16th Meeting of Senior Fellowships Officers of the ... - Development

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16th Meeting of Senior Fellowships Officers of the United Nations System and Host Country Agencies
tary resources of one another and many of them had already developed such partnerships.
There were no one-size-fits-all solutions. Each Agency, Fund or Programme had
to develop its own approaches.
42. Another issue of constant relevance to Senior Fellowships Officers was the Evaluation
of Fellowships. Mr. De Tomassi pointed out that the issue had been on the agenda
of previous meetings, as well. Not infrequently, evaluation was wrongly perceived as
auditing or inspection. Evaluation was: “Understanding why and to which extent some
intended or unintended results are achieved and their impact on the stakeholders”. To maximize
the efforts of the Fellowships Services toward a common fellowships evaluation,
it should be ensured that training and fellowships programmes responded to the development
needs of recipient countries as identified in the Poverty Reduction Strategy
Paper (PRSP) which stated as the overreaching principle the national ownership and
leadership of the process, of its products and results.
43. Referring to the item on the Global Review of Fellowships Stipend Rates, Mr. De Tomassi
took the opportunity to welcome the representative of the Conditions of Service
Section of the United Nations. This Section was the sole authority in the UN to make
decisions on stipend rates for each country and had been instrumental in the resolution
of many financial problems which trainees had encountered in host countries.
44. Mr. De Tomassi closed his general introduction with a quotation: “Coming together is
a beginning. Keeping together is progress. Working together is success”.