The Institutional Effectiveness Learning Group (IELG), in which Oxfam participates, commissioned independent evaluators, ITAD, to undertake a study of the strengths and challenges of strategic funding. The study is based on the Independent Progress Reviews (IPRs) prepared for the UK's Department of International Development's (DFID) Programme Partnership Arrangement (PPA) funding stream.

The results identify the most evident strengths of strategic funding to be:

• investment in strategic development;
• increased sector networking and sector-wide learning;
• investment in innovative programmes and approaches and 
• strengthened organisational systems and processes. 

The report demonstrates how having access to this type of funding has allowed PPA holders to better plan these kinds of activities in a way that unrestricted income generated from other sources does not always allow organisations to do.