State Department for Economic Planning Dashboard

When the National Integrated Monitoring and Evaluation System (NIMES) was established in Kenya in 2004, one of the challenges facing the Country then was weak M&E culture in the Public Sector. The Public Sector institutions in Kenya had not fully embraced an M&E culture in their programmes and projects implementation. As such decision making in these institutions/organizations was not evidence based.NIMES was one of the government’s efforts to reform the Public Sector towards more evidence-based development results for the invested resources. Monitoring and Evaluation was to be seen as a management tool not auditing, policing or witch-hunting tool. M&E was to aid decision makers in using evidence from M&E systems to assist them make choices. The focus of M&E was to be on results not processes. This therefore called for enhanced capacity to supply M&E information since weak M&E demand was often the root cause of poor quality and quantity of M&E supply. The government adapted M&E weeks/conferences as a technic to promote M&E culture and practice. The Monitoring and Evaluation Directorate (MED) in the State Department for Planning within the National Treasury and Planning has been hosting the National Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) Week/Conference since 2012. Each M&E week espouses a theme focusing attention on a prevailing issue or circumstance in relation to M&E. Over the years, the National M&E Week forum has been attracting an average of 500 participants and representatives from International and regional countries, National, County Governments, Parliamenterians,Private Sector, Academia, and non-state actors professionals into a common unit with a purpose of learning from each other. The forum provides learning platforms and knowledge management hubs on matters concerning monitoring and evaluation fields. Other than M&E weeks, the Directorate in collaboration with stakeholders has: Developed and rolled-out online M&E system(e-NIMES/e-CIMES); Developed Kenya Evaluation Guidelines; M&E Norms and Standards in the Public Sector; Continued capacity building national and county staff on M&E; Revamped the website(monitoring.planning.go.ke) as one-stop shop for NIMES products.Monitoring and Evaluation interest in the Country has greatly improved as witnessed by the adoption of M&E practice across the Public Sector units. M&E has become a big business and industry in Kenya thanks to concerted efforts from the Government of Kenya and Development Partners.

Delegates during the 10th Kenya National M&E Week/Conference, in Kisumu

Over the years the Monitoring and Evaluation Directorate has produced a number of M&E reports through NIMES framework. These documents contain useful information which is meant to aid in decision making. Unfortunately, circulation of these documents has been limited due to various reasons.  Among these include: High cost of production/printing of reports; Cost of storage of huge number of published reports; High cost of delivering to various locations/stakeholders. It is against this background that the Directorate in collaboration with ICT Authority embarked on revamping its website. The website  provides one-stop shop for all NIMES products and outputs. The website will be a channel for increasing transparency, accountability and access to information on the level of implementation of various development initiatives as enshrined in the Constitution of Kenya Articles 10 and 35. 

Since it was launched on 6th April, 2022, we have witnessed huge traffic to the website because access to information now is quick and simultaneous. The users are now preferring soft copies unlike hardcopies which can also be bulky and require storage. The website has saved the government costs of printing huge number of documents and transporting them to various stakeholders.

All Annual Progress Reports (APRs) on the implementation of Medium Term Plans of  Kenya Vision 2030 are now available in the revamped MED website.