End-term Evaluation of Bottom Up Project in Ethiopia
Despite COVID-19, the war in Tigray and flooding in Afar, Bottom Up was relevant and largely effective. The evaluation credits the project's flexible change management for this. A low-cost, eco-friendly IPM method now replicated across the country is its main impact, while international sourcing and consumer engagement targets were mostly missed.
Overview
This end-term evaluation covered the EU-funded Bottom Up project (1 April 2019 to 31 March 2023). Solidaridad implemented it with Ethical Trade Denmark, MVO Netherlands and Ethiopian partners ETIDI, ETGAMA and ECPGEA. The project aimed to build a sustainable, inclusive and transparent cotton and garment value chain from Ethiopian farms and factories to European buyers and consumers. It worked with smallholder farmers (through Dansha Cotton Producers Union), commercial farms, ginners and textile and garment factories in Ethiopia, and with businesses and consumers in the Netherlands, Denmark and Germany. The evaluation assessed relevance, effectiveness, efficiency, impact and sustainability (OECD-DAC, excluding coherence) to draw lessons and recommendations for future projects.
Key findings
- 2,608 smallholder farmers adopted better practices in line with CmiA, 104.32% of the 2,500 target. 89% of the certified union's cotton was internally verified as sustainable, against none at baseline in 2019.
- 10 factories complied with social standards (BSCI/WRAP; target 8) and 9 with environmental standards (ZDHC/OEKO-STeP; target 8). The overall compliance rate of textile and garment factories reached 85%.
- Only 1 of 4 targeted producers supplied verified lint cotton to factories (25%), and only 1 of 2 targeted EU buyers sourced from participating factories (50%).
- Only 5 of 8 targeted factories had implemented at least two measures to improve working conditions for women, and only 5 of 8 publicly reported on sustainability (62.5% each).
- European consumer reach exceeded targets in all three countries (NL 8,515,502; DK 550,215; GER 917,074), but online engagements did not achieve the targeted consumer engagement.
- In Year III the project fully executed 76.92% of planned activities, after Year II was severely affected by COVID-19 and the war in Tigray.
- In the factory survey, 85.7% of 42 respondents agreed they felt confident to report sexual harassment. The project contributed to the National Gender Mainstream Guideline, and 5 factories developed or improved gender policies.
In figures
104.32 % of target
125 % of target
112.5 % of target
62.5 % of target
50 % of target
25 % of target
Data table
| Item | % of target |
|---|---|
| Farmers adopting better practices (2,608 of 2,500) | 104.32 |
| Factories meeting social standards (10 of 8) | 125 |
| Factories meeting environmental standards (9 of 8) | 112.5 |
| Factories with 2+ measures for women (5 of 8) | 62.5 |
| EU buyers sourcing (1 of 2) | 50 |
| Producers supplying verified lint (1 of 4) | 25 |
| Target | 100 |
Recommendations
- Design future projects to focus on either the bottom or the upper tier of the cotton-textile value chain rather than every tier at once.
- Improve documentation of reports and log frames, using project management and log-frame software, to support collaboration and M&E.
- Give more attention to Integrated Crop Management and Integrated Soil Fertility Management alongside sustainable IPM and improved seed.
- Adopt Business Intelligence tools to measure factories' sustainability performance.
- Strengthen the industry working group through partnership with academia for research and knowledge transfer.
- Build resilience into the value chain, alongside traceability, inclusion and transparency, given Ethiopia's political instability.
- Define social inclusion targets and indicators covering people with disabilities, and use interactive, wiki-enabled vlogs for consumer engagement.
Lessons learned
- Commitment to flexibility in response to changing contexts was the primary lesson and was key to results in fragile and conflict-affected settings.
- The strong partnerships created for gender mainstreaming were crucial.
- Capacity building, workshops and industry-wide experience sharing were pivotal for sustainable production and for policy advocacy.
- A comprehensive approach involving stakeholders at every tier of the value chain is needed for sustainability.
- A pragmatic internal verification scheme worked when external verification was impossible because of force majeure events.
Methodology
Ex-post mixed-methods evaluation, described as quasi-experimental and following a constructivist, outcome-based and co-design approach. It drew on 23 key informant interviews across 17 beneficiary and stakeholder organisations, a Kobo survey of 47 workers in 4 factories, observations at 4 factories in May 2023, and a review of project documents. Qualitative data were analysed thematically in Dedoose and quantitative data descriptively in SPSS.
Limitations
- The ToR contained around 40 research questions, and time was too limited to answer them all. Cost-effectiveness, total benefits versus expenditure, and delivery against the implementation plan were not assessed.
- The final Year 4 report was not available, so Year 4 results and outputs were largely not considered.
- Data collection took longer than expected because of respondents' availability.
- A planned farm observation could not take place because of security issues.