Economic Empowerment Programme Consultant

Terms of Reference (TOR)

Introduction

NCA is an international non-governmental organization that has been working with Afghanistan for over 30 years. NCA’s approach is to work in partnership with national NGOs, in the areas of long term development, humanitarian assistance and advocacy. NCA are developing and implementing an Economic Empowerment programme that addresses the lack of jobs and income opportunities in selected provinces in Afghanistan. The lack of jobs commanding a living wage, pervasive unemployment, extremely low levels of women labour force participation and vulnerable forms of employment in low productivity jobs represent major factors of the high level of poverty in Afghanistan.

  1. Partner Information

CoAR is national NGOs implementing in an enterprise development project in Faryab provinces. ADA is national NGOs working in the development sector implementing value chain development project in Faryabprovince. Nejat center is national NGO, implementing vocational skill project in Faryab province.

Economic Empowerment:

NCA’s economic empowerment programme is building on the experience and successes of the previous livelihoods programme. The new programme represents a shift towards a greater focus on income generation and employment creation, principally through targeted support to both men and women for the development of rural small scale enterprises, value chain development of existing enterprise and provision vocational skills training and tool kits for youth. The economic empowerment program has been managed through three components, i.e. New Enterprises, Existing Enterprises and Vocational skills.

Purpose and Scope:

The purpose of this terms of reference is to identify an individual consultant or firm to conduct research: to identify niche value chains, unleashed business opportunities for enterprise development and market driven vocational skills in the Daikundi, province and do the data analysis and write the final report.

Value Chain Analysis Responsibilities:

The consultant and partner task are dived as follow: the consultant will be responsible for the design of the tools, database, data analysis and report, while partner (ADA) will be responsible for the field work, data collection, enumerators supervision and quality of the data.

  • Develop data collection tools fortwo value chains
  • Design data collection tools, work plan and methodology
  • Map the end markets (ADA)
  • Map the core process in the value chain (ADA)
  • Map the participants / market actors involved in these process (ADA)
  • Develop the value chain map showing flow of goods and linkages between market actors and the end markets (ADA)
  • Analyze the governance structure (ADA)
  • Analysis the support market (ADA)
  • List the constraint at each node (ADA)
  • Identify the technology needs at each level (ADA)
  • Identify the knowledge flow and need for each actors (ADA)
  • Identify the linkages needs (ADA)
  • Identify the business management training needs (ADA)
  • Provide recommendation for each constraints
  • Develop clear work plan for the partners to implement those actions points at each level
  • Data analysis, tabulation and final report will be done by the consultant/firm.

Enterprise Identification Assessment Responsibilities:

The consultant and partner task are dived as follow: the consultant will be responsible for the design of the tools, database, data analysis and report, while partner (COAR) will be responsible for the field work, data collection, enumerators supervision and quality of the data.

Develop assessment tools to identify the 6 potential opportunities for enterprise development by making long list of opportunities by brainstorming, literature review and business panel. Once long list is developed then shortlist of the opportunities should be made by funnel approach or filtering approach. The final shortlist should tested technically and economically, the successful ideas will be elaborated in the form of business plan.

  • Develop both quantitative and qualitative data collection tools using -acceptable methodologies.
  • Training the partners relevant staff in the assessment methods and tools
  • Developing database for data entry,
  • Data cleaning and data analysis
  • Quick screening: shortlisting the business ideas through the specified set of criteria’s
  • Deeply screening: at this step business ideas prioritizing and testing through the specified criteria which have developed at the earlier preparation step.
  • Assessing the market, specifically identify market demand, market access barriers, potential sub-sectors with opportunities for new enterprises.
  • Assessing the feasibility of the business ideas which have passed the screening steps
  • Assessing the economic viability of the enterprise opportunities
  • Developing the business plan for each enterprise opportunities that have passed the earlier steps.
  • Develop provide supervision of data -collection using appropriate methods and procedures to ensure accuracy and quality of data.
  • Final report writing and getting approval from NCA

Vocational Skills Demand Survey Responsibilities:

The consultant and partner task are dived as follow: the consultant will be responsible for the design of the tools, database, data analysis and report, while partner (NeJAT) will be responsible for the field work, data collection, enumerators supervision and quality of the data.

9 vocational skills will be identified in the end of the survey

  • Design the questionnaire for the youth (male/female), enterprises and government organization and secondary data collection.
  • Provide two days orientation training to the NEJAT team
  • Piloting the questionnaire in the field and finalizing
  • Providing on time response to the field enumerators on cell phone while conducting the survey
  • Design the data bases for the data entry in excel sheet
  • Undertaking the data analysis in SPSS
  • Data tabulation
  • Final report drafting and incorporating comments if any

Key Deliverables:

-Inception Report

-Final 3 reports, value chain, enterprise development and vocational skills report

Time Schedule:

  • The estimated time for this consultancy is two month.
  • One week for methodology, data collection tools, work plan,
  • Two week for field work, data collection (This will be done by the partner’s organization)
  • Two week for data cleaning, data analysis and data tabulation
  • Three week for report writing and incorporation of comments from NCA

Budget and Resources:

The consultant/firm will estimate all the related cost of this consultancy including, fees only etc. The partners will do the data collection, it is not part of the responsibilities of the consultant.

13. Submission of Proposals

The consultant/firm will send two short proposal, technical and financial. The technical proposal should explain the value chain analysis, enterprise development and vocational skills methodology, CVs of the consultants if more than one. The financial proposal should contain, detail cost of the consultancy.

Selection Criteria:

The proposal will be selected based on the following criteria

  • Value chain analysis/enterprise development and vocational skills methodology 35 marks
  • Curriculum vitea of the consultant/s 20 marks
  • Similar report written by the consultant 20 marks
  • Financial proposal 25 marks

Submission Guideline:

Submission process:

Both Technical and Financial Proposal should be submitted in soft copy. All proposal documents shall be provided in English language.

Individual consultant, consultancy firm, national NGOs or local capacity builders are requested to submit their technical and financial proposals. Technical Proposals should include the details on methodology, activities and milestones, budget details, time frame, CVs of experts and similar reports written by the consultants.

The proposals should be submitted latest by 16:00 hours, 20 October, 2017 insoft copy to the email address:and Copy stating “Economic empowermentconsultant” in the email subject line.

Onlyshortlistedapplicants/consultancy firmwillbecontacted.NCA/CoARreservestherighttorejectanyorallproposals and isnotboundto any legal claim in this regard. No telephone inquirieswill be entertained.