Question NW1040 to the Minister of Social Development

Reply:

(a) Apart from monitoring statistical trends such as the changes to poverty produced by STATSSA, the department also conducts periodical impact evaluations

The social development sector has institutionalised the results-based management approach in contributing to the desired developmental state as outlined in the National Development Plan vision 2030. The department has been committed to the use of evidence from evaluations to inform decision making by managers, improve policy formulation and programme performance.

The department has conducted a number of evaluation studies to measure the effectiveness, outcomes, sustainability and impacts of the services delivered to communities and especially poor and vulnerable households, as well as gather an understanding of the lessons to be learnt. A brief outline of the evaluations that have been conducted in the last five years is as follows:

• Implementation evaluation of the Older Persons Act (OPA) to understand how the Older Persons Act 13 of 2006 is implemented (or how it is working) and how it can be strengthened. Evaluation report and the improvement plan have been completed and are in the process of Cabinet approval through the Department of Planning Monitoring and Evaluation. Some of the findings were used in the review of the Older Persons Act.
• Evaluation of You Only Live Once (YOLO) Programme to assess the effectiveness, efficiency, relevance and sustainability of the YOLO programme targeting 15-24 year olds and to determine the improvements to be made. The intention is to determine the immediate outcomes of the programme with regard to the extent to which YOLO contributes to increased knowledge, reduced negative attitudes and norms, reduction in risk behaviors’, and increased testing and adherence, all of which contribute to reducing HIV transmission. Evaluation report and the improvement plan has been completed. The findings were used to strengthen the programme.
• Evaluation of NPO regulatory system to assess how effective the system of NPO delivery is and how it can be strengthened. Evaluation report and the improvement plan have been completed. Some of the findings of the evaluation will be used for the review of the NPO Act Evaluation report and the improvement plan have been approved by Cabinet. The Department of Planning Monitoring and Evaluation has been monitoring the progress on the implantation of the improvement plan.
• Evaluation of Household Food and Nutrition programme to assess the appropriateness of the design and implementation of the national integrated food security strategy during the first year and to understand whether the strategy is addressing the issues of hunger in South Africa. An improvement plan was developed to ensure that findings and recommendations are used to strengthen the programme.

(b) The National Drug Master Plan provides a multisectoral blueprint for South Africa’s response to substance abuse. It is aimed at improving efficiency and effectiveness and interventions in preventing substance abuse by providing a clear national policy statement, leadership and coordination of activities related to countering the substance abuse problem in South Africa. The implementation of the NDMP 2013 – 2017, ensured that South Africa reaffirmed its commitment to effectively addressing and countering the world drug problem in partnership with every local, national and international stakeholders. NDMP 2013 – 2017 was fully implemented. The implementation evaluation of NDMP 2013 – 2017 was conducted in order to understand whether, and how it has been implemented and how likely it is to facilitate efficient and effective service delivery across different institutions and programmes for reducing substance abuse. Amongst the recommendations provided from the implementation evaluation report were the following: The NDMP needs to be reviewed and harmonise its approaches; the Provincial Substance Abuse Forums and the Local Drug Action Committees be strengthened and it should have an Implementation Plan. The NDMP 2013 – 2017 was reviewed and NDMP 2019 – 2024. The NDMP 2019-2024 was approved by Cabinet in October 2019. Government Departments are currently being capacitated to implement the NDMP guided by the Implementation Plan