Monitoring and Evaluation

Quality Assurance

Quality management is a mechanism of ensuring that projects are executed to the highest standards specified within given time and resources.  This is achieved through frequent technical and financial audits of projects, employing both deskwork and physical inspection.

The Monitoring and Evaluation Section  was established as part of the National Road Fund Agency (NRFA)  in 2002 with the objectives of providing NRFA with some technical capacity to review technical documentation, undertake technical audit and evaluation of projects being funded from both the road fund and some donor funds/loans. This became even more necessary with added responsibility of coordinating the ROADSIP.

Originally, the Engineering Section was set up and consisted of two sections and managed by two engineers, one in Highway Engineering Section (planning section) and one in Inspectorate Section (monitoring section). 

In fulfillment of the desire by the Committee of Ministers on RMI (Road Management Initiative) and Cooperating Partners that the National Roads Board is strengthened to adequately execute its functions as outlined in the Road Fund Act No. 13 of 2002 and the added role of coordinating of ROADSIP, the Monitoring and Evaluation  Section strives to achieve its objectives.

Like in the previous year (2006), the Monitoring and Evaluation Department continued performing the following functions:

a)             reviewing technical documentation submitted by implementing agencies    (mainly the Road Development Agency – RDA);

b)             carrying out technical audit of road projects (mainly out-sourced );

c)              monitoring project procurement (mainly foreign financed) and;

d)             monitoring project implementation through physical inspection as well as desk    study.

The Department reviewed technical reports such as consultancy reports and tender evaluation reports, draft annual work plan for 2008, project payment certificates, terms of reference for both locally financed as well as foreign financed consultancies etc.

Technical audit tasks were all outsourced due to limited number of technical staff in the Department who, most of the time, were required to process huge volume of payment certificates on daily basis as well as undertake random site inspection and perform other urgent tasks assigned to the Department.

In monitoring project procurement, emphasis was placed more on foreign financed projects for which NRFA had a role of coordinating activities of implementing agencies and reporting to cooperating partners (foreign financiers). For locally financed road projects or activities, the implementing agencies (RDA and RTSA) had delegated responsibility to adjudicate tenders up to specified thresholds by the Zambia National Tender Board through respective tender committees in the two agencies. Tenders above the specified thresholds were always referred to the Zambia National Tender Board to adjudicate.

Monitoring of programme implementation and evaluation was, like for pervious years, achieved through physical inspection of projects as well as contract progress tracking through desk review.

In 2007 around 33 road projects (new construction, upgrading and periodic maintenance) worth K524.5 billion covering 2,400 Km billion were inspected.

Projects Inspected during the Year 2007

In addition to physical inspection the section checked to verify validity, authenticity and correctness of 2,020 payment certificates from the contracts that were active during the year and well over K3.0 billion claimed erroneously on various certificates was detected and saved.

One contract was recommended for termination on account of non performance and poor workmanship on rehabilitation of selected township roads in Kitwe .

Road Fund Programme Performance: 2007 Vs 2006

2007 Plan Vs 2006 Plan

Compared to 2006 as shown in Table 15 above, the road maintenance programme in both activity and cost was much higher in 2007 primarily due to continuation of all performance maintenance contracts whose duration ranged from 3 to 4 years but renewable every year depending on good performance. In addition, more new projects were programmed to start during the year.

Table 16: Progress in 2007 Vs Progress in 2006

Exchange rate is US$1 equivalent to ZMK 3,800.

Like the previous year, late procurement of new contracts for routine maintenance on Trunk, Main and District Roads including periodic maintenance on the same classes of roads contributed to the low overall performance compared to the programme. However, more road maintenance was done in 2007 compared to 2006 particularly on routine maintenance.

Even though a lot of labour-intensive routine maintenance was undertaken during the year, the amount jobs created could not be determined because labour statistics and returns were not submitted.

The condition of the paved road network, based on measuring criteria employed previously (other than the international roughness index, IRI) improved marginally from 65% Good, 15% Fair and 20% poor in December 2006 to 65% Good, 20% Fair and 15% Poor in December 2007 primarily due to the few periodic maintenance contracts initiated covering Great East Road (Mutenguleni to Mwami Border Post), Solwezi – Mwinilunga, Ndola – Mufulira, Sabina – Mufulira, Kaoma – Mongu and Mufulira – Mokambo Roads.