Yesterday, marked an important milestone for evidence-informed governance in South Africa, with Cabinet approving the revised National Evaluation Policy Framework (NEPF).
The revised NEPF represents a significant step forward in strengthening South Africa’s National Evaluation System and ensuring that evaluation evidence is more relevant, timely and influential in shaping policy, planning, budgeting and service delivery across all spheres of government.
What’s new in the revised NEPF?
A stronger focus on use and impact – evaluations are explicitly positioned to inform real decisions, with clearer mechanisms for management responses, improvement plans and accountability for follow-through.
Broader and more flexible evaluative approaches – including rapid evaluations, evidence synthesis, performance and expenditure reviews, institutional reviews, systems thinking and foresight tools, ensuring “fit-for-purpose” evaluation across the policy cycle and spheres of government.
Transformative Equity and Climate & Ecosystems Health lenses – formally embedding equity, inclusion and environmental sustainability as core evaluation criteria, reflecting South Africa’s development priorities and constitutional values over and above the OECD DAC criteria.
Digital and data innovation – greater use of data platforms, real-time monitoring, evidence maps and responsible AI to improve access to, and use of, evaluative evidence.
Stronger collaboration and capacity building – reinforcing partnerships across government, academia, civil society and international peers, and re-establishing advisory structures to support quality and learning.
Support for adaptive and transformative governance – positioning evaluation as a tool for learning, innovation and navigating complexity in a rapidly changing policy environment.
The revised NEPF builds on the gains of earlier frameworks while responding to today’s governance, fiscal and development realities. It is a critical enabler for a capable, ethical and developmental state — and a reminder that good evidence is central to better outcomes for citizens.
A huge appreciation to all the stakeholders, local and international who contributed to the revision.
CreativeBox
