Project details

As of May 2008, the Ministry of Food and Rural Areas (MLR) of the Federal State of Baden-Wuerttemberg has – within the scope of a tender procedure – commissioned the IfLS to carry out the monitoring and ongoing evaluation of the ‘Measures and Development Plan for Rural Areas in the Federal State of Baden-Wuerttemberg 2007-2013’ (MEPL II). Partners of the IfLS are

• Research Group on Agriculture and Regional Development (Forschungsgruppe Agrar- und Regionalentwicklung Triesdorf – ART),
• ECOZEPT, Freising (with Offenburg branch office),
• Becker, Borchers, Wippel (BBW) – Society for Management Consulting, Freiburg.

The ongoing evaluation of the MEPL II in Baden-Wuerttemberg carried out by the IfLS includes the full range of partial evaluations to be executed during the programme period, especially the mid-term evaluation in 2010 and the ex-post evaluation in 2015. The system of ongoing evaluation – which is aimed at EU-wide for the support period 2007-2013 – implies an advancement of tasks compared to past evaluation systems, where ex-ante, mid-term and ex-post evaluations provided an assessment only at fixed points in time. The corresponding recommendations were therefore partly formulated too late to be able to implement changes in the programme’s execution. Ongoing evaluation is a more continuous process, regarding – on the one hand – the advancement of evaluation methods. On the other hand, recommendations concerning improvements addressed to the administrative authority can be realised during the process of programme implementation, thus facilitating more timely responses if need be. Ongoing evaluation entails a close cooperation and interactive collaboration between the persons in charge of the MEPL II and those in charge of evaluation. Meetings between the MLR, the LEL and the evaluator are held on a regular basis.