The Effects of Monitoring and Evaluation on the Performance of Diary Community Processing Centre in Rwanda
Jean Bosco Harelimana* and Marthe Umugwaneza
Kigali Independent University-ULK, Kigali-Rwanda
*Corresponding author
Jean Bosco Harelimana, Kigali Independent University-ULK, Kigali-Rwanda.
ABSTRACT
This research is interested in carrying out research on the effects of Monitoring and Evaluation on the Performance of Diary Community Processing Centre in Rwanda. In order to assess the relationship between Industrial development projects monitoring and evaluation for projects performance, an assessment conducted demonstrated that Monitoring is being done on monthly, Quarterly, semi-annually and annually and evaluation is done during baseline stage, mid-way of the project, End term of project and ex post of the project.
The results showed that 67.9% were strongly agreed that the developed indicators were being monitored and evaluated regularly, 89.3% of them were also strongly agreed that the developed Performance indicators track project/program changes and provided the details information on the Performance of the program at Burera Diary Ltd while 75% of the reported that there is an appropriate way to monitor and evaluate the project/program progress made along its implementations. The result from interview guide for NIRDA staffs showed that RMMF and M&E manuals were most useful M&E tools used by NIRDA M&E team to monitor and evaluate Burera Diary Ltd projects. They highlighted the aggregates and disaggregates indicators to be monitored and evaluated include, number of new jobs created, changes in sales and productions, changes in technologies used, changes in profits, changes in exports and assess how these listed indicators shall impact the lives of communities,
Finally, the beneficiaries responded that their lives improved and more changes happened in their families like most of them bought land, built the houses and pay the tuition fees of their children.
Keywords: Monitoring, Evaluation, Performance, Program and Project
Introduction
Monitoring is the ongoing collection and analysis of data that informs project managers if progress towards established goals is being achieved. Evaluation is a comprehensive appraisal that looks at the long-term impacts of a project and exposes what worked, what did not, and what should be done differently in future projects.
The objectives of monitoring and evaluation system, is to provide information to key players in order to help them to make decisions based on the past experiences, status of Performance to ensure the management is accountable to stakeholders and partners. Governments and agencies need to know the progress of their actions such as development endeavours and their Performance to achieve the goals and objectives of their institutions. It is for this reason that monitoring and evaluation systems are created to measure and help staff and management to achieve very well their goals and understand their Performance.
Rwandan Projects brought a very great change in the development of Rwanda after genocide against the Tutsi in 1994, more donors began actively supporting Rwanda by creating projects, Government too established its own projects purposely to rebuild Country and uplift the lives of Rwandans, socially and economically. Public and Private sector was also mobilized to put in place their projects not only to develop themselves but also to help in community development, and to develop the Country in general. The services offered by these projects vary from one project to another [1].
Monitoring provides regular information on Performance of different projects being supported by NIRDA while evaluation helps them to know well what they set out to do, what they have accomplished and how they accomplished it [1]. The services that Rwandan projects offer to communities are normally delivered in different ways. In order to know the importance of these projects to the community or to evaluate its contributions, it is necessary to carry out the monitoring and evaluation of these projects.
Mostly, these projects are funded by donors, development agencies and the owners of the projects may even look for loans in banks. Rwandan Projects need therefore to manage the funds that have been allocated to them in a transparent and accountable manner.
Burera Diary as a case also had the same issue of poor Monitoring and evaluation of staff whom failed to carryout effective and efficient to enable better implementation of program and achievements of intended both immediate and intermediate results
Objectives
The general objective is to assess the effects of monitoring and evaluation on industrial development project in Rwanda. The Specific Objectives;
- To assess the monitoring and evaluation tools of diary ltd community processing centre in Burera District;
- To analyse the Performance of diary ltd community processing centre in Burera District;
- To find out the relationship between of Monitoring and Evaluation team on Performance of diary ltd community processing centre in Burera District.
Review of Literature
Zubair carried out a study called a systematic approach for monitoring and evaluating the project progress. The objective of this study was to identify techniques that can be used in the construction industry for monitoring and evaluate the physical progress and also establish how current computer technology can be utilized for monitoring the actual physical progress at the construction site. They discussed the results of a questionnaire survey conducted within the Malaysian Construction Industry and suggest a prototype system, namely Digitalising Construction Monitoring (DCM).
Using emerging technologies and information system the DCM re-engineer the traditional practice for monitoring the project progress. The study revealed that the system can automatically interpret drawings of buildings and extract data on its structural components and store in the database. It can also extract the engineering information from digital images and when these two databases are simulated the percentage of progress can be calculated and viewed in Microsoft Project automatically.
Kimweli analysed the role of monitoring and evaluation practices for the success of donor-funded food security intervention projects in Kenya. The purpose of the study was to find out the role of monitoring and evaluation practices for the success of donor-funded food security intervention projects. The study targeted residents of Kibwezi district who have benefited from donor-funded food security projects. The study utilized a case study design because it was considered a robust research method particularly when a holistic and in-depth investigation is required. A sample of 40 respondents was selected from four Locations; Makindu, Nzambani, Masongaleni and Mtito Andei; from the larger Kibwezi district through purposive sampling.
There Monitoring and evaluation affect positively sustainability of projects in Romania. Investigated the influence of management practices on sustainability of projects in Kangema District (Kenya) [4]. The objective of the study was to assess the influence of manager in practices on sustainability of the projects in Kangema District, Murang’a County, Kenya. It focused on Training, Monitoring and evaluation & Evaluation, Leadership and financial management aspects in relation to project sustainability. The study revealed that sound financial management, appropriate training, leadership and effective Monitoring and evaluation influence the sustainability of the projects. Analysed the sole of Monitoring and evaluation practices to the Performance of donor funded food security intervention projects in Kenya [2]. The purpose of the study was to find out the role of Monitoring and evaluation practices to the Performance of donor funded food security intervention projects [5].
Jackson, Joseph, and Ben analysed factors affecting the effectiveness of Monitoring and evaluation of constituency development fund projects in Kenya [3]. The objective of the study was to establish the factors affecting Monitoring and evaluation on the projects with reference to technical capacity, political influence, stakeholders‟ participation, and budgetary allocation of Constituency Development Fund (CDF) projects in Kenya. Descriptive research design was used. The target population was all the Project Management Committee (PMC) and CDF members. Stratified random sampling was used to get the sample. Data was collected using questionnaires which were subjected to content, face and construct validity tests. Descriptive and inferential, stat sties were used. Mean, standard deviation, correlation, ANOVA and Multiple regression analysis was used to determine the effectiveness of Monitoring and evaluation for CDF projects. The model was able to explain 85.6% of the variances in effectiveness in Monitoring and evaluation thus it’s a significant tool on CDF projects at 5%.
Methodology
This section seeks to examine and understand the methodology that was used to study the role of taxation in the development of Rwandan economy. Tools and techniques and methods had been used to achieve the stated objectives: both primary and secondary data were collected then analysed so that the correlation and strength between variables can be determined. The study uses correlational as it shows the relationship between taxation and Rwandan economy [6].
The population of this study will be composed by projects M&E team, NIRDA staff and industrialist, which is in total of 56.
The researcher interested to use a census approach whereby the department will be represented through NIRDA personal as in charge of this CPC program depends on their level of skills, expertise and specialization and also the Diary of Burera personnel in order to provide accurate information regarding the business activities and Performance as well.
There is a Questionnaire distributed to the entire staff of NIRDA in order to track whom can understand and provide reliable data the same to Burera personnel, this was used to select the staff based on key findings and status towards the good the research conducted. The researcher used the census in data collection where the identified target population all of them will be interviewed for assurance of safe and quality data intends to generate [7].
The census technique is used to interview all targeted population and considered as Sample size as here below presented depends on their skills, knowledge and expertise.
The research used stratified sampling technique in order to consolidate and assess the gathered information’s from different groups of people and department as well as per indicated in the below table:
The identified respondents based on the skills and knowledge in their specialized field, the researcher will approach all targeted population ensure a relevancy and accuracy of the collected information. The above figure for sampling was selected depends on the above reasons mentioned.
Findings and Results
The results show that the big number of respondents is aged between 30-39 years old represented by 55.4% of the entire respondents and the smallest number were those above 60 years old represented by 1.8% of the respondents [8].
The results show that the participants attend this researcher were 56 of who most of them were females (64.3% of the total respondents) while male were 35.7% of the total respondents. This implies that most respondents involved in this study were females due the various factors existed in Rwandan home-grown solution that women were empowered and now are responsible as well as participating in political and job opportunities.
The results show that most respondents are well educated since 26.8 % of the total respondents attended master education level, 37.5% of the total respondents attended bachelor’s degree, 25%% of the total respondents attended secondary school while 8.9% and 1.8 attended secondary and primary education level [9,10].
The findings show that most respondent have at least between 3 years of working experience since 30.4% of them have 3-5 years working experience, 28.6% have 5-7 working experience while 23.2% have 8 and more year of experiences.
The NIRDA staffs were requested to react on the study questions in order to assess the Monitoring and Evaluation tools and its effect on Performance of Industrial development projects in Rwanda, especially for Burera Diary Ltd as a case study.
The findings showed that monitoring was being done on daily basis and most of possible time as highlighted by 39.3% and 46.5% while evaluation done during the starting of the project, midterm and end line of projects as shown by 71.4 of the total respondents.
This shows that both monitoring and evaluation are being used at Burera Diary Ltd to capture the implementation level of the project and document the results being achieved.
The findings show that the respondents were strongly agreed that NIRDA has in place the monitoring and evaluation tools to be used in tracking the Performance and project Performance as reported by hundred percent (28 NIRDA staffs) of respondents. In addition, 92.9% (26 out of 28 NIRDA staffs) reported that M&E manuals and framework (Result monitoring measurement framework (RMMF) guide are existed and useful to capture the needed project data and measurement of Performance level. Meanwhile, M&E are conducted regularly and provide relevant information as reported by a hundred percent of the expected respondents while 96.4% of them were strongly agreed that the content of M&E tools provide enough details on the project implementations which orient project/program at the end. The table 4.7 showed that 67.9% were strongly agreed that the developed indicators were being monitored and evaluated regularly, 89.3% of them were also strongly agreed that the developed Performance indicators track project/program changes and provided the details information on the Performance of the program at Burera Diary Ltd while 75% of the reported that there is an appropriate way to monitor and evaluate the project/program progress made along its implementations [11,12].
This indicates that the M&E indicators were well developed and helpful to attain the Performance project/program implementations at NIRDA, especially at Burera Diary Ltd.
The result from interview of staffs showed that RMMF and M&E manuals were most useful M&E tools used by NIRDA M&E team to monitor and evaluate Burera Diary Ltd projects. They highlighted the aggregates and disaggregates indicators to be monitored and evaluated include number of new assessed market, number of new jobs created, changes in sales and productions, changes in technologies used, changes in profits, changes in exports. And assess how these listed indicators shall impact the lives of communities, the beneficiaries responded that their lives improved and more changes happened in their families like most of them bought land, built the houses and pay the tuition fees of their children [13].
shows that project/program team have enough skills and knowledge and they were expert with relevant qualification as agreed by 92.9% and 96.45 of the respondents while other 7.1% were disagreed about the statement. This helped them to prepare a good Performance on time as reported by 78.6% of the respondents while 92.95% of them the evaluations were conducted regularly respecting of baseline data, midterm and end term evaluation. This infers that the M&E team were strong enough along the period of study to capture the Performance of the projects/programs at Burera Diary Ltd project.
The findings show that 78.6% of the respondents were agreed that the implemented project/program achieved their objectives as they planned, 82.1% of them agreed that scope of implemented project ensured and supported the effectiveness, efficiency of the project sustainability and Performance, 92.9% of them reported that M&E team have required quality standards techniques/procedures to conduct monitoring and evaluation activities. This impacted positively the implemented projects in term of competitiveness as agreed by 96.4% of the respondents. At the end, this showed that the provided support changes the lives conditions of the implemented project beneficiaries and entire communities are strongly agreed by 89.3% of NIRDA staffs involved in the ongoing study. This was either in term of production capacity (as strongly agreed by a hundred percent) and quality (as strongly agreed by 89.3%) as well as profit maximization (as strong agreed by 85.7%) since the projects fund which were available were being used smoothly as were agreed by 78.6 of NIRDA staffs [14].
The results show that 56.3% of the involved project beneficiaries were strongly agreed that monitoring and evaluation held by Burera Diary Ltd under the supervision of NIRDA increased the production level in last three years. This was well proved by an increase in number of employees as 56.3% were also strongly agreed while 43.8% were strongly agreed that their factory got the profit along the last three year of the study. The real evidence is based on 37.5% of the beneficiaries who were strongly disagreed that their factories did get any loses.
The results show that 83.3% of beneficiaries were strongly agreed that the existence of their factories contributed to the Rwanda Economy, the mentioned factories distributed their cheaper quality product everywhere in Rwanda as agreed by 58.3% and 50% respectively.
The results from the interview guide for project’s beneficiaries showed that most of them achieved more like to build their own house, endowment them, starting new generating project as their own investment for better being healthy, buying moto vehicles, they produce various products yogurt. This income generated from the sold product by CPC helped CPC’s beneficiaries to access to heal care through paying mutual health insurance [15].
The findings show that there was an increasing in total revenues from Rwf 22,000,000 in 2018 to Rwf 46,400,000,000 in 2020 and the number of total employees has been increased from 14 employees in 2018 to 27 employees in 2020.
The results showed that there was a strong positive relationship between M&E tools, M&E indicators, M&E team and Burera Diary Ltd Performance along the period of the study from 2018-2020. This means that as M&E increased, Burera Diary Ltd CPC’s Performance also increased accordingly due to the regular follow-ups held by NIRDA. This fits the literature from Jackson, Joseph, and Ben who found that effective Monitoring and evaluation affect the projects with reference to technical capacity, political influence, stakeholders‟ participation of Constituency Development Fund (CDF) projects in Kenya at 85.6% model variances as effectiveness in Monitoring and evaluation at 5% [3].
The findings show that R-square of 0.876 shows that project Performance of Burera Diary Ltd are completely explained by M&E held by Burera Diary Ltd under the supervision of NIRDA along the period of the study i.e., from 2018 to 2020. The null hypothesis states that the mean variance of M&E tools, M&E indicators, M&E team are equal and the results from the table 4.18 shows that p-value was less significant level of 0.05. This lead to reject the null hypothesis and conclude that monitoring and evaluation have different mean. Therefore, since all sig values for the selected CPC were less than 0.05. The research concluded that there was a statistically significant difference between M&E tools, M&E indicators, M&E team toward Performance of selected CPC.
These results from the regression model of Burera Diary Ltd: i.e., Y=8.774 + 0.067 X1 + 0.066 X2 + 0.054 X2, the results from the table 4.22 shows that by holding other variables constant, Burera Diary Ltd Performance was 8.774. On the other side, an increase in one unit of M&E tools lead to an increase of 0.067 unite by holding other variable constant; an increase of one unit in M&E indicators increase 0.066 unite by holding others variable constant while an increase of one unit in M&E team increases 0.054 unite by holding others variable constant. Hypothesis of the research stated that monitoring and evaluation has no significant effect on the Performance of industrial development projects at Burera Diary Ltd from 2018-2020. Finding showed that M&E tools, M&E indicators and M&E team are significant since all t-values in absolute value are greater than 1.96 at significant level of 0.05. This implies that the null hypothesis was rejected and concluded that M&E has good Performance in increases in number of employees resulted from regularly monitoring and evaluation has a positive and significant effect on Performance of industrial of Burera Diary Ltd.
Hypothesis of the research stated that monitoring and evaluation has no significant effect on the Performance of industrial development projects along the period of the study. Finding from the table 4.17 showed that all t-values in absolute value are greater than 1.96 at significant level of 0.05. This implies that the null hypothesis was rejected and concluded that M&E tools, M&E indicators and M&E team are significant and have a positive and significant effect on Performance of Industrial development of Burera Diary Ltd projects in Rwanda.
Conclusion and Recommendations
The results of the study show that both monitoring and evaluation are being used at Burera Diary Ltd under the supervision of NIRDA to capture the implementation level.
The findings demonstrate the results achieved for each project since M&E are conducted regularly and provide relevant information as reported by a hundred percent of the expected respondents while 96.4% of them were strongly agreed that the content of M&E tools provide enough details on the project implementations which orient project/program at the end. It is also show strong enough along the period of study to capture the Performance of the projects/programs at Burera Diary Ltd since the result shows that project/program team have enough skills and knowledge and they were expert with relevant qualification as agreed by 92.9% and 96.45 of the respondents while other 7.1% were disagreed about the statement.
As well, the M&E indicators were well developed and helpful to attain the Performance project/program implementations at Burera Diary Ltd since the study shows that 67.9% were strongly agreed that the developed indicators were being monitored and evaluated regularly, 89.3% of them were also strongly agreed that the developed Performance indicators track project/program changes and provided the details information on the Performance as well as Performance of the projects/program at Burera Diary Ltd while 75% of the reported that there is an appropriate way to monitor and evaluate the project/program progress made along its implementations.
This impacted positively the implemented projects in term of competitiveness as agreed by 96.4% of the respondents. At the end, this showed that the provided support changes the lives conditions of the implemented project beneficiaries and entire communities are strongly agreed by 89.3% of NIRDA staffs involved in the ongoing study. This was either in term of production capacity (as strongly agreed by a hundred percent) and quality (as strongly agreed by 89.3%) as well as profit maximization (as strong agreed by 85.7%) since the projects fund which were available were being used smoothly as were agreed by 78.6 of NIRDA staffs.
Thus, the monitoring and evaluation held by Burera Diary Ltd under the supervision of NIRDA increased the production level in last two years. This was well proved by an increase in number of employees as 56.3% were also strongly agreed while 43.8% were strongly agreed that their factory got the profit along the 3 years of the study. The M&E contributed to beneficiaries lives changes since 58.3% of beneficiaries involved in the study was agreed this. It has been showed that that 83.3% of beneficiaries were strongly agreed that the existence of their factories contributed to the Rwanda Economy, the mentioned factories distributed their cheaper quality product everywhere in Rwanda as agreed by 58.3% and 50% respectively since the production capacity of all mentioned CPC has been increased remarkably from 2018 to 2020. This was due to the crisis resulted from covid-19 global pandemic which affected all economic sector for both supply and demand while the there was an increasing in number of jobs created along the period of the study. On the other side. The regression results show that the coefficients of determination shows that change in CPC Performance in term of total revenues and total employees (as keys CPC indicators) can be jointly explained by M&E tools, M&E indicators and M&E team for all mentioned CPC along the period of the study.
The research found that there was a statistically significant difference between M&E tools, M&E indicators, M&E team toward Performance of selected CPC and Hypothesis test shows that the null hypothesis was rejected and concluded that the M&E tools, M&E indicators and M&E team as regularly regular follow-up held by NIRDA has a positive and significant effect on CPC’s Performance as industrial Research Development Agency Performance since the study fund a positive relationship between M&E tools, M&E indicators and M&E team and CPC Performance.
The study concludes that both monitoring and evaluation are being used at mentioned CPC by Burera Diary Ltd under the supervision of NIRDA to capture the implementation level of the project and the M&E tools were available and provide enough information for the future programming at Burera Diary Ltd and NIRDA as a whole while the M&E indicators were well developed and helpful to attain the Performance project/program implementations at Burera Diary Ltd.
The study also concludes that M&E tools, M&E indicators and M&E team helped CPC’s team to prepare a good Performance on time and M&E team were also strong enough along the period of study to capture the Performance of the projects/programs at Burera Diary Ltd.
It has been concluded that there was a live change CPC Performance in term of production Performance level of beneficiaries in term of total revenues and number of employees within CPC which were under NIRDA control even if they were stacked by ongoing covid-19 global pandemic which affected all economic sector for both supply and demand. The study concluded that there was a job creation in term of increase in number of employees which resulted from regularly monitoring and evaluation chich has a positive and significant effect on Performance of mentioned CPC under control of industrial Research Development Agency.
Based on the finding of this study, both Burera and NIRDA is recommended to ensure and to continue regular M&E as well capacity building on CPC team and develop strategic indicators that further measure the performance of the targeted interventions and come up with positive impact in terms of jobs creations, more productions and sales, expansion of market, increase of quality product etc.
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