Health policy and planning
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Evaluation researchers have confirmed the importance of conference evaluation, but there remains little research on the topic, perhaps in part because evaluation methodology related to conference impact is underdeveloped. We conducted a study evaluating a 4-day long health conference, the Second Global Symposium on Health Systems Research (HSR), which took place in Beijing in November 2012. ⋯ Participants noted that the Symposium influenced the field of HSR only in so far as it influenced the capacity of stakeholders, but did not lead to any high level agenda or policy changes, perhaps due to the insufficient length of time (7 months) between the Symposium and post-conference follow-up. This study provides an illustration of a framework useful for conference organizers in the evaluation of future conferences, and of a unique methodology for evaluation researchers.
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Lack of political commitment has been identified as a primary reason for the low priority that food and nutrition interventions receive from national governments relative to the high disease burden caused by malnutrition. Researchers have identified a number of factors that contribute to food and nutrition's 'low-priority cycle' on national policy agendas, but few tools exist to rapidly measure political commitment and identify opportunities to advance food and nutrition on the policy agenda. This article presents a theory-based rapid assessment approach to gauging countries' level of political commitment to food and nutrition security and identifying opportunities to advance food and nutrition on the policy agenda. ⋯ In addition, whereas the low cohesion of the policy community has been viewed a major underlying cause of the low-priority status of food and nutrition, the analysis finds that policy community cohesion and having a well thought-out policy alternative were present in most countries. This tool may be useful to policymakers and planners providing information that can be used to benchmark and/or evaluate advocacy efforts to advance reforms in the food and nutrition sector; furthermore, the results can help identify specific strategies that can be employed to move the food and nutrition agenda forward. This tool complements others that have been recently developed to measure national commitment to advancing food and nutrition security.