Mongolia, Nicaragua, and Tunisia. The main focus of the evaluation included consistency with the aid demands of these countries, the effects of assistance, and the appropriateness of the implementation process.

The evaluation for the assistance for Indonesia, for instance, confirmed that as some of Japan’s aid policies were established through close policy dialogues with Indonesian government-affiliated parties and experts, not only were Japan’s policies of a high level with a great deal of consistency with Indonesia’s medium-term development plan, but also evaluation effects highlighted facts such as that they complemented the support from other donor countries, and thus were suitable. Efforts such as the Supporting Development of Eastern Indonesia Program were reported to have appropriate aid implementation processes. As a forward-facing proposal, based on the changing development needs of Indonesia and the fact that bilateral relations have entered a new phase, the precedence of support for the country has been highlighted as requiring reconsideration.

Priority issues evaluations were also implemented, targeting the “Basic Education for Growth Initiative (BEGIN)” and “Japanese Assistance to Africa through the TICAD Process.” These evaluations assessed relevance of Japan’s policy with the undertakings of the international community, the effectiveness of the ODA projects, and the appropriateness of the process. In the evaluation of “Japanese Assistance to Africa through the TICAD Process,” not only was it confirmed that consistency in the support with leading international frameworks and Japan’s high-level policies was being well maintained and that it was being effectively realized in the area of debt relief, but also that various wide-ranging successes had been recognized in region-wide and South-South cooperation, and as such the support process was generally viewed as being suitable. As a forward-facing proposal, the evaluation concludes that it is desirable to further promote comprehensive support incorporating the provision of infrastructure, an area where Japan puts particular effort among major donor countries, with “software” such as skills transfer and human resources development.

In program-level evaluations, a joint evaluation with USAID, the US-Japan Partnership for Global Health, was implemented. As well, as evaluations by the governments and organizations of developing countries, “Japanese Development Assistance to Malaysia Project,” “Japanese ODA on Consolidation of Peace and Security in Africa,” and “Japanese Cooperation in El Salvador’s Eastern Region” were executed.

## Project Level Evaluations

Evaluation of individual projects is one of the areas to be enhanced, as it is important for publicly accountable, effective, and efficient aid. For all Japanese ODA loan projects, the former JBIC conducted ex-ante evaluations at the preparatory stage of all the projects. Two years after the completion of projects JICA, formerly JBIC, conducts ex-post evaluations by external evaluators in accordance with international standards for evaluation of relevance, efficiency, effectiveness, impact, and sustainability. In order to develop a more thorough evaluation system, JBIC conducted mid-term reviews since FY2004 to verify the appropriateness and effectiveness of the project plan five years after the conclusion of loan agreements, along with ex-post monitoring seven years after the completion of projects to verify effectiveness, impact, and sustainability.

Furthermore, impact assessments that quantitatively analyze the effect of ODA loan projects on local residents were conducted. For example, in addition to the ex-post evaluation of “Social Sector Development Project in Amazon Area / Social Sector Development Project in Sierra Area” in Peru, thematic evaluation concerning the Improvement of Living Environment and Livelihoods in Poor Communities was conducted. This evaluation, which employed econometric techniques, analyzed the impact of small-scale infrastructure projects (e.g., water supply, roads, small-scale electrification) on residents financed by a social investment fund $ ^{17} $ established under the Fujimori administration. As a result, the evaluation confirmed that water drawing time was reduced and the incidence of diarrhea among children under six declined in beneficiary households in regions in which water supply projects were implemented in comparison with regions in which they were not. It also suggests that small-scale electrification projects led to an increase in business start-ups among beneficiary households.

In technical cooperation, JICA had worked consistently to conduct evaluations at each project stage: prior to commencement, during implementation, at the time of conclusion and following completion. In addition, the recommendations and lessons learned through these evaluations were systematically fed back to inform project planning and implementation. Furthermore, in order to enhance