for the project to design and put in place enabling conditions and measures to integrate informal workers in solid waste management operations. In view of the progress made at this stage and considering the delay due to Covid-19, there are difficulties in ownership concerning intermunicipal cooperation. No municipality has agreed to provide a site for the waste treatment centre. The Chamber of Commerce had to provide its own land.
2.4 Cross-cutting issues Finding 22. National and international partners consider UNDP reliable and experienced. UNDP is strategically positioned vis-à-vis the Government at the national level through the support it provides in the implementation of projects and the provision of strategic and technical advice. However, Haiti’s volatile environment had a negative impact on the UNDP programme and the latter did not demonstrate sufficient institutional resilience in relation to this environment. The fragmentation of projects and themes and the lack of a theory of change have likely limited the impact of UNDP in Haiti. Over the years, UNDP has developed a privileged relationship with its national partners in various areas of its programme, such as governance, post-disaster reconstruction, and DRM. UNDP has positioned itself as a reliable and competent partner in these areas and has proven its ability to provide impartial advice and technical assistance to its national partners. UNDP is recognized especially for its central position in advocacy and the promotion of an enabling environment for development, particularly for the achievement of the SDGs. Government partners appreciate the relevance of UNDP support, its responsiveness and the alignment of its interventions with the country’s priorities as well as the added value of these interventions, particularly to meet the challenges of good governance, risk and disaster management and resilience. Several partners interviewed also underlined that UNDP is
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generally perceived as a coordinating agency. This gives it legitimacy and leadership in the coordination of certain sectoral tables and the development of integrated projects such as the post-Matthew recovery or the socio-economic response to the Covid-19 pandemic. Political and social instability as well as the health crisis linked to Covid-19 paralysed the implementation of the country programme. The country has faced recurring electoral and political crises.135 Several interventions experienced start-up and implementation delays due to this situation, to internal inefficiencies of UNDP or to inadequacies in project design. For example, the duration of the projects is not always sufficient for a proper exit strategy including capacity-building of national institutions. It is important to note that the UNDP portfolio in Haiti for this period is characterized by a dispersion of projects and themes. This made it difficult to assess the strategic approach adopted or the underlying theory of change of UNDP in Haiti. No evidence was found that UNDP Haiti has formulated or used theory of change to plan and implement its outcomes or programme, or to adapt management. The evaluation team reconstructed a theory of change for each of the three outcomes using information available in the CPD results framework and the programme portfolio. The evaluation team found that the underlying intervention logic of the UNDP programme is aligned with national priorities, with overall adequate focus on the main country challenges. However, the absence of a clearly defined theory of change remains a missed opportunity to create synergies and complementarities within and among portfolios and to define risk assumptions and adequate mitigation strategies. For these reasons, the fragmentation of projects and themes, and the lack of a theory of change have likely limited the impact of UNDP in Haiti. From interviews, it also seems that this fragmentation of the portfolio affected the perception of certain partners on the technical expertise and the areas of intervention of UNDP.
Addendum to the Common Country Assessment (BCP) 2016-United Nations, Haiti, January 2020
CHAPTER 2: FINDINGS
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