Kaplan Kit Question

Alex is undertaking performance appraisal on his staff for the year. What stage in the training and development process would this be included within?

A Evaluation and validation
B Setting training objectives
C Identification of needs
D Programme design

Professor answer is C.
It is correct that performance appraisal can be done at initial stage to see need for training. However, A can be also correct? Like if we do performance appraisal after training to see progress and aftermaths of trainings.