The Independent Commission for Aid Impact's annual report 2012-13 : fifth report of session 2013-14, Vol. 1: Report, together with formal minutes, oral and written evidence

The Independent Commission on Aid Impact (ICAI) was established in May 2011 with a strategic aim to provide independent scrutiny of UK aid spending, to promote the delivery of value for money for British taxpayers and the maximisation of the impact of aid.

ICAI reports directly to Parliament through the International Development Committee, which established a sub-Committee on the work of ICAI in October 2012.

This has worked well, and has helped foster closer working arrangements that promote the sharing of ideas between IDC inquires and the evaluations that ICAI undertakes.

ICAI's Annual Report 2012-13 was generally well-received, as was the Commission's overall performance over the past year.

The Annual Report published ICAI's budget for the first time and another excellent innovation was a section following up recommendations made in ICAI's Year 1 reports.

ICAI should include a more detailed assessment of the impact of UK aid, including overarching lessons for DFID and should do more to promote lesson-learning across evaluations. This could be done by seminars and outreach events following each evaluation, which would help improve knowledge dissemination, both to DFID and the wider development community.

A clear message this year was that DFID must think more strategically about its management of large contracts, especially those with multilateral agencies, nongovernmental organisations and contractors.

This seems a fundamental criticism of the Department given the significance of these relationships.

DFID should pay closer attention to how it selects external agencies as implementing bodies, and how much it pays for their services.