its impact.
• Collaborative Outcomes Reporting Technique (CORT). We applied this participatory technology using researchers based in each country, bringing together in-country partners to reflect on what the project had achieved, and how it could be improved.
• Contribution analysis. Taking the results from the CORT work, and supplementing it with a literature review and in-depth interviews, we conducted a contribution analysis to show the extent to which the NI-SCOPS programme was achieving its objectives.