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From
Independent Advisory and Evaluation Service
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Published on
19.11.25
This excerpt was taken from CGIAR’s Independent Advisory and Evaluation Service (IAES) recent blog.
Independent advice works best when it’s coordinated, transparent, and grounded in shared purpose and professional respect. Within the Independent Advisory and Evaluation Service (IAES), the Independent Science for Development Council (ISDC) and Evaluation Function have been doing exactly that by aligning strategic independent proposal and Inception Report reviews and Evaluability Assessments. This time the efforts aim to ensure CGIAR’s 2025–2030 Research and Innovation Portfolio is coherent, credible, evaluable, and ready to deliver impact.
This collaboration within IAES is not new. ISDC and Evaluation Function began aligning their work during the 2022 Portfolio process, setting a strong foundation for joint learning and complementarity. Today, as CGIAR finalizes its 2025–2030 Portfolio, that collaboration has deepened—creating a more coherent, systematic, and forward-looking approach to independent advice.
Two Perspectives, One Goal in Portfolio Advice
ISDC and Evaluation Function come at the same challenge from different angles. ISDC focuses on what’s ahead by providing strategic, science-based advice that helps ensure CGIAR research is credible, relevant, and ready to deliver impact. Evaluation Function looks at how things work in practice by assessing performance, for learning, and accountability from the Inception phase throughout implementation. Together, they offer CGIAR stakeholders both a strategic lens (how to strengthen science and future directions) and a diagnostic lens (what’s working and why).
If differences in advice or recommendations arise, they generally reflect the distinct intent, purpose, and methods of the respective workstream processes. In practice, these variations demonstrate the dynamic, multifaceted nature of scientific and organizational assessments. Both perspectives, independent and evidence-informed, are valid and valuable inputs for decision-making in the design and implementation of the 2025–2030 Portfolio within CGIAR’s complex system. They are complementary parts of a complete picture.