The publication of this independent evaluation report is an important milestone in the development of CoST. It focuses on the support provided by the World Bank from 2011- 2014 through its Development Grant Facility (DGF). The World Bank 3-year grant, totaling USD1.5m, provides support to the CoST International Secretariat – currently hosted by the UK-based Engineers Against Poverty (EAP) – to meet the following two objectives:
–  Strengthening existing programmes;
–  Establishing CoST as a global programme

In hindsight, that support has proved critical in helping to establish what is now a robust programme with 15 participating countries, significantly strengthened systems and procedures and benefiting from the financial support of the UK and Dutch Governments.

This report demonstrates that the ambitious targets of the DGF grant were substantially met, despite severe financial constraints during the period of the DGF grant.

The report was executed by Agulhas Applied Knowledge.