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This project to carry out an independent evaluation of the
SMEPol project was commissioned by the Middle East and North
Africa Office of the Canadian International Development Research
Center (IDRC). RAPID had previously delivered a policy
engagement training course for SMEPOL staff, so already
had a good understanding of the project approach and context.
The evaluation was carried out between August 2005 and March
2006, focusing on two key areas: replication and scoping in
the region.
The SMEPol project, supported by IDRC, CIDA and the Government
of Egypt (GoE), aims to support Egypt's transition towards
a market economy, by assisting the GoE to improve the policy
environment for small and medium enterprises development.
Hosted by the Egyptian Ministry of Finance (MoF), it is doing
this by supporting this ministry, the Ministry of Foreign
Trade and Industry and the Ministry of Investment in the development
of policies, legislation, regulations and procedures to further
support MSME development. The 4 year project started in April
2000 and was extended in July 2004 to December 2005. After
more than four years of activity, the project is considered
by all partners as a success.
Clearly identifying and attributing a projects' influence
on policy - and then drawing lessons - is rarely straightforward.
Our approach to the study was based on the principle of triangulation
and a set of specific individual methods were used, including
project document reviews, composition analysis, literature
reviews and interviews with a range of SMEPOL stakeholders
as well as independent experts on the Middle East. This resulted
in a range of data to support our conclusions and generate
a comprehensive assessment of the evaluation questions. We
believe our assessment of the SMEPOL project, key lessons
and recommendations for future steps in Egypt is robust. We
do stress that our assessment of the potential for replicability
across countries in the Middle East is more preliminary -
given the much wider focus (on 11 other countries) and the
less intensive data collection.
The final report of the evaluation, intended to feed into
the processes of programme development at IDRC, covers four
main sets of issues. First, it provides an assessment of the
SMEPOL project - what happened, what worked and why. Second,
it highlights some lessons for replicability - setting the
findings of the SMEPOL project within the context of the literature
and practical experience in this area. Third, we make recommendations
regarding how Canadian stakeholders might continue to work
on policy development on MSME issues in Egypt. Fourth, we
outline options for replicating SME policy development type
interventions in other parts of the Middle East - based on
an analysis of where the context conditions are favourable
and the types of activities that donors might support in different
contexts.
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