Independent Evaluation Group (IEG) Implementation Completion Report (ICR) Review NB Human Wildlife Coexistence Project (P095617) Report Number : ICRR0020404 1. Project Data Project ID Project Name P095617 NB Human Wildlife Coexistence Project Country Practice Area(Lead) Botswana Environment & Natural Resources L/C/TF Number(s) Closing Date (Original) Total Project Cost (USD) TF-96337 31-Jan-2015 20,470,000.00 Bank Approval Date Closing Date (Actual) 19-Nov-2009 31-Jan-2016 IBRD/IDA (USD) Grants (USD) Original Commitment 5,500,000.00 5,500,000.00 Revised Commitment 5,500,000.00 5,500,000.00 Actual 5,499,999.98 5,499,999.98 Sector(s) Other Agriculture, Fishing and Forestry(100%) Theme(s) Biodiversity(40%):Other environment and natural resources management(40%):Environmental policies and institutions(10%):Improving labor markets(10%) Prepared by Reviewed by ICR Review Coordinator Group Keith Robert A. Oblitas Ridley Nelson Christopher David Nelson IEGSD (Unit 4) 2. Project Objectives and Components a. Objectives The Project's Development Objective is: (i) to mitigate human-wildlife conflict through proactive prevention interventions in selected rural communities in Northern Botswana; and, (ii) to offer local people in the project areas employment choices in wildlife-based tourism to benefit directly from the presence of wildlife. Source: Grant Agreement, March 31, 2010 (The wording for the Development Objective in the PAD is identical – refer PAD (October26, 2009) page viii. Independent Evaluation Group (IEG) Implementation Completion Report (ICR) Review NB Human Wildlife Coexistence Project (P095617) b. Were the project objectives/key associated outcome targets revised during implementation? No c. Components Component 1 Strengthening extension service delivery for Human Wildlife Conflict Interventions. (Estimated costs at appraisal financed by grant - US$1.15 million, base costs without contingencies. Actual costs at completion - US$0.94 million.) Strengthening the Department of Wildlife and National Parks (DWNP) extension service delivery through training of district and national staff in administrative and operational activities in planning, decision making, implementing and monitoring for Human Wildlife Conflict Interventions in three project areas; and provision of an enabling environment to implement the Human Wildlife Conflict (HWC) policy of DWNP, and transition from depending on compensation towards engaging communities in proactive conflict prevention strategies. Funding included training in strategic and operation management of HWC for national and district level staff, and community mobilization. Component 2 Strengthening the capacity of the rural target population to implement Human Wildlife Conflict strategies. (estimated costs at appraisal financed by grant - US$3.81 million, base costs without contingencies. Actual costs - US$3.68 million). This simultaneously addressed reducing vulnerability and increasing rural livelihoods and income opportunities at three project sites. This was through building capacity of rural populations to adopt prevention methods in order to mitigate HWC impacts, and building skills to enable finding employment in the tourism industry. Communities were expected to adopt tested deterrent methods to reduce the destruction of crops by elephants, and deploy livestock-predator practices such as fences for cattle. Training of individuals in hospitality management would also be provided. Component 3 Project management support (Estimated costs at appraisal financed by grant - US$0.54 million, base costs without contingencies. Actual costs - US$0.64 million.) Build the capacity of DWNP staff to execute the project, including in procurement, disbursement and external communication skills; and supporting an information dissemination forum, and a project Steering Committee. d. Comments on Project Cost, Financing, Borrower Contribution, and Dates Project Costs, Financing and Borrower Contribution The project was financed through a GEF Grant of $5,5 million of which 96 percent ($5.26 million) was disbursed. The PAD reports estimated Total Project Cost at $20.47 million, as shown above in Section 1, and in the PAD's sections on Project Costs, and Components. The PAD's Project costs of $20.47 million are made up of the Grant amount plus counterpart funds of $14.97 million. Counterpart funding was for ongoing and recurrent expenditures on budget support for community trusts, operational and administrative costs, and direct compensation to farmers for crop and livestock losses. Annex 12 of the PAD provides a breakdown of estimated counterpart funds by project activity. The ICR presents project costs as for the Grant only, and does not present counterpart funding contributions. (The different presentation of project costs in the ICR, compared with the PAD, could have been made clearer in the ICR, and information on actual counterpart expenditures also provided.) Key Dates The Project was approved on 11/19/2009 and closed on 01/31/2016, one year after the scheduled closing date of 01/31/2015 – making for an overall project period of 7 years and 2 months. Mid-term Review was in April 2012, 3 ½ years after Approval, and just short of the MTR date planned at Appraisal of May 2012. Independent Evaluation Group (IEG) Implementation Completion Report (ICR) Review NB Human Wildlife Coexistence Project (P095617) Restructuring: There was one Restructuring – on 04/01/2014 – to extend the closing date by one year, and to adjust targets for several indicators on project efficacy and outcome. 3. Relevance of Objectives & Design a. Relevance of Objectives The project pioneered the development of a Human Wildlife Coexistence (HWC) strategy with proactive community involvement intended to reduce the extent of damage (crops, village infrastructure, other) inflicted by wildlife such as elephants, and lions. A degree of management to reduce wildlife damage was thus introduced, compared with the former provision of only compensation. Compensation was continued, although options to phase out compensation have also been considered. Under the project, local communities. were to be mobilized to manage HWC through a proactive “coexistence” strategy for humans and wildlife. The urgency to find ways to contain animal damage is evident. The elephant population is increasing at an unsustainable rate - in the period 2000-2010, elephant numbers in Botswana doubled. As human and animal numbers increase, the pressures for sustained or even increased human wildlife conflict can be expected to mount. Another Government objective related to managing human-wildlife coexistence was to promote, through the project, employment in wildlife- based tourism through training and promotional activities. Botswana’s biodiversity and land area devoted to preservation of natural resources is considerable – the country has the largest elephant population in the world, and the project area contains numerous large cats, giraffe, antelope and other plains species. The country has been developing wildlife-based tourism for some 30 years, and the tourist industry is Botswana’s second largest contributor to GDP. Innovations in conservation of Botswana’s natural resources are clearly relevant, particularly so when recognizing the role in conservation and welfare of local communities. Thus, the choice of creating employment (objective 2) with the overall strategy to mitigate human-wildlife conflict through proactive prevention interventions (objective 1), would test a co-existence approach to human-wildlife conflict, which could add to Botswana's strategy for reducing conflict. In this, while objective 1 was the fulcrum of the project ("The project's higher-level objectives are to reduce human-wildlife conflicts that pose a threat to conservation and rural development." PAD, page 9), the second objective supports the thrust to provide employment and increase the involvement of communities in wildlife management. The project’s approach is reflected in various Bank and Government strategies: the Bank’s Botswana Country Partnership Framework (2015) includes environmental management. The Bank is preparing a “Wildlife Conflict Management and Biodiversity Conservation for Improved Rural Livelihoods Project,” and will also prepare a policy note on nature-based tourism. Likewise, Government’s National Vision 2016 emphasizes resource conservation and nature-based tourism. The project’s Relevance of Objectives is High. Rating High b. Relevance of Design The Project’s design, appropriately emphasizing both the technical and community outreach of the project and the increased skills required in the Government institutions involved, was framed to achieve the objectives. The small-scale, locally based interventions (such as fencing, elephant deterrents, cattle kraaling, the use of chili peppers, watch dogs, and other actions) made activities more easily implemented by villagers. There were two areas where project design could have taken more account of the evidence and local conditions: • Arrangements to increase institutional capacity for the involved Government agencies could have been stronger. • The target for the key indicator for the outcome objectives – a reduction of 33 percent in the incidence of wildlife conflicts for elephants and lions – was optimistic. In a situation where the conditions for HWC are mounting (increasing human, and especially elephant populations), reaching a reduction of even 10 percent would have been an achievement. The trend of HWC would likely increase as human and wildlife populations get larger, and human land use around wildlife reserve areas grows. However, taking the design as a whole, the overall Relevance of Design is assessed Substantial. Independent Evaluation Group (IEG) Implementation Completion Report (ICR) Review NB Human Wildlife Coexistence Project (P095617) Rating Substantial 4. Achievement of Objectives (Efficacy) PHREVISEDTBL Objective 1 Objective Mitigating HWC through proactive prevention in selected rural communities. Rationale The greatest weakness of the project was in M&E, in particular in measuring results, notably for HWC (Section 10). Field measurements for HWC only began at the end of the project's third year, and no baseline survey was done. This situation makes quantitative assessment difficult. But some observations on results can be made as follows. Results in terms of reducing Human Wildlife Conflicts were to be monitored for the two species that caused the greatest damage to crops, village infrastructure and cattle - elephants and lions. Measurement problems limit the degree to which possible trends can be ascertained. First, data was not collected in the first two years of the project, hence the baseline starts at a higher level/later date. Second, human wildlife conflicts in any year are influenced by rainfall. A dryer than typical wet season causes elephants to seek more of their fodder from crops, as their normal grazing land has less growth. Similarly, gazelles and other plains animals tend to move towards human water sources, attracting predators such as lions nearer to human settlement. Conflicts have, thus, been influenced by weather variability. In two of the last three years of the project, rainfall was below average. This would have influenced HWC upwards with respect to average trends. (The ICR reports that data for 2015, the last year of the project, was not available.) Weather influences, however, are unlikely to have significantly altered the general picture for changes in HWC summarized below: Data presented in the ICR, for both elephant-human conflict and lion-human conflict show no discernible trends for elephants, and even an increase in conflicts with lions during the last three years of the project. Summarizing the situation, the ICR (page 18) comments that ….“there is unlikely to be a decrease in the level of livestock predation by lions. Similarly to the elephant conflicts, lion conflicts have not been reduced as a result of the project interventions.” Given that no discernible trend of reducing HWC has been noted, the project’s effectiveness in reducing HWC was clearly low. Nevertheless, as noted above, in a situation where pressures for greater HWC are there (a fast growing elephant population in particular alongside human population growth), even to halt an upwards trend in HWC represents an achievement, albeit a modest one. But the data or proxy data on trends in HWC, with the gaps in M&E at the beginning of the project, plus other measurement problems, do not provide reliable information to assess HWC. There have been some positive achievements in policy and institutional capacity which would assist future developments: a Human Wildlife Coexistence Strategy has been prepared under the project; the concept of coexistence as a preferred approach compared with compensation in managing human-wildlife intervention is being internalized by the Department of Wildlife and National Parks (DWNP); and a core of staff in the Department have had hands-on experience with the new approach. (The future of compensation still needs to be determined. Under the project, farmers continued to receive compensation. Experience elsewhere in Africa suggests that precipitate removal of compensation may be counterproductive). Rating Modest PHREVISEDTBL Objective 2 Objective Offering local people in the project areas employment choices in wildlife based tourism to benefit directly from the presence of wildlife. Rationale There were 162 persons trained in skills for wildlife based tourism, and 93 were employed after their training. This exceeded project Independent Evaluation Group (IEG) Implementation Completion Report (ICR) Review NB Human Wildlife Coexistence Project (P095617) targets.Training included persons from more vulnerable tribes or groups. The careers for which training was provided included more complex activities such as accounting and lodge management. The quality of training is difficult to gauge from the ICR (a small qualitative survey would have been useful for evaluation purposes), but stakeholder views were positive. The Training was operationally linked with the project's community implementation efforts, and capacity building of regional and centrally based staff. The ICR offers anecdotal evidence of villagers expressing positive views on both the training and employment activities under the project (ICR, page 20). But, as commented on by the Task Team, the most persuasive indicator of the quality of training are the results themselves. A success ratio of 93/162 (57 percent) is good taking into consideration that the trainees were from the local villages, and that training was for middle level jobs, rather than manual-type jobs. Post-training employment for villagers was significant, with diverse training leading to employment, mainly in HWC management, related tourism, and in the general jobs market. On balance, the Efficacy of Objective 2 is rated Substantial. Rating Substantial 5. Efficiency Incremental Cost Analysis. Consistent with GEF methodology, in lieu of standard economic rate of return analysis an Incremental Cost Analysis was undertaken at Appraisal to estimate the project’s efficiency. (Incremental Cost Analysis is the additional costs associated with transforming a project with national or local benefits into one with global environmental benefits.) The baseline scenario (without the project) would entail continuation of costs from human wildlife conflicts (such as crop damage, livestock losses), a possible increase in poaching, the continued costs to DWNP over the longer term of providing compensation for wildlife damages and foregone benefits from eco-tourism. The ICR did not recalculate the incremental costs, but commented on the appraisal analysis. The key point, however, is whether the project resulted in significantly reducing HWC. As discussed under efficacy, the project may have some longer-term impact reducing HWC, the essence of the project’s first objective, but to date impact appears to have been small. For the project’s second objective, the larger than planned number of community members employed in the local wildlife-based tourist industry would have added further benefits to local tourism due to improved capacity of the workforce. Cost-Effectiveness. Instead of using high-cost wildlife-proof fencing, activities for the same purpose were generally low cost; for instance: Chili-pepper deterrents, early maturing maize, herding dogs, simple kraaling structures, and other technologies. Partnerships with local training institutions also kept costs down. However, while costs may have been low, the benefits (i.e. effectiveness through lower HWC) were also low. Strategy and institutional strengthening benefits. Preparation of the Human Wildlife Coexistence Strategy is reported in the ICR to have established a base for future coexistence; and implementation capacity of the Department of Wildlife and National Parks has been strenghthened through various training and on-the-job learning. While difficult to quantify, such actions may have significant longer term benefits. Overall Efficiency. For the first objective, the modest achievements must also be reflected in efficiency. For the second objective, training and employment of community members in the local tourist industry exceeded expectations and can be expected to contribute to local tourism. Use of simple technologies was low cost, but the modest, if discernible at all, reduction in HWC limits the utility of cost-effectiveness comparisons. Spin-off benefits are likely from better focused planning and implementation resulting from the Human Wildlife Coexistence Strategy prepared under the project, and from the increased training and implementation capacity of the DWNP. While efficiency was as planned for the project's second objective, for the first objective, efficiency was weak due to weak impact. Overall, Efficiency was Modest. Efficiency Rating Modest a. If available, enter the Economic Rate of Return (ERR) and/or Financial Rate of Return (FRR) at appraisal and the re-estimated value at evaluation: Rate Available? Point value (%) *Coverage/Scope (%) Independent Evaluation Group (IEG) Implementation Completion Report (ICR) Review NB Human Wildlife Coexistence Project (P095617) 0 Appraisal 0 Not Applicable 0 ICR Estimate 0 Not Applicable * Refers to percent of total project cost for which ERR/FRR was calculated. 6. Outcome The project’s objectives were highly relevant in that they supported Botswana’s goal to bring in a new strategy of proactive coexistence between wildlife and humans to protect its precious land and wildlife resources. The project’s design was substantially relevant overall despite some weaknesses. A program to develop the coexistence strategy was prepared, but indicators of impact were weak, and the capacity of the implementing agency to carry out the project was overestimated. The project satisfactorily created employment, but it largely fell short of decreasing the number of Human Wildlife Conflicts – the evidence shows no discernible improvement, or at best, a small reduction in HWC, and the efficacy and efficiency for this objective are therefore rated modest. There were significant shortcomings in the operation's achievement of its objectives and in its efficiency. Thus, the project's overall Outcome was Moderately Unsatisfactory. a. Outcome Rating Moderately Unsatisfactory 7. Rationale for Risk to Development Outcome Rating The potential from the project’s core activity - proactive interventions to reduce human wildlife conflicts – is, as well demonstrated through the graphs in the ICR, not yet proven in that significant benefits (reduced conflicts) have not yet been demonstrated. There is therefore considerable on-going risk. Whether the project’s proactive human wildlife coexistence approach can work remains to be seen, and to this effect, good M&E will be a critical need. Institutional capacity is another risk. At Government level, the gains made during project implementation to raise staff capacity through training at multiple levels, would need to be at least maintained and, better, to be augmented to handle the larger program that Government intends. A risk for village communities is elite capture of community activities, although the ICR reports that the Village Project Committees effectively managed this risk. A fundamental risk relates to how compensation will be handled in the future. Can the cultural dependency of communities on DWNP, and the system of compensating communities for losses, be broken, or reduced, in favor of an approach of a coexistence strategy implemented by each community, without or with much reduced Government compensation? Experience in Africa has shown that communities tend to consider compensation as a right, and changes can be difficult. Care will thus be needed to find an acceptable and workable balance in compensation and private/community incentives for action. Overall, risk to development outcome is Substantial. a. Risk to Development Outcome Rating Substantial 8. Assessment of Bank Performance a. Quality-at-Entry The decision to bring in a coexistence approach was sound in that it piloted a proactive approach to the natural situation in which humans and animals are living and competing for the same land/crop/wildlife resources. In this proactive way, it brought the community into active engagement in coexistence activities with wildlife. What to do with compensation is still to be tested, but the HWC approach is clearly the right direction. Another sound element of the design was to borrow experience and technology from coexistence approaches in nearby countries. The decision to use DWNP for project management might have resulted in slower capacity-building than other arrangements (such as using Independent Evaluation Group (IEG) Implementation Completion Report (ICR) Review NB Human Wildlife Coexistence Project (P095617) an NGO), but had the merit of building capacity where it was needed for longer-term human wildlife co-existence. The M&E program failed to recognize that data for the base situation was weak, in particular for the project’s most important indicator - HWC trends, although this omission became more recognizable during project implementation. There was also unrealistic optimism in expecting a one third reduction in conflict against the rapidly rising elephant population. However, in other respects, quality at entry was Satisfactory. Quality-at-Entry Rating Satisfactory b. Quality of supervision Supervision missions were regular (about twice annually), and provided, or arranged for, significant technical assistance in GEF procedures, general project management, fiduciary management, and procurement. Botswana had no previous experience with GEF projects. The measures taken to tackle the late start and the reasons for the weakness in the M&E program are not entirely clear, but a change in the target for reducing HWCs was not made until 2014, four years after project approval, suggesting slow remediation for M&E. The team was effective in promoting the Project Steering Committee, and also played a role in formulation of the Policy on Human Wildlife Conflict. It took until the last supervision mission of the project to downgrade project DO and IP performance from Satisfactory to Moderately Unsatisfactory (The Task Team has advised IEG that the downgrade was made because evidence related to the project was not available at project closure, but the data was received shortly after closure). Previous performance had been rated Moderately Satisfactory in the first three project years, and Satisfactory in the last two project years. The change in target for HWC reduction did not resolve the data difficulties for measurement. Generally weak M&E meant that the project did not provide a firm results-base for proceeding and scaling up further. For a pilot operation this is a critical weakness. Supervision performance was Moderately Unsatisfactory. As the project's outcome is rated in the unsatisfactory range (below the line), the balance between the satisfactory quality at entry and moderately unsatisfactory supervision, results in an overall rating of moderately unsatisfactory for the Bank's overall performance. Quality of Supervision Rating Moderately Unsatisfactory Overall Bank Performance Rating Moderately Unsatisfactory 9. Assessment of Borrower Performance a. Government Performance Government provided support to the project throughout implementation, and at a senior level – the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism chaired meetings of the Project Steering Committee. Other Government ministries and agencies were also involved with aspects of the project under their jurisdiction. Government provided the counterpart funding needed.. The Project Steering Committee also involved government officials from district levels, helping to establish greater capabilities in HWC at field levels. Government performance was Satisfactory. Government Performance Rating Satisfactory b. Implementing Agency Performance The Project Implementation Unit was enthusiastic, but capacity was significantly reduced by the resignation of the Project Coordinator and other staff. This affected performance of most project activities, including M&E, financial management and procurement. On the other hand, at the field level, the focal officers performed well in their continuous community interactions. In addition to the problems of the M&E program, sharing of some data was poor. Thus, the ICR comments (page 10) that “the PIU did not provide the data to the Bank implementation support missions, which only received the data in the final evaluation report presented by the Government.” The Bank team "rated the project as moderately unsatisfactory due to the fact that the PIU had not provided the data on the HWC incidents that were key to measure one of the the outcome indicators." (ICR para 80). The data held back was primarily the HWC results, which did not start becoming available until the third year of the project when the Independent Evaluation Group (IEG) Implementation Completion Report (ICR) Review NB Human Wildlife Coexistence Project (P095617) communities had been trained in monitoring HWC. But reducing HWC was the project's primary goal and it was important that the data (even if only existing from the third year, or using proxy indicators or small surveys), was available. Bank supervision missions repeatedly asked for the data, but without result. The PIU's reluctance to release some of the project's key data, substantially influences the performance rating for the implementing agency. Given these shortcomings, performance was moderately unsatisfactory. Implementing Agency Performance Rating Moderately Unsatisfactory Overall Borrower Performance Rating Moderately Unsatisfactory 10. M&E Design, Implementation, & Utilization a. M&E Design M&E was designed to provide information relevant for each of the project’s two objectives, and all of the intermediate monitorable indicators. These were all presented (PAD, Annex 3) in a detailed Results Framework, supplemented by an equally detailed schedule on “Arrangements for Results Monitoring,” specifying quantitative targets by year, and also specifying responsibility, and type and frequency of reporting. The PAD text outlines other details: one person in the PIU would be responsible for reporting results; the M&E system would use a Management-Oriented Monitoring System, supplemented by a Decision Support System; training for M&E would be provided for all extension staff; and there would be some training in M&E for local communities. These combined indicators and arrangements provided a clear base for the M&E program, except in one respect which significantly constrained implementation and utilization. The ICR indicates that baseline data was scarce and even non-existent for some variables. If baseline data had been collected earlier, and data gaps identified, it might have been possible to find data through alternative sources, or to do a survey, or to supplement the particularly important data gaps with proxy data. (e.g. some of the proxy information relevant to reduction of human-wildlife conflicts might have been whether or not a farmer’s crop has been damaged, cattle taken, etc. Farmers can often recall significant production impact information for at least several years) Also, if the significant influence of variations in wet seasons on HWC had been identified earlier, it might have been possible to develop a model taking account of climate in HWC results. As discussed in the ICR (page 9), an alternative (or supplementary) indicator for the project’s first objective might measure the level to which communities adopted various HWC practices. b. M&E Implementation Organizational difficulties, a change in the consulting firm providing technical assistance, and difficulties training DWNP staff and communities, led to an extremely late start in the M&E program. Data on HWC was only collected at the end of the third year of the project. c. M&E Utilization The late provision of data limited its utility. There was also an access problem. The ICR reports that the PIU did not provide HWC data to Bank implementation support missions (the hold-back was in the last three years); and that the Bank team only received the data in the final evaluation report presented by Government. Overall Assessment Because the M&E program started late, was implemented slowly, did not find an alternative way to assess the trend of human wildlife conflicts at the core of the project, had limited utility except in reporting progress against output indicators, and HWC data was not shared with Bank teams, the M&E program had Negligible utility. M&E Quality Rating Negligible Independent Evaluation Group (IEG) Implementation Completion Report (ICR) Review NB Human Wildlife Coexistence Project (P095617) 11. Other Issues a. Safeguards The project triggered two safeguards (Environmental Assessment, OP4.01; and Indigenous Peoples, OP 4.10). Environmental and Social Assessments were carried out during project preparation, which formed the base for preparation of implementation frameworks for each of the two policies. Project activities were chosen which would not require resettlement. Women formed the majority of the beneficiaries. An activity which worked well was the formation of Village Project Committees, which helped coordination and protected against elite capture. No safeguard violations were reported. b. Fiduciary Compliance Financial Management. The implementing Agency- DWNP - maintained adequate financial arrangements and followed the guidelines in the Grant Agreement. Nevertheless, reporting tended to be late, with annual audited reports sometimes over six months in arrears of the reporting deadline. Staff capacity was an issue, however, although it improved with training assistance from the Bank. Procurement. Staff turnover and capacity was a serious issue, which led to procedural inconsistencies, as the involved staff were for most of the project period, inadequately trained. Procurement and financial management irregularitiese is, however, not raised as an issue in the ICR. The Task Team spent considerable time advising the agency on procurement and financial management, assistance. c. Unintended impacts (Positive or Negative) Not Applicable. d. Other --- 12. Ratings Reason for Ratings ICR IEG Disagreements/Comment Piloting a community-based approach to addressing Human Outcome Moderately Satisfactory Moderately Unsatisfactory Wildlife Conflict was not demonstrated. Insufficient data and implementation experience to Risk to Development Outcome Modest Substantial assess longer term success of the HWC approach. As a pilot project in particular, late Bank Performance Moderately Satisfactory Moderately Unsatisfactory and limited initiatives for monitoring HWC. Delayed data sharing with Bank. Borrower Performance Moderately Satisfactory Moderately Unsatisfactory Staff turnover in PIU reducing implementation capacity. Quality of ICR Substantial --- Independent Evaluation Group (IEG) Implementation Completion Report (ICR) Review NB Human Wildlife Coexistence Project (P095617) Note When insufficient information is provided by the Bank for IEG to arrive at a clear rating, IEG will downgrade the relevant ratings as warranted beginning July 1, 2006. The "Reason for Disagreement/Comments" column could cross-reference other sections of the ICR Review, as appropriate. 13. Lessons 1. An M&E program needs to be established at or before the beginning of a project; with monitorable indicators to assess project outputs and key outcomes; an implementation plan; staffing and training; and a baseline survey as needed. This is particularly important for a pilot program testing a new approach destined for wider application. The M&E program started extremely late, and data on Human Wildlife Coexistence - the heart of the project - only started to be collected at the end of the project's third year. In its establishment and implementation, M&E fell short in most of the features above. 2. For project data where baseline information is incomplete or non-existent, proxy data, which can partially serve the same purpose, should be considered early in project implementation. For critically needed information, a targeted survey may also be helpful to obtain the baseline information required. In this case, proxy data, such as the degree to which local communities adopted project recommended practices, and community intentions on whether to continue HWC approaches, would have given some indication of the perceived utility of the project's new approach. For critically needed information such as this a small targeted survey might have been helpful. 3. Stated project objectives and associated indicators need to be realistic in the light of past and anticipated trends, measurable by practical means, and achievable within the project timeframe. In this case, the original indicator on reduced HWC was too ambitious against a rapidly rising elephant population and increasing human pressures. 14. Assessment Recommended? Yes Please explain As part of a group of projects from different countries to compare experience with Human Wildlife Conflict/Coexistence approaches this project would provide useful experience in Coexistence approaches, and also a case example of the importance of appropriate M&E in HWC management. The project experience could also contribute to better understanding of how to balance compensation with incentives for local action. 15. Comments on Quality of ICR The ICR is a candid assessment of the project experience and is in most respects of good quality. It is informative, with a scientifically oriented discussion and enough explanation in the text for the general reader. The use of graphs adds interest to the discussion. Project cost estimates differed from the PAD, as the ICR costs are only for the grant, while in the PAD, counterpart funding was considered part of overall project costs. It would have been helpful if the ICR had clarified and justified the changed approach, and also provided separate information on the amount and activities funded by the counterpart funds. The ICR could have been improved if it had provided more discussion/evidence on several topics: (i) looking to the future, the issue of what to do with the compensation program as HWC becomes more established; (ii) the follow-on situation (does the project under preparation include Independent Evaluation Group (IEG) Implementation Completion Report (ICR) Review NB Human Wildlife Coexistence Project (P095617) on-going support for this project’s communities?); (iii) the responsibilities under the project of the local communities; and, (iv) the lessons did not include M&E which was the project's main weakness (although M&E is discussed in the main text). Nevertheless, although the issues above could have received more attention, in other respects, the ICR provides a probing discussion and its quality is rated substantial. a. Quality of ICR Rating Substantial