Costed annual workplan for evaluation for 2026 (First regular session 2026)

About

The 2026 costed annual workplan for the Evaluation Office of UNICEF is presented in response to Executive Board decision 2025/14. It is the first such document to be presented to the Executive Board. It represents a results-based budget for the first implementation year of the Plan for global evaluations, 2026–2029, which in turn represents an overview of the highest-priority global evaluation commitments that will support the full range of accountability and learning needs of UNICEF and partners over the quadrennium.

As a results-based budget, the costed annual workplan identifies the resources required to undertake the highest-criticality evaluations identified in the Plan for global evaluations, 2026–2029 for completion in 2026, and for a select set of evaluations initiated in 2025 and previous years that will be completed in 2026, at a sufficiently high level of timeliness, credibility and utility prescribed in the United Nations Evaluation Group norms and standards. It also identifies the resources required to undertake those cross-cutting evaluative activities – for example, national evaluation capacity development, quality assurance, evaluation syntheses, strategic communications, knowledge management, and evaluation follow-up – that, together with the core evaluation work of the Office, are crucial elements in the drive towards the end result targeted by the evaluation function: to equip UNICEF and its partners, as well as the Executive Board, with the robust independent and impartial evaluative evidence to achieve maximum results for children at scale, manage the numerous risks and seize the numerous opportunities that might arise along the way, and continually learn and adapt in pursuit of these objectives at a particularly pivotal time in its evolution.

United Nations Children’s Fund
Executive Board
First regular session 2026
10–13 February 2026