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Concept note on NEMA
RF_NGO_15_SUDHA
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
N G\o -
This section is a summary of the concept note on NEMA. AFF strongly recommends that (he
entire report be read to understand the basis for the various conclusions.
Background to the study
1.
1.
The Voluntary Sector has been growing fast, with agencies emerging in diverse areas
and particularly in the area of socio-economic development. As the Voluntary sector
becomes more extensive, it appears increasingly necessary to develop accreditation
and evaluation mechanisms. In this context, the Ministry of Health and Family
Welfare, Government of India requested Society for Services to Voluntary Agencies
(SoSVA) to appoint a consultant to carry out a feasibility study for creating a
National Evaluation and Monitoring Agency (provisionally named NEMA) for the
Voluntary sector. SoSVA, after a short listing and evaluation process, retained
A.F.Ferguson & Co. (AFF) to carryout the study.
AFF’s approach to the study
2.
AFF’s approach to conceptualizing NEMA involved four broad steps as shown in
Exhibit 1 below
Exhibit 1
AFF Approach to the study
» Reports on Voluntary sector
• Existing monitoring mechanisms
• Earlier efforts / initiatives (India)
Planning Commission, Charities Aid
Foundation etc.
• Working papers on the voluntary sector
• Evaluation mechanisms of Donors /Funding
agencies
o VA databases
• Survey to elicit preliminary response to NEMA
• Meetings / Discussions with about 70 stakeholders
across Delhi, Maharashtra and Karnataka
- Donors
-
VAs
- Government / Government agencies
• Views, concerns and feedback on need for NEMA
and identity / proposed role of NEMA
Secondary Research
Primary Survey
Concept Note on NEMA
Benchmarks / Evaluation practices
• Evaluation mechanisms / Guidelines of Donors /
International Funding agencies
• Role / structure of similar agencies
- NAAC, ICA1, ICRA - Healthcare accreditation,
• Internet research on International experiences
- Arnova, ISTR, Philippines council for NGO
accreditation,
Ngoresearch.com,
National
Charities Commission UK
AFFMC
Stakeholders’ Workshops
• Workshops in Pune, Bangalore and Delhi
• Participation of over 120 key stakeholders
including VAs, Government representatives and
donors
• Purpose
- Share initial feedback from primary survey
- Opinion generation on need / role / identity of
NEMA
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Concept note on NLMA
3.
The objective of secondary research was to compile information on the existing
monitoring mechanisms and initiatives in the areas of grading / rating in the voluntary
sector and in other areas. AIT also reviewed evaluation practices and structure of
select organizations that undertake rating, accreditation and related services in areas
such as healthcare, education etc. AIT had intensive interactions with stakeholders
through a Primary Survey (70 contacts) and Stakeholder Workshops (120
participants) across Maharashtra, Karnataka and Delhi and elicited focused feedback
on the need for NEMA, the role and the identity of NEMA, to factor the views of the
Voluntary sector in conceptualizing NEMA.
4.
The following paragraphs summarize the conceptual outline of NEMA prepared by
AFF.
NEMA - A Conceptual Outline
Need for NEMA
5.
AFFMC
The key drivers for setting up NEMA is summarized below:
•
The voluntary sector in India has grown both in size and diversity and its role
in the economy has significantly increased. However, growth brings along
concerns relating to institutional strengthening, a decline in quality of service
delivery that need to be addressed.
•
There has been a perceptible shift in the resource mobilization of the voluntary
sector. Today, the voluntary sector receives significant proportion of its funding
from public, Government and foreign donors including Multi-lateral agencies,
making the sector accountable. This coupled with the general opacity in
functioning has put the credibility of the sector at stake. While there is an
urgent need to address both the credibility and the accountability issues, the
existing legal framework does not address these issues adequately.
•
Paradoxically, the Voluntary sector has to contend with multiple guidelines and
additional mechanisms imposed by donors, which has actually made access to
funding more difficult. For instance, within Government, different
ministries/schemes have different guidelines even on the basic criteria such as
years of existence. An accreditation system could enable simplification and
streamlining these guidelines.
•
Donors are constrained in the absence of a mechanism to validate the
‘genuineness’ of VAs and have expressed that an accreditation system could
reduce efforts in shortlisting VAs and enable better selection and in meeting
funding objectives.
•
While there have been efforts at creating validated VA databases and selfregulatory frameworks, these efforts have limitations relating to criteria for
selection as well as comprehensiveness in coverage.
•
The recognition of the need for an accreditation system for VAs is quite clearly
evident from some of the self-regulation initiatives within the sector as well as
Government initiatives. Internationally too, as in Philippines and Canada, this
need has been recognized.
•
A majority ol the VAs (about 85%) met during AFF’s primary survey have
favored creation of NEMA and mentioned “Increased credibility” and
“Institutional strengthening” as key benefits for the sector by creating such an
agency. This finding has been further validated during the Stakeholder
Workshops.
11
I
Concept note on NEMA
6. Considering the above factors, a comprehensive accreditation mechanism does not
only seem desirable but a necessity. NEMA has the potential to further complement
and strengthen the sectoral efforts in this direction as well as to facilitate
institutionalization of standards and performance norms in the Voluntary Sector.
Role and Coverage of NEMA
7. AFF recommends that NEMA be set up as an Accreditation agency. This is to ensure
that at a start up stage, NEMA has a focused agenda to start with. NEMA should
accredit VAs with focus on governance and transparency issues. The objective of the
accreditation would be to certify the genuineness of the Voluntary agencies.
8. In the long term, NEMA could play other key roles as well. NEMA could have an
important information dissemination mechanism in terms of creating databases,
releasing research / working papers, conducting conferences, seminars etc. NEMA
could also be involved in standardizing guidelines and evaluation mechanisms for the
government in an advisory capacity. Considering that, over a period, NEMA would
develop the required skill sets and mechanisms for carrying out detailed assessment
such as pre-funding appraisals, project-monitoring etc. on behalf of donors, NEMA
could examine this option in the long term.
9.
The coverage of NEMA should be phased out and should be initially on a pilot basis
(for eg. health sector VAs in 3 or 4 states) over a period of 3 years. This to ensure that
the accreditation process is adequately ‘tested’ before launching the process al a
national level. NEMA’s accreditation should, in the long term, be available for all
VAs requiring access to public funds.
Proposed Governing Structure for NEMA
10. The proposed Governance structure for NEMA is shown Exhibit 2
Exhibit 2
Proposed Governance Structure
-T——
................- -
. ................................................
-
-
GOVERNING BOARD
V Chairperson cum Chief Executive
Overall direction and policyf
STAKEHOLDERS’
j,,:, council
Voice of the Voluntary
.
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L_J\
| <--------- >
Executive’
COMMITTEES
Specific tasks and activities
Governing Board
11. The Governing Board (GB) would be responsible for overall direction and policymaking for NEMA. One of the above members would be nominated as its
Chairperson cum Chief Executive
Stakeholders' Council initially, to he replaced with Regional Councils later
12. In order to further enhance NEMA’s ability to interact with the sector at large in the
initial stages, AFF recommends constituting a Stakeholder Council. The Stakeholder
AFFMC
iii
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/
Council would be primarily responsible for voicing the concerns in the sector and for
fine-tuning the policy making process of NEMA.
Executive C 'ommittees
13. Executive committees should be focused on specific tasks that would form inputs for
both the operational as well as policy-making activities of NEMA.
Proposed Accreditation Process
14. NEMA’s accreditation could be done through a three-stage process of SelfAssessment, Peer Review cum Audit and Accreditation. The peer review cum audit
would be carried out by a team comprising of NEMA personnel and select members
from a Certified Assessor Panel (CAP), which would be nominated from among the
VAs. The criteria need to be universal and not sector specific, as the focus of
accreditation is on the ‘genuineness’ in terms of its identity, governance, operations
and transparency. Exhibit 3 lists proposed areas for evaluation.
Exhibit 3
Accreditation Criteria - Key areas
Identity
• Should be registered as Trust/ Society/ Section 25 Company with a verifiable physical
address
• Should have been in existence for a minimum of 3 years from date of registration
Management structure
• Appropriate criteria relating to
- Composition of governing board and details of board members
- % of the non-executive members
- Number of Board meetings
- Documentation and circulation of Minutes of Board meetings
- Role of the board in terms of programs, budgets and audited financial statements etc
Responsibility for organisation’s legal compliance
Certificates of satisfaction from current / past Donors
Operations
• Should have adequate systems / processes for Project planning / implementation and
internal control mechanisms
• Defined operating organization structure with defined roles and responsibilities for
personnel
• Appropriateness of qualifications and experience of staff through well defined policies
Financial information dissemination
• Signed audited statements, balance sheet, income & expenditure statement, receipts and
payments account, schedules to these, notes on accounts and the statutory auditors’ report
available for dissemination
• Remuneration and reimbursements to Board members are to be disclosed
• The organisation’s Annual Report be disseminated/ communicated to key stakeholders and
available on iequest every year, within 8 months of the end of the organisation’s financial
year.
Other areas to be evaluated
• Mission / Objectives
• Networking
• Program effectiveness / Impact
• HR Policies / Remuneration
AFFMC
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/
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Concept note on NEMA
15. Key aspects of NEMA’s proposed accreditation process include the following
•
Accreditation could be in the nature of ‘pass/fail’ and based on compliance to
norms at two levels; minimum and desirable
•
All VAs meeting minimum norms could be eligible for accreditation. There
would be no grading among VAs who meet minimum norms. Validity of
accreditation for VAs meeting minimum norms could be 3 years, after which it
needs to be renewed
•
Information on compliance to desired norms could be provided as additional
information (on the lines of the BBB evaluation) along with the accreditation.
The validity of the accreditation for VAs meeting desired norms could be for a
period of 5 years.
Funding Pattern
16. Most of the revenue streams such as accreditation fees, membership fees etc. arc
likely to be substantial only after NEMA gets established and is able to attract a
critical size of accredited members. AFF recommends that the Government should
support NEMA for expenses relating to its creation as well as part of its annual
recurring expense in the initial stages.
17. The accreditation fee for the VAs could be a nominal flat fee or a slab based fee
depending on size (could be based on the average annual outlay of the VA for the past
three years). However, a better way would be make the accreditation fee reimbursable
by the Government/ Donor to the VA as part of their funding to the VA.
18. In the long term, NEMA should aim to meet all its recurring expenses from its own
revenues. This is important to establish and maintain NEMA as a truly independent
evaluation agency. NEMA could enhance its revenue generating potential by carrying
out specific evaluation exercises for donors. Other sources of revenue could include
subscription fees from accredited members who can avail of standard services such as
access to publications, newsletters etc.
Conclusion
19. NEMA could be an important first step towards having a formal approach to
institutionalizing performance and governance norms in the Voluntary sector. The
success in creating and establishing NEMA lies in gaining confidence and
acceptability among the sector through a ‘bottom up’ orientation. AFF believes that
some of the recommendations such as the role of a Stakeholders’ Council are critical
to achieve this.
VW*
20. This concept note would be discussed with stakeholders through a final
Dissemination Workshop to be held this month. The objective of the Dissemination
Workshop would be to share AFF’s concept note on NEMA in order to enable finetuning of the recommendations. Further to this, AFF would prepare its final report
detailing the following for operationalizing NEMA
AFFMC
•
Financial feasibility
•
Operating framework covering
Institutional structure and
•
Project Promotion Plan and Funding Strategy
Evaluation
policy
and
guidelines
and
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