"THE IPDC IS A UNIQUE STRUCTURE IN THE MEDIA DEVELOPMENT ECOSYSTEM. The IPDC’s core strength and unique contributions to the media development ecosystem lies in its Member State-driven intergovernmental Council decision-making body, coupled with its support to grassroots projects across the globe on an annual basis. Interviews consistently highlighted the strong alignment of its normative function with key requirements for a healthy media ecosystem. This includes its work on media viability, which stakeholders noted was particularly timely, coming at a moment when many independent media outlets were facing “existential threats”. The IPDC is also the only Special Account within UNESCO’s CI Sector with an explicit focus on journalism education. Interviewees further emphasised the Programme’s unique position to use its Council to hold Member States to account on issues related to journalist safety. The evaluation also generally found that the IPDC’s normative function and grassroots projects are well aligned. Grassroots projects frequently incorporate and localise UNESCO’s global normative instruments, ensuring that standards and tools are applied in contextually relevant ways. This dynamic is most evident in the area of journalist safety, where the Journalist Safety Indicators have been adapted and applied across multiple national settings.
STRONG PERFORMANCE OF THE IPDC’S GRASSROOTS PROJECTS. The projects reviewed primarily contributed to improvements in knowledge, skills and improved practices across a variety of thematics. An important factor is that the IPDC effectively reaches project implementers with access to a diversity of beneficiaries – community, online and traditional media outlets, students, and marginalised groups such as some Indigenous communities in Central America or South-East Asia. Moreover, the IPDC contributes positively to UNESCO Global Priorities, including gender equality and Africa. Projects frequently address women journalists’ safety and participation, and Africa remains a major focus region.
IMPROVED PROCESSES THAT ENABLED EFFICIENCY. Field Offices play a critical role in identifying proposals and implementation monitoring, while the Secretariat is widely perceived to be responsive, manage annual calls transparently and consistently, as well as provide effective backstop support to Field Offices. The latter has implemented several reforms recently to improve the efficiency of processes, including an online portal for proposals, and an IPDC/ Global Media Defence Fund (GMDF) project database.
FINANCIAL SUSTAINABILITY IS A MAJOR RISK TO THE IPDC AND ITS PROJECT IMPLEMENTERS. As the only intergovernmental media development mechanism in the UN system, stakeholders interviewed underlined the importance of its continuity. However, much like other media development initiatives, funding levels have declined since 2020. This has put a strain on resources. In 2024, the Bureau received 117 project proposals but approved 39 (with additional initiatives placed on a reserve list). By comparison, the Bureau approved 86 grassroots projects in 2021. Evaluation participants also pointed to limited funding available to further enhance the IPDC’s contributions to media viability policy and uptake of journalism education curricula. While the Secretariat has the broadest donor base in comparison to UNESCO’s Multi-Donor Partnership on Freedom of Expression and Journalist Safety (MDP) and the GMDF, just four donors provided USD 1 million or more between 2018 and 2025. There is also a perceived ‘competition’ in funding between these three mechanisms. Stakeholders reported that donors often favour vehicles perceived as more flexible and faster to deploy, while the IPDC’s intergovernmental cycle can slow decisions, and politicise normative discussions. At the grassroots project level, partners described post-grant finances as vulnerable, including dependence on short-term and small-scale projects and/or projects downsizing once grants ended. The evaluation found that sustainability planning was often absent or operationally vague among grassroots (despite it being part of IPDC requirements), with plans that assumed follow-on donor funding rather than specifying how activities would be embedded in routine systems and resourced.
IMPACT IN CONTEXT: The Challenges of Short-Term Projects in a Worsening Global Climate for Media Freedom While the evaluation found that IPDC interventions did contribute to gains for its beneficiaries, long-term and systematic changes are harder to demonstrate. While IPDC grassroots projects are typically short-term and small-scale and often operate in contexts that are increasingly hostile to independent media, policy and institutional change require sustained engagement over time, and the involvement of stakeholders across civil society and authorities. This points to an area that merits further exploration. The IPDC’s unique position of supporting grassroots projects globally and international media development actors creates an opportunity for the Programme to facilitate connections between stakeholders.
LIMITED ABILITY TO COMMUNICATE RESULTS AND IMPACT. The IPDC Secretariat has made notable progress in developing a Results Assessment Framework, aimed at capturing the breadth of IPDC supported activities and consistent with its demand-driven approach. As a result, Performance Indicators are largely activity or output level, such as counting the number of projects implemented broken down by thematic area. The IPDC Secretariat introduced an M&E Framework in 2025 and delivered training for Field Offices and grassroots partners to support its implementation. This includes requirements for projects to include performance indicators and guidance on how to collect more outcome level changes. However, the evaluation found a number of gaps to address. Current grassroots project reporting was typically output focused rather than analytical and providing contributions to outcomes; which is a partially understandable limitation given the short implementation timelines of most projects and limited M&E capacity of some partners. The evaluation also found that Field Offices and grassroots projects likely will not have sufficient resources to implement the new M&E Framework. For example, interviews highlighted that they did not have the knowledge or time to conduct Outcome Harvesting workshops, a suggested tool to collect outcome level changes. The RAF also lacks indicators that capture outcome or impact level changes." (Key findings, pages 2-4)