WASHINGTON, date, 2014—The Board of Executive Directors of the World Bank Group, through its Committee on Development Effectiveness (CODE), has commissioned an independent external review of the Bank Group’s Independent Evaluation Group (IEG).
IEG is responsible for assessing the relevance, efficacy, and efficiency of the World Bank Group’s operational programs and activities and their contributions to development effectiveness. Independent evaluation is undertaken to improve accountability and inform the formulation of new directions, policies, and strategies.
The Board, via CODE, oversees the adequacy, efficiency, and robustness of the Bank Group’s evaluation system. To that end, the Board has periodically commissioned independent assessments of IEG that focus on issues core to the effective performance of the evaluation function. The last such independent assessment was conducted in 2004.
The main objective of this latest review is to provide suggestions and recommendations to the Board of Executive Directors in order to continue to enhance IEG’s impact and further strengthen its role as an independent evaluator of the Bank Group’s work. The review is expected to clearly identify IEG’s main strengths and areas where improvement is necessary. The process is scheduled to conclude in September 2014.
The Board has selected Andrei Bougrov, Saraswathi Menon and Heather Weiss to serve on the panel that will undertake the Review. Short biographical information on the panelists follows:
Andrei Bougrov is a Deputy CEO, Deputy Chairman of the Board of Directors of MMC Norilsk Nickel and a Member of its Management Board. He is Vice President of Interros Holding Company and Member of the Board of Directors of JSC RusHydro. Prior to this, he was President, Chairman and Member of the Board of Directors of Rosbank; Chairman of the Board of Directors of Prof-Media and the Third Generating Company of Wholesale Electric Market; and member of the Board of Directors of various other corporations. From 1993-2002, he served as Russia’s Principal Resident Representative and Executive Director at the World Bank, where he was Dean of the Board of Directors.
Saraswathi Menon is currently the Director of the Policy Division in UN Women, the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women. She was formerly Director of the Evaluation Office in the United Nations Development Programme and the elected Chair of the United Nations Evaluations Group. She worked on UNDP programmes as Deputy Chief of the Regional Programme in the Regional Bureau of Asia and the Pacific, UNDP Deputy Resident Representative in Nepal (1999-2000) and as UN Resident Coordinator and UNDP Resident Representative in Mongolia (2000-2003).
Heather Weiss is the Founder and Director of the Harvard Family Research Project and is a Senior Research Associate and Lecturer at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Dr. Weiss is known for her work building the demand for and use of evaluation as a cornerstone of social change. Her recent publications focus on reframing research and evaluation to support continuous improvement and democratic decision making, examining the case for complementary learning from a research and policy perspective, and assessing new ways of providing and evaluating professional development. She is a consultant and advisor to numerous foundations on strategic grant making and evaluation. She served on the National Academy of Sciences team evaluating The U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR).
