The evaluation department of the Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation, together with the evaluation units of the Global Environment Facility, the United Nation Environment Programme and the Green Climate Fund, in collaboration with the secretariat for the Government of Norway's International Climate and Forest Initiative, organized an international learning event on evaluating international forest initiatives with particula

At its 51^st meeting in October 2016, the GEF Council requested the Trustee, in cooperation with the Secretariat, to initiate discussions on the 7^th replenishment of resources of the GEF Trust Fund (GEF-7).The 2^nd replenishment meeting provided an opportunity for Contributing Participants to review GEF performance and evaluate progress, assess future funding needs, and agree on a financing framework.

On September 8, 2017 from 11:30-12:30 pm (Balcony E), Anupam Anand and Geeta Batra of the Independent Evaluation Office of the Global Environment Facility (GEFIEO), led a session on Innovations in evaluating the impact of environmental interventions for the MERL Tech DC Conference. The session focused on experiences from the GEFIEO on using innovative technology and tools, machine learning, geospaital and econometric methods.

The 19^th session of the Conference of the Parties (COP 13) to the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) takes places in Ordos, Inner Mongolia, China. Juha I. Uitto, Director of the Independent Evaluation Office of the GEF, presented findings of the recently completed GEF Land Degradation Focal Area Study and shared innovative approaches to assessing impacts in GEF land degradation projects.

Juha I. Uitto (Director, Independent Evaluation Office of the GEF) was invited to the "Meet the Author" session of the Annual Natural Hazards Research and Applications Workshop where he presented the books Evaluating Climate Change Action for Sustainable Development, edited by Juha I. Uitto, Jyotsna Puri, and Rob D.