Podgorica, 10 March 2016

The  Montenegrin Promotional Evaluation Conference on “Sharing experiences / practices and evaluation standards in the area of the monitoring and evaluation” took place in Podgorica, and it was organized by the Montenegrin Evaluation Network in cooperation with the Western Balkan Evaluation Network WBEN.

Connecting the Western Balkan countries in the field of monitoring and evaluation is significantly important for the reasons of sharing experiences and goal proximities, and environments. The Montenegrin Evaluation Network acting as one of the 130 evaluation organizations in the world aims, in accordance with internationally prescribed standards, to develop a culture of evaluation at the national level.

The promotional conference was organized within the "BEST-PROFY" project supported by the International Organization for Cooperation in Evaluation (IOCE) / International Organization for Cooperation in Evaluation, which is the institutional partner of the United Nations in the field of evaluation, and which member is the Montenegrin Evaluation Network.

The overall objective of the BEST - PROFY project (SHARING EXPERIENCES / PRACTICES AND EVALUATION STANDARDS IN THE AREA OF MONITORING AND EVALUATION) is to improve the environment for the promotion of evaluation through the cooperation at the regional level and defining common criteria for establishing standards for the evaluation at the regional level - WBEN evaluation standards. The participants of this project are Macedonia, Slovenia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Montenegro. The best practices in the field of monitoring and evaluation in Montenegro were presented at the meeting of the Montenegrin Evaluation Network. In accordance with the prescribed criteria for the selection of best practices / experiences, the best selected practices in Montenegro are the experiences of the UNICEF Montenegro that were presented by Ida Ferdinandi (UNICEF, Montenegro), including the experiences of the NGO Human Rights Action (HRA), whose work was presented by Tea Gorjanc-Prelević, the director of the NGO Human rights Action (HRA).

Ljiljana Jovović, Montenegrin Evaluation Network Coordinator, spoke on the importance of the evaluation to the social development and stressed that the basic purpose of the evaluation implementation is in assuring assessment quality and valuating the results, achieved changes in society, organization, program or project, and that the purpose of monitoring and evaluation at that is to answer the question whether  we move towards the achievement of the set goal and if there is a faster and better way to do it. This question is of key importance to the development of society, community, organization, program or project, and is therefore recommended to be frequently raised. From the above, both monitoring and evaluation should consist of key, basic activities of society, organization, institution, plan, project, strategy and so on. 

In addition to the representatives of the Montenegrin Evaluation Network, the audience of the meeting was also addressed by Kristina Perazić, 1^st Secretary of the Directorate General for Coordination of the EU Assistance Programs at the Montenegrin Ministry of Foreign Affairs, with the subject titled “IPA and possibility of involvement in expertise in Montenegro"; dr.cs Risto Ivanov, the coordinator of the BEST PROFY project and representative of the Macedonian Evaluation Network; Bojan Radej, the coordinator of the Slovenian Evaluation Network, on the subject titled “Applications for evaluating synergy of public policies effects"; Radmila Stupar-Đurišić from the Montenegrin Evaluation Network on the subject titled “Why do we need evaluation?”;Ida Ferdinandi, the UNICEF representative, had a presentation on “Principles and evaluation process, UNICEF experiences in Montenegro”; and Tea Gorjanc-Prelević, the director of the NGO Human rights Action (HRA), presented the work results of the non-governmental organization in the area of monitoring and evaluation.

Skopje, 21 December 2015

The identification of best practices for monitoring and evaluation of institutions and organizations in the South East Europe with special reference to Macedonia was the focus of the workshop entitled “Sharing experiences and practices in Macedonia”, which was held in Skopje.

More than twenty experts from Macedonia and the wider region (Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro and Slovenia) had the opportunity to introduce themselves and hear the experiences of the Macedonian Evaluation Network MEN, new global trends in this area, as well as the goals, activities and results of the new partnerships at national and regional level.

At the beginning, Mr. Ljupčo Prendžov, the Deputy Minister for Regional Development in the Government of Macedonia, addressed to the participants of the workshop, who pointed out that the monitoring and evaluation are applied in his ministry, especially in the part relating to the IPA cross-border cooperation with neighboring countries, as well as the planning and implementation of the regional development projects. He stressed out that the further capacity building of policy makers, professional associations, and individual evaluators, is very important so that the world, European and regional trends in this area might be followed.

At the workshop, among the presentations there was also the one of Vlatko Danilov, the President of the MEN, who pointed out that the evaluation is an independent assessment of whether and how certain programs, strategies, projects, measures or regulations affect social changes and quality of life. They contribute to the strengthening of good governance, and that is why the evaluation should be conducted both by the government officials and non-governmental organizations that can raise awareness of the importance of monitoring and evaluation.

It was Mr. Gligor Stojkov who spoke at the workshop about experiences and good practices of monitoring and evaluation, and gave an overview of previous evaluations that were made in Macedonia.

 Dr Risto Ivanov, by explaining the BEST- Profy project entitled “Sharing best practices and standards of evaluation”, thoroughly explained all the so far implemented activities that were executed within the regional network of cooperation in the Western Balkans between Slovenia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, between Croatia and Serbia, and between Macedonia and Montenegro. At the end, Mr. Ivanov opened a few questions about the creation of a national model for the evaluation of policies, entailing what cooperation is to be established on a regional level, what form of capacity building, capacities of professional organizations and individual evaluators may contribute to the public dialogue and communication with the public et al.