Development Minister Anne Beate Tvinnereim believes that moving it out of Norad and to Førde will strengthen the evaluation department’s independence. Photo: Haakon Mosvold Larsen
The government is moving workplaces that evaluate Norwegian aid from Oslo to Førde. At least 15 man-years will be affected. – Expensive and poor solution, says Norad’s shop steward.
This work is currently placed organizationally under Norad in Oslo. The government’s aim is for government workplaces to be present in larger parts of the country.
– There is a strong and good professional environment for aid work in Førde, so the evaluation activity of Norwegian aid fits like a glove, says Development Minister Anne Beathe Tvinnereim (Sp).
She points out that the evaluation activities must be independent. It is therefore desirable that the evaluation department should no longer be under Norad.
The relocation of this department applies to nine man-years. The government will look at which other functions can also be moved to reach the number of at least 15 man-years.
The evaluation department that is being moved will be co-located with Norec (formerly the Peace Corps), which moved to Førde six years ago.
Fear of poorer quality
The employee organizations in Norad (AK, NTL, Parat and UNIO) are very surprised by the government’s decision.
– We understand that when completely new state bodies and workplaces are created, that these are considered to be established throughout the country and not just Oslo. But we are completely against already established workplaces being moved, they say in a joint statement to Panorama.
They emphasize that the Evaluation Department in Norad already has an independent function, it is subject to its own instructions and reports directly to the Minister for Foreign Affairs in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the ministerial council in the Ministry of Climate and the Environment. It is today organizationally and administratively rooted in Norad.
– Our fear now with this decision is that the evaluation of Norwegian aid will be qualitatively weakened, say the shop stewards.
They believe that a major advantage of the current solution is that the Evaluation Department has closeness to and insight into the management of Norwegian aid, and that this helps to strengthen the quality of the evaluations. The fear is that this insight will now disappear when the expertise is moved to another government body far away from Norad.
– The evaluation department has developed cutting-edge expertise in both method, assistance and inclusive work processes and was assessed to maintain very high quality by OECD/DAC in 2019. This move, like other relocation processes, can end up being both an expensive and poor solution, with reference to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ own report in connection with the relocation of the Peace Corps to Førde. In the worst case, this could weaken the evaluation function for several years to come, and could thus pose a risk that the management of over NOK 50 billion will become less knowledge-based.
– Expensive and poor solution
Norad’s shop stewards are also concerned about the strain the decision may cause for employees who have to decide whether to move to a completely different part of the country.
– For those affected, it will be very difficult to break away from their existing local environment, especially when this also affects children and family, they say.
According to the union representatives, experience from other relocations shows that a lot of valuable expertise is lost by breaking up established professional environments.
– The relocation of the Evaluation Department in Norad to Førde, therefore, does not appear to be well-founded professionally or economically appropriate in an expensive time for Norwegian society. This appears to be district policy, the result of which is an expensive and poor solution, they conclude.