RAMSI has had a major impact since it arrived.

• Law and order has been restored, and guns are no longer used by criminals.
• Government revenue has almost tripled, from SI$258 million in 2002, to SI$688 million in 2006.
• Seven recruit classes of new police officers and 70 new prison officers have been recruited and trained.
• Over one thousand public servants have received training in the re-established Institute of Public Administration and Management.
• The economy has been recovering strongly. New sectors are starting to open up or previous sectors are being re-established. For instance, tourist boats are visiting many parts of the country, including the Shortlands, Gizo, the Marovo Lagoon, the Florida Islands, Santa Ana, Lata, Utupua and Tikopia.

RAMSI is not the only reason these advances are being made, but it is playing a large role by providing the environment in which such progress can be made.

But how does RAMSI measure its own progress and performance?

In 2005, a performance framework was established to measure RAMSI’s success and progress. This is a more systematic way of measuring what is being achieved.
It uses four different tools:

• A people’s survey – to be undertaken annually.
  Each year, a team of international and local staff conduct a survey across all nine provinces and Honiara. A statistically representative sample of people are asked their views on a number of issues potentially impacted by RAMSI’s work.
• Capacity building stocktakes for all of RAMSI’s programs
• Analytical reviews by a special team
• Self-evaluation mechanisms by individual programs

The first RAMSI performance report was completed in 2006 and is conducted annually. This process will allow RAMSI to measure its performance in a systematic way, year by year, and help RAMSI report its progress to the Government and people of Solomon Islands, and to the governments of the region.

It will also help RAMSI ensure its work is consistent with the Solomon Islands Government’s own development priorities, which must be RAMSI’s guidelines too. As part of the process, RAMSI will now:

• Regularly review its effectiveness in building capacity
• Undertake an annual survey to ascertain whether people feel that their lives are improving or not

Defining objectives and indicators to measure progress will help the Solomon Islands Government and RAMSI determine the evolution of RAMSI’s work.

Other outside bodies will continue to judge RAMSI’s performance and report on its progress. In 2005, the Pacific Islands Forum’s Eminent Persons Group (EPG) visited Solomon Islands to review the impact of RAMSI in its first two years. The EPG Report [0] – whose main recommendation was that “the tenure of RAMSI should be measured by the achievement of its tasks rather than be time bound” – has served as one of the most respected external assessments of RAMSI to date.

Other reports and assessments of RAMSI by external bodies can be found here [0].