Page - (000109) - in Evaluating Climate Change Action for Sustainable Development

topic that ishighon thepolitical agenda forashortperiodonly.The results that are of interest for thewider publicmaterialize onlywith a certain time lag andarenot available with the first 3–5 years of a project. In fact, more time between the intervention and the evaluation would be needed in order to assess whether the adaptationmeasureshavebeeneffectiveandcontributed to increased resilience,or whether mitigationmeasures finally resulted in the expected reduction of green- house gas emissions. This also leads to the question if a highly diverse portfolio covering a timeframeof 12years canbe assessedwith the samemethodology. Finally themethodologicalchallenges toassesseffectivenessalsodependonthe topic. For adaptation interventions they are considerably higher than for those projects in the field of mitigation. Contrary to the field of mitigation, no clear metric and reliable baseline data exist for measuring adaptation and a lot of the measures are rathermore of a qualitative than quantitative nature. Therefore, it is more difficult to find adequate indicators,which canmeasure effectiveness of the interventions.Thus,more timeneeds tobeinvested in thedevelopmentofbaselines andmeasurement, reporting, and verification systems.Moreover, aggregating and scoringwill remaindifficult. Finally the influenceandeffectivenessofprojectsworkingonthepolicy level to create a better climate change framework is difficult tomeasure. The assessment concentrated here on interviewswith Swiss experts engaged in policy dialogue in international institutions and initiatives andon the institutions’ results reporting. 5.5.3 ForPractitioners/ProgramManagers • Results reporting: As in other areas of intervention, the commondifficulties in assessing results statementsatoutcomeand impact levelhavebeenexperienced in the climate change assessment. It revealed several lessons in termofResult Based Management (RBM) and monitoring for project managers of climate change relevant project. Despite the fact that the reorganization process of SDC (2008–2012) has focused on result orientation and that results based management within SECO has been improved, it appears still premature to expect comprehensive and well-documented result reporting on all interven- tions.This is especially thecase for theearlier projects under review.Given the fact that the design of projects in terms of climate change has improved significantly over time, it can be expected that a similar assessment in a few yearswouldbemoresuccessful ingatheringquantitativeandqualitative results, thus allowing for an aggregation at higher level. However, this depends on the developmentof result frameworkswithsmartandstandardizedindicatorsacross theportfolio.Consequentbaselinestudiesandtheonsetandrigorousmonitoring during implementation are further preconditions. Thisdoesnotmeanthatgatheringresultsonclimatechangeeffectivenesswill becomeaneasytask.Theabove-mentionedmeasuresneedsignificant resources. Consequently the expectation on a quantitative monitoring of GHG emission 5 Lessons fromTakingStockof 12Years ofSwiss InternationalCooperation. . . 91