Client
International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD)

Services
Innovation Capacity,
Strategy and Learning

Location
India

Areas
Sustainable Agriculture & Food
Climate Resilience
Sustainable Trade, Business & Industry

From July 2024 to February 2025, Collaborative Impact worked with the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) and its implementing partners to conduct a comprehensive portfolio MEL diagnostic of its portfolio of agricultural development projects and programmes in India and develop an empowering outcome- and utilization-focused MEL framework for its Investments in Agroecology Value Chains Project (IAVCP). The combined process ended in a full-day sensemaking workshop in which stakeholders (IFAD, government, partners, and producer and processing enterprises) discussed and prioritised recommendations and actions.

IFAD has partnered with the Government of India for three decades to drive sustainable rural development. However, persistent MEL challenges and capacity constraints hinder learning and effective use of evidence for outcome-focused improvement, policy engagement and adaptive management, in turn hindering the ability to foster sustainable rural development outcomes in India. There is an urgent need to transform MEL practice into a strategic driver for change is evident.

The Investment in Agroecology Value Chains Project (IAVCP) presented a unique opportunity to pilot an innovative MEL approach that can serve as an example for future programmes and projects. The five-year initiative (2022-2027) by the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) aims to boost small producers’ and enterprises’ incomes by supporting agroecological (AE) business development, strengthening supply chain linkages, and catalyzing commercial investment in AE value chains. The project aims to develop a scalable model for AE value chain development, led by viable and innovative producer and processing enterprises. Its pertinence lies in demonstrating the viability and impact of this private-sector-led approach while showcasing the added value of AE.

Collaborative Impact was tasked with the assignment to:

1. Help design an empowering outcome- and utilisation-focused MEL framework for IAVCP that can generate robust, credible, and actionable evidence on the benefits of AE and the viability and impact of private-sector-led AE value chains, informing investment for scaling.

2. Conduct a comprehensive portfolio MEL diagnostic to identify good practices, lessons learned, and solutions to critical gaps and bottlenecks that can elevate MEL from a compliance tool to a strategic driver of transformative change and impact.

3. Develop an improvement action plan for country- and project-level MEL systems and capacity strengthening that responds to the portfolio and IAVCP MEL insights and recommendations.

The approach for the assignment combined visioning and scoping meetings with a sponsor group of IFAD and partner staff, a desk review and stakeholder consultations, field visits involving interactive workshops with farmers, businesses, and partners, and a converging multi-stakeholder sensemaking workshop. The approach drew on Collaborative Impact’s three key design principles:

• Participation. Engaging stakeholders in co-design and listening to local needs and perspectives to build ownership and buy-in.

• Systems thinking. Building shared understanding of how actors and interventions combine to generate sustainable outcomes and impacts.

• Rigorous innovation. Thoughtfully combining diverse methods and processes to overcome bias, enable systemic analysis, and promote effective evidence uptake/use.

Portfolio-wide MEL Improvement and Capacity Strengthening

The assignment resulted in four prioritised recommendations for strengthening MEL across the IFAD India portfolio (see graphic below): one for the country level, one for the project level, one for the local level, and one focused on upgrading IFAD India’s MEL capacity to support the others. Each recommendation includes a set of prioritized solutions categorized as either ‘Most Urgent’ or ‘Critical but Less Urgent,’ with an indicative set of key actions outined for each solution.

Among the ‘Most Urgent’ solutions are for example:

• Ensure IFAD’s Country Strategy (COSOP) includes core learning questions on recurrent challenges to guide project design and evidence and knowledge building, aligned with India’s priorities for South-South learning and exchange.

• Support all new projects in developing a robust MEL framework at inception, with refined ToCs, clear learning and KM strategies, and and defined MIS specifications linked to COSOP learning questions.

• Develop and implement methodologies for generating evidence on scalable approaches and scaling innovations through mixed-methods impact case studies.

• Strengthen the producers’ capacity to gather and analyse their own data, enabling informed decisions on market linking, finance access, and business growth.

• Contract a pool of dedicated MEL experts with facilitation skills to address project MEL bottlenecks, support evidence building on scalable approaches, and facilitate cross-portfolio learning.

IAVCP MEL Framework Design

Collaborative Impact’s Participatory Impact Assessment & Learning Approach (PIALA) guided the IAVCP MEL design. Rooted in the shared vision of success co-developed with the sponsor group, The the MEL framework is structured around four key dimensions:

• Targeted and practical data collection ensuring evidence uptake for informed decision making: The framework prioritizes Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) that are most relevant for decision-making by farmers, businesses, and investors, ensuring adaptive management and continuous learning while avoiding data overload. Anchored in an Evaluative Theory of Change (EToC), it establishes a structured yet manageable set of 25 KPIs to assess progress and impact.

• Empowering businesses and producers to co-generate and apply evidence: The framework equips producer and processing enterprises with participatory methods and tools to collect and analyze KPI data to strengthen their supply chain linkages, enhance AE benefits, and improve viability and growth potential. Inclusive data collection and sensemaking processes will enable producers to take ownership of their data, enhancing their AE performance, productivity, income, and resilience.

• Demonstrating impact and generating actionable insights for scaling AE VCs: Grant-level impact case studies and aggregated IAVCP-level impact evaluations using a combined Realist Evaluation (RE) and Difference-in-Difference (DiD) approach will enable rigorously assess the effectiveness of private- versus public-led AE value chain development in generating sustained AE benefits at scale, while providing actionable insights to address market and investment barriers, create favorable scaling conditions, and mitigate risks at an early stage.  

• Fostering policy alignment and investment for market integration and wider adoption: Findings from the impact case studies and evaluations will inform investment readiness and cross-sectoral policy coherence aligned with national priorities such as climate-resilient agriculture. This is expected to advance market integration and wider adoption, while also strengthening India’s leadership in the Global South’s transition to sustainable agriculture.

Models and Methods Used

• Participatory Impact Assessment & Learning Approach (PIALA)

• Double Diamond (4D)

• Theory of Systems Change

• Participatory Sensemaking

Reports

• Ling A, Singh G, and Van Hemelrijck A. (2025). Monitoring, Evaluation & Learning (MEL) Discovery Report. Elevating MEL from a compliance tool to a strategic driver of change in IFAD’s India portfolio.

• Van Hemelrijck A. (2025). IFAD’s Investment in Agroecology Value Chains Project (IAVCP) in India: Outcome-focused Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MEL) Framework.