Economist Professor Peter Quartey has emphasized the importance of strong monitoring and evaluation systems in implementing key policy initiatives, especially as donor support continues to decline.
Prof. Quartey, who also serves as Board Chairman of the Development Insight Hub, urged the government to reinforce its M&E frameworks to effectively drive industrial development.
He highlighted the need to focus on Ghana’s youthful population, stressing that equipping young people with the right skills is essential for sustainable economic growth and long-term national development.
“So every program, every policy, every strategy, you have to evaluate it. It has to be monitored and also evaluated. Monitoring is an ongoing process. Evaluation at a certain terminal point, where you evaluate. Now, if you look at a lot of government programs, we don’t monitor enough, and we don’t evaluate.
The idea of this is to get young people to get into the evaluation business. We are equipping them, for they are the future generations”.
“We are equipping them for evaluation; we are equipping them for all the activities that can require it, and this also provides a job opportunity for them because once they become certified, any job outlets or avenues, we can recommend them, or they themselves can apply and then get jobs.”
It’s also good for the nation because, as a country, we need to be evaluating programs so that we see where there are gaps. So we quickly fill the gap.
We don’t wait till the end and realise it has failed, and when it is success, we replicate or even scale it up.
