Justice Ajaari

Justice Ajaari has more than 20 years professional experience in International Development, Research, Management Consulting, Capacity Building, Monitoring and Evaluation, Strategic Planning, Performance Measurement, Civil Society Engagement, Private Sector Development and Youth and Gender Advocacy. Mr. Ajaari has been providing research, capacity building and monitoring and evaluation technical support to multiple governments, international development organizations and private sector clients globally in a variety of areas, including Health, WASH, Agriculture, Gender and Governance. Amongst these clients are; Government of Ghana, Government of Liberia, African Leaders Malaria Alliance (ALMA), United States Agency for International Development (USAID), UNICEF, United Nations Mission in Liberia (UNMIL), International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), Project Concern International (PCI-Liberia), John Snow Research and Training Inc. (JSI), FRONTLINE AIDS, ACDI/VOCA, Catholic Relief Services (CRS), PATH, Management Systems International (MSI), Mennonite Economic Development Associates (MEDA), Episcopal Relief and Development (ERD), United States Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Compassion International, Carana Corporation, Johns Hopkins Centre for Communication Programs, Abt Associates, JHPIEGO, University Research Company LLC-Center for Human Services (URC), FHI360, Global Communities, Population Services International, Total Family Health Organization (USAID/TFHO) and SEND/West Africa. Mr. Ajaari expertise includes Technical Proposal Development, Project Design, Project Implementation, Project Management, Project Coordination, Development of Activity Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning Systems, Qualitative and Quantitative Research, Data Management, Capacity Building, Data Analysis, Technical Report Write up, Documentation of Lessons Learnt, Change and Success Stories, Research Dissemination, Strategic Planning, Results-Based Management, Process Evaluation, Performance Evaluation and Impact Evaluations. Mr. Ajaari received a Bachelor's degree in Agriculture from the School of Agriculture, university of Cape Coast in Ghana in 2001, and a master’s degree in population based Field Epidemiology from the school of Public Health, University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa in 2008. Mr. Ajaari’s research experience includes works with the prestigious Ifakara Health Institute (IHI) in Tanzania, Kintampo Health Research Center in the middle belt of Ghana and the Savanna Agriculture Research Institute (SARI) in Northern Ghana. Mr. Ajaari has several professional international development certificates and technical publications to his credit. Between November, 2014 and December, 2019, Mr. Ajaari was the Deputy Chief of Party and the Senior Monitoring and Evaluation Advisor on the flagship 10 million Dollars USAID/Ghana Evaluate for Health Project where he carried out five annual Data Quality Assessments (DQA). He also designed, set up and managed the famous USAID/Ghana HPNO Monitoring and Evaluation Community of Practice (MECOP) for five years. Mr Ajaari was also a Co-PI in USAID/Ghana’s HPNO National Longitudinal and Prospective Baseline Studies in 2015, Midline in 2017 and Endline in 2019. He also provided Research, Monitoring, Evaluation, Systems Development and Capacity Building Support in line with USAID guidelines and policies to implementing partners of USAID/Ghana Health Portfolio and some Nutrition, Agriculture and Livelihood related Feed the Future (FtF) projects under the USAID/Ghana Economic Growth Office (EGO) such as USAID/Resilience in Northern Ghana (RING), USAID/SPRING, USAID/Communicate for Health, USAID/WASH for Health, USAID/People for Health, USAID/Systems for Health, USAID/SIPO II, USAID/GHCS-PSM, USAID/Health Keepers Network, USAID/Strengthening the Care Continuum, USAID/RISKS, USAID/IMPACT Malaria, USAID/MalariaCare, USAID/VectorLink, USAID/AIRS, USAID/Saving Maternity Homes, USAID/SHOPS, USAID/VectorWorks, USAID/Maternal and Child Survival Project. Between August, 2020 and March, 2021, Mr. Ajaari is was a Senior Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MEL) Advisor for West Africa; working on Food Security and Nutrition with the 9 million euros West Africa Fruits and Vegetables program which is a flagship program being implemented by a consortium of Wageningen University Centre for Development Innovation of the Netherlands, Advance Consulting of the Netherlands, SNV Netherlands Development Organization, SENSE Research School for Socio-Economic and Natural Sciences of the Environment which is a joint venture of the environmental research institutes of more than ten Dutch universities and research organizations and RESILIENCE Netherlands which is an international network of organizations that carries out research and consultancy projects for clients in emerging markets. Between March, 2021 to April 2022, Mr. Ajaari was the West Africa Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MEL) Specialist on the 23 million dollars USAID/ West Africa flagship MEL/CLA program, Analytical Support Services and Evaluations for Sustainable Systems Program (USAID/WA ASSESS). The program is a flexible inter-agency mechanism for Monitoring and Evaluations, Capacity Building, Learning, Knowledge Management (MEL/CLA) and other analytical support, serving the Regional Economic Growth Office (REGO) of the USAID West Africa Regional Mission. The portfolio includes programs in Agriculture, Trade, Health, Environment, WASH and Energy, running across 21 countries in the West Africa Sub-region. The program is being implemented by a consortium of United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), University of Rhode Island (URI) of the United States and Ghana’s Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST). As the Monitoring and Evaluation Specialist, Mr. Ajaari provides managerial and technical leadership for USAID/ West Africa ASSESS’ Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MEL) activities; collaborates with other technical leads to develop the program framework, MEL Plans, PIRS and Performance Indicators in order to capture Program Performance Results and Provide Effective, Accurate and Timely Monitoring, Evaluation, Learning and Reporting of all program activities. Mr. Ajaari also will work closely with the Monitoring and Evaluation team to design, implement and supervise the program’s Monitoring and Evaluation activities, ensuring that lessons learned are integrated into program implementation to continuously improve quality of interventions and outcomes. Mr. Ajaari is also responsible for documenting and disseminating program successes and challenges to USAID/West Africa. Mr. Ajaari leads in designing and conducting operations research. Between May 2022 to June, 2022, Mr. Ajaari was the Director of Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MEL) and Collaborating, Learning and Adapting (CLA) on the 35 million USAID/Ghana Trade and Investment Project (GTI) which is being implemented by a consortium of international NGOs such as Nathan Associates, ACDI/VOCA, SoCha and International Executive Service Corps (IESC). Between June 2022 to July 2023, Mr. Ajaari was the Interim Chief of Party (COP), Interim Director of Operations (DOO) and the Deputy Chief of Party (DCOP) on the 16.5 million USAID/Ghana flagship Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MEL) Platform Activity with the responsibility of provides a diverse array of demand-driven services to USAID/Ghana, implementing partners (IPs), and Ghanaian stakeholders including Government of Ghana Ministries, Departments, and Agencies, and Ghanaian academic and research institutions with technical MEL services such as; • Performance management support: strengthening results measurement, MEL plan reviews, performance data analysis, and supporting performance management. • Research and analysis: conducting assessments, special studies, and surveys. • Evaluation services: performance and impact evaluations. • Capacity building and learning support: M&E and learning-related training, workshops, and coaching, learning events for USAID staff, implementing partners, and other stakeholders, engagement with Government of Ghana and other local research institutions. • Knowledge management databases and Geographic Information System (GIS) mapping. • Communication and outreach: Strategic communications and dissemination, media, and event support, and designing and producing outreach materials and information. The MEL Platform is led by LINC with exceptional team of experienced implementers, evaluators, and researchers, such as The Cloudburst Group, DevLab@Penn, and the Institute of Statistical, Social, and Economic Research (ISSER) at the University of Ghana. The period of performance for the contract is June 1, 2022 – May 31, 2026 Presently, Mr. Ajaari is the Deputy Director of Research and Learning (DDRL) for Last Mile Health (LMH), an international not for profit development organization that partners with governments to build strong community health systems that equip professionalized community health workers to provide essential, primary healthcare to the world’s most remote communities. Mr. Ajaari is responsible for providing technical oversight on the development and implementation of research protocols and MERL plans for the Liberia country programs and projects, inclusive of learning or evaluation questions, methods, indicators, targets (as applicable), and analytics; contributing to the design of evaluation studies, including household surveys, and oversee their implementation; leading engagement with program teams to ensure MERL plans are fit for purpose and responsive to programmatic priorities and learning needs; adapting and developing data collection tools (e.g., surveys, key informant interview guides, focus group guides) and manage the implementation of those tools and analysis of data; sharing findings with program teams and collaborate to use findings to refine strategies, strengthen programs, and improve activities; supporting other MERL activities as requested by Liberia Monitoring, Evaluation, Research and Learning Director; developing strategy for improving programmatic data use and learning for Liberia team; leading collaboration between Liberia MERL and Programs teams to ensure data from grant reports and routine M&E is fed back to program teams for adaptive management.; strengthening learning exchanges between the Liberia program team and other LMH programs (i.e., ensure relevant MERL findings are shared across counties within Liberia and all country teams, particularly for similar projects and activities); engaging with the data systems team to ensure that LMH’s data portal facilitates data use; supporting the Director, LMERL in strategic planning, budget management, and work plan development for research, MERL planning, and learning activities and providing effective coaching, mentorship and professional development related to MERL plan development and implementation among the Liberia Country Program Monitoring, Evaluation, Research and Learning (MERL) team members