Relevance
The evaluation assigned a rating of 4 for the relevance of the programme, finding that the programme was highly relevant to the needs of the communities and the Government of Pakistan.
Effectiveness
A rating of outstanding performance (4) was also awarded for the programme's effectiveness. The evaluation found that the programme was instrumental in building community resilience. Furthermore, the analysis indicated that in both the flood- and drought-prone areas the trend of improvement in resilience was the same. Likewise, male- and female-headed households almost equally improved their resilience.
Efficiency
The evaluation also scored the programme's efficiency at a 4 for outstanding performance. The cumulative achievement of the programme against the targets indicated that the programme achieved most indicator targets and even surpassed several of them. Though some activity targets were missed due to lockdown because of the COVID-19 outbreak, the programme provided excellent support to the Provincial Development Authorities (PDMAs), District Development Authorities (DDMAs) and communities to cope with the outbreak which was not foreseen at the time of programme formulation, which the evaluation notes as an excellen example of adaptive management.
Sustainability
This criteria was scored as outstanding performance (4). The evaluation found that the programme has no environmental or socio-economic risks to sustainability, rather there will be an environmental enhancement in terms of land conservation, promotion of social forestry, water conservation, etc.
Impact
The evaluation found several visible impacts of the programme: (i) increased household income, (ii) trained volunteer force available for support to the Government of Pakistan during disasters, (iii) well-informed communities about disaster risk reduction (DRR), (iv) improved knowledge and practices about WASH, (v) self-confidence of communities, (vi) Union Council level infrastructure which provided evacuation routes as well as easy access to cities and markets and (vii) registration of people living with disabilities with the Social Welfare Department, entitling them to special benefits from government schemes such as health care, cash grants and exemption from some taxes. Keeping in view all the achievements against various targets (mostly surpassed the targets), and gathering of community perceptions and quantitative data during the FGDs, a rating 4 was assigned to impacts.
Programme Monitoring and Evaluation
The evaluation found that although the Programme Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) system was well in place and fully recorded the achievements of the programme in terms of quantitative targets, reporting on the quality of interventions was less adequate. For this reason, the evaluation scored this criteria as a 3 (performance in line with what would be expected of a well-functioning organization).
Adapting to COVID-19
Adapting to the COVID-19 pandemic, the programme extensively launched campaigns to sanitize villages, towns and schools, promoted frequent hand washing, and provided soap bars and sanitizers to communities as well as to district authorities. This promoted safe WASH practices to a great extent, which is likely to positively impact food absorption and savings on health expenditures. Furthermore, the programme provided cash grants to the poor households left out by the GoP schemes to survive during the lockdown. This practice greatly saved the poor from becoming more destitute.