Evaluation Office year in review 2024-2025

The evaluation of the organization’s efforts to prevent, mitigate and respond to gender-based violence offers critical insights into the strengths and persistent challenges across policy guidance, programme implementation and organizational support.

While the policy on the prevention of gender-based violence offers strategic direction, its limited visibility and ownership, especially outside the refugee coordination model framework, hinders broader applicability. UNHCR excels in survivor-centred response and case management, with recognized leadership and effective multi-sectoral integration, particularly in refugee settings.

However, systemic issues such as staff burnout, funding constraints and inconsistent monitoring weaken service quality. Efforts to mitigate the risk of gender-based violence and to encourage the widespread adoption of the policy show promise in some sectors but remain inconsistent, often impacted by resource constraints and accountability gaps. Prevention efforts, often reduced to awareness-raising due to funding cuts, have been more successful when rooted in long-term, locally tailored strategies.

The field presence of UNHCR remains its greatest comparative advantage, enhancing the organization’s access and influence, but also exposing the organization to sustainability challenges when other actors withdraw.

The evaluation team made eight recommendations, to which the management response is due before the plenary meeting of the 2025 Executive Committee.

In 2024, the Evaluation Office and the UNHCR Regional Bureau for the Middle East and North Africa jointly commissioned a thematic evaluation of phone-based contact centres covering Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Libya, Mauritania and Tunisia.

These centres provide a means of communicating with refugee communities, allowing for feedback, complaints and referral to services. These centres have generally enhanced access to services across diverse populations, though access challenges persist due to technology adaptation issues, SIM card restrictions and localized information gaps, such as the lack of detailed and location-specific information that interviewees identified as critical to navigating available services.

Efforts to improve efficiency through automation have helped streamline operations but sometimes compromise user satisfaction, particularly among callers who prefer human interaction.

The effectiveness of the centres varies widely by context and vulnerability level of the users, with key trust factors linked to wait times, interpreter quality, and credibility of the system on behalf of the users. As in other evaluations, the centres continue to face challenges in reporting back to users on how users’ input has informed decisions, and there is limited evidence on how their analysis supports adaptive programming.

To further strengthen phone-based contact centres in the region and beyond, the evaluation made eight recommendations, to which a management response is expected by the end of October 2025.

The evaluation of the UNHCR response to the level three crisis in Ukraine, covering the period February 2022 to March 2024, found that UNHCR provided timely, relevant protection and assistance at scale, including effective cash-based interventions, shelter interventions, legal advice and aid, delivered in a manner consistent with humanitarian principles.

Strong partnerships, flexible funding and continuous adaptation by UNHCR to the evolving context were key enablers of the UNHCR response.

The evaluation found that despite the large amount of assistance provided in the form of cash, in-kind support was still overused. The evaluation also highlighted the support by UNHCR for government-led social protection and area-based approaches but noted a lack of coherence across the international humanitarian system on transition planning and support for localization and area-based approaches.

The evaluation of the UNHCR humanitarian response to the Sudan situation from mid-2023 to mid-2024 covered Chad, Egypt, South Sudan and the Sudan.

It found that UNHCR and its partners provided timely emergency aid to forcibly displaced and stateless persons while incorporating a long-term strategy in line with the humanitarian–development–peace nexus approach, though evidence of sustainability and impact remained limited. Investment in the refugee coordination model improved coordination between agencies, but there was inconsistent participation in some countries, which raised concerns.

The evaluation recommended that UNHCR systematically integrate resilience and sustainable responses from the outset of crisis interventions to:

• better address longer-term needs
• apply cross-regional and cross-border best practices
• expand minimum requirements for monitoring
• refine its prioritization approach
• enhance coordination (including through the roll-out of the new refugee coordination model guidance).

The country strategy evaluation for Peru reflects the evolving role of UNHCR as Peru became a key host country, now hosting over 1.5 million Venezuelans.

The evaluation found that UNHCR strengthened asylum and protection systems, supported mixed movement responses and expanded humanitarian aid during the pandemic. It emphasized the success of UNHCR in localizing protection through community-led and refugee-led partnerships and in facilitating social integration. Progress was made with respect to refugees’ access to health and education, but coverage and coordination with authorities remained limited.

The evaluation concluded that the presence of UNHCR significantly enhanced the protection landscape in Peru, but called for stronger inter-agency coordination, more consistent internal collaboration and deeper municipal engagement. Key recommendations included:

• continuing support to national asylum governance
• improving coordination across migration platforms
• expanding livelihood partnerships
• strengthening data systems and field presence.

The evaluation of UNHCR’s Somalia operations highlighted the challenge of delivering large-scale humanitarian responses in fragile, crisis-prone displacement contexts while aiming to reduce aid dependency, building national protection systems, and promoting self-reliance.

Despite the important contribution of UNHCR to policy milestones and efforts to localize aid and strengthen asylum systems, progress has been constrained by resource limitations, rigid planning models, as well as output-focused approaches that have undermined strategic impact. Efforts to integrate conflict- and climate-sensitive programming and shift toward area-based approaches show promise, but urban focused aid has deepened rural-urban gaps and worsened tensions, poverty and environmental harm in cities.

While the strong field presence of UNHCR is an asset, the organization faces growing tension between carrying out its mandate, achieving strategic goals, confronting operational realities and acknowledging the need for adaptive, quality-driven engagement.

A joint multi-country evaluation assessing progress of the inclusion of refugees in national education systems was completed by the Regional Bureau for the East and Horn of Africa and the Great Lakes together with the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD).

The evaluation found that while commitments made with respect to laws, policies, planning and strategy were, by and large, achieved by Member States, no State has fulfilled its commitment to integrate refugee schools into national education systems. Fewer resources were devoted to governance and management, which are needed to facilitate, guide and oversee implementation, supervision and monitoring at the national level.

The evaluation noted that the degree to which refugee inclusion in national education systems can be achieved is affected by complementary rights, notably the right to move, the right to work and the right to documentation; all of which are in the process of being strengthened by IGAD Member States.