External evaluation of the EU guarantee under the EIB's external lending mandate : final report

According to the EU Evaluation Guidelines, an evaluation is defined as "an evidence-based judgement of the extent to which an intervention has: - Been effective and efficient; - Been relevant given the needs and its objectives; - Been coherent both internally and with other EU policy interventions and - Achieved EU added-value." However, given the short period of time that elapsed since the beginning of the current ELM period, the mid-term evaluation should focus mainly on relevance, and should consequently assess the consistency of the intervention, since the intervention is not mature enough to assess results. The aim of a mid-term evaluation is to assess if the conditions are in place to allow the programme to achieve its objectives. Impact and sustainability are normally used only when the intervention is advanced enough to observe its primary effects, where there is a better opportunity to evaluate its long-term effects. In this respect, the mid-term evaluation will therefore analyse if the expected impacts are likely to be achieved. The evaluation will analyse the probability and potential for longer-term impact to occur. In addition, the selection of case studies will include the maximum of financing operations with full or non-zero disbursement rate, to assess the actual outputs and short term outcomes when feasible. The table below summarises our approach to analyse if the conditions are in place to allow the programme to maximise its impacts and to reach its initial objectives and targets. The analysis will include an assessment of outputs and outcomes whenever the timeframe of the operation has allowed them to come about.