News Brief

The following notice is being issued on behalf of Tom Bernes, Chairman of the Evaluation Group of International Monetary Fund (IMF) Executive Directors:

"The IMF's Evaluation Group of Executive Directors is in the process of reviewing the Fund's experience with external evaluation since the launch of its pilot project on External Evaluation in 1996. The Group hopes to be in a position to present a recommendation to the members of the International Monetary and Financial Committee (IMFC) at its next meeting on April 16, 2000 on ways to strengthen the Fund's capacity to undertake independent evaluation of its operations, policies, and programs."

Questions on this exercise may be addressed to the Public Affairs Division, External Relations Department, International Monetary Fund, Washington D.C. 20431, or by e-mail to publicaffairs@imf.org

Background

In 1996, the Executive Board adopted a policy on external evaluations for an experimental period of two years. Under this policy, up to two or three evaluations would be undertaken each year by independent outside experts selected by the Executive Board and on topics and subject to terms of reference set by the Board, as proposed by an Evaluation Group of IMF Executive Directors (currently comprising Mr. Bernes, Chair, and Messrs. Alexandre Barro Chambrier, Nicolás Eyzaguirre, Abbas Mirakhor, J. de Beaufort Wijnholds, and Yukio Yoshimura). The Evaluation Group has commissioned external evaluations on the IMF's Enhanced Structural Adjustment Facility (ESAF), IMF Surveillance, and IMF Economic Research Activities, which are available on the IMF's web site (www.imf.org) or by request to the External Relations Department.