Spotlight series: Advancing impact evaluations of agricultural climate services in Africa

This paper examines the advancing imapct evaluation of agricultural climate services in Africa. The design and implementation of effective climate information services (CIS) requires understanding the extent to which they impact the decisions and lives of those who use them. Impact evaluations are designed to measure the change in human well-being or other outcomes associated with an intervention. The impact can be direct, indirect, intended, or unintended.

The paper finds that an impact evaluation of an agricultural CIS has two important steps:

1. Establish that farmers are using the CIS to determine the extent to which a CIS effectively provides information that potential users want or need, and
2. Attribute and measure impacts on wellbeing to the CIS to determine if users of the information are able to act on it to inform their livelihoods decisions and evaluate the impact of the information.