BHA & DDI Evaluation Series Looks at Response to COVID-19

As it is critical to capture key learning from the pandemic response, the USAID Bureau for Humanitarian Assistance (BHA), with Bureau for Development, Democracy, and Innovation (DDI), has commissioned an additional evaluation series to understand the performance of the BHA-funded response to SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19). It includes a Performance Evaluation for the follow-on fiscal year (FY) 2021 COVID-19 Supplemental funding and broader Thematic Evaluations of the BHA COVID-19 response overall (2020-2022). The evaluations will help to identify recommendations and learning from BHA’s COVID-19 response in humanitarian contexts and contribute to improved future BHA programming related to large-scale infectious disease outbreak or pandemic responses.

The evaluation series is being conducted by Technical Assistance for Non-Governmental Organizations International (TANGO) and Tulane University School of Public Health. The two-year evaluation activity extends from October 2022 – September 2024 and is a buy-in project of the LASER PULSE Consortium.

The evaluation team has finalized the Inception Report for the Performance Evaluation and recently released a summary of the inception plan to implementing partners (IP). The Inception Report, including its evaluation questions, scope, and methodologies, was informed by a lengthy Inception and Co-Creation Phase (December 2022-April 2023). The co-creation activities included: conducting 25 scoping interviews with BHA, working closely with BHA to gather all available award data and documents, conducting a gap analysis of the award data, discussing secondary data for six public international organization (PIO) awards, performing a desk review of award proposals, and gathering valuable IP feedback and input through a scoping e-survey.

The FY 2021 Performance Evaluation is assessing the BHA $1.3 billion multi-sectoral funding distributed through 187 awards across 46 countries and global/regional level. The study is evaluating achievements toward meeting the funding objectives, BHA key sector indicators, and award targets. The proposed methods and data sources are shown in the chart below. Additionally, the Thematic Evaluations include two targeted case studies selected based on inception phase scoping interviews and a range of criteria (feasibility, interesting, novel, equitable, and relevant). More information on these thematics will be shared when available.

The evaluation team looks forward to sharing key findings and learning from the pandemic response and this evaluation series in the year ahead.

Evaluation team leader contact: Maryada Vallet – maryada@tangointernational.com