An Innovative Method for the Evaluation of LAGs and Rural Development : ‘A Mirror for LAGs’

The Leader initiative delivers a variety of innovative activities. It is a tool for rural development that is used to bring people, communities, and regions together. Experience in the European countries, including the Czech Republic, has shown that the Leader initiative has delivered visible enhancements to rural areas. This paper is based on an internal project of the Institute of Agricultural Economics and Information (IAEI) elaborated in the period from 2014 to 2016. The internal project dealt with the creation of a methodology with a special focus on the self-evaluation of the Local Action Groups (LAG), titled “A Mirror for LAGs”. The aim was to develop and validate a self-evaluation tool for LAGs. Cooperation with fourteen LAGs was used as the methodology of creation. The proposed procedure was tested on two LAGs. The method has two parts; an evaluation of the LAG’s strategy is undertaken as Part A, and an evaluation of the Leader principles as Part B. The evaluation of strategy (Part A) is based on the analysis of LAG activities concerning strategy. In Part A, the following elements are analyzed: the basic characteristics of the LAG, the financial budget, and the way the strategy’s objectives were met. Part A is mostly based on a quantitative approach. The evaluation of the principles (Part B) is mainly based on a qualitative analysis. Part B assesses the most individual way that evaluators (LAG) conduct their work and requires a significant amount of subjective assessment. For example, very often questionnaire surveys, interviews and focus groups are needed to generate data. The evaluation of the Leader principles depends on the evaluator’s skills too