Concern Worldwide ,Consultancy for HEA Endline Assessment Jobs in Malawi

Closing date: 17 Jul 2015

Terms of Reference
(TOR)

Consultant to
support a rapid Household Economy Approach (HEA) Endline Assessment for Concern
Worldwide’s Food, Income and Markets Programme (FIM II), Malawi

Background

The Food, Income and
Markets Programme (FIM) – or Titukuke[1]- is a follow on programme to a
previous sustainable livelihoods programme that began in 2006 in the districts
of Nkhotakota, Lilongwe and Dowa in Malawi. The current programme began in
January 2012. FIM II (as it has become known) seeks to build on the experiences
and lessons learnt to strengthen the gains made during the previous five years
of implementation, as well as initiate the programme in Nsanje- a district with
a high incidence of poverty.

The overall goal of
the programme is – to contribute towards enabling
the poor and vulnerable households to achieve adequate and sustainable access
to – and control over – resources to attain their livelihood rights without
undermining their natural resource base. FIM has the specific
purpose: “Poor
and vulnerable households have increased their local economy and food security
through environmentally sustainable improvements to agriculture production,
support to farmer organization capacity, and agribusiness appropriate to
vulnerable households at the village and district level”.To
achieve this, the programme will address the three main dimensions of poverty
(Assets and return on assets, Inequality and Risk and vulnerability) with
activities focused on the four outcomes below:

****Assets (and
Return on Assets)****

· Outcome 1. Extreme
rural poor have increased and diversified agricultural production leading to
improved nutritional security.

· Outcome 2. Civil
Society organizations and local communities have increased capacity to provide
an enabling environment for extremely poor rural households to have improved
income and access to markets.

****Inequality****

· Outcome 3. Extreme
rural poor women have increased access to services, control over important
resources and influence over decision making.

****Risk and
Vulnerabilities****

· Outcome 4. Key
Institutions and local communities have strengthened capacities to mitigate
against hazards.

FIM II initially
aimed to target approximately 15,000 poor and vulnerable households over four
years in the districts of Lilongwe, Nkhotakhota and Nsanje. Five thousand
(5,000) households will be new to the FIM programme and will be targeted by
interventions aimed at food security. The remaining 10,000 will be either
existing beneficiaries from FIM I, who still need food security assistance (approximately
4,000 households) or have become more food secure and are hence able to
participate in interventions aimed at economic and agriculture development
(approximately 6,000 households).

The programme
focused on building self-help capacities through village level resource
persons, building of assets, access to appropriate credit and community
organization to achieve increased smallholder income, and livelihoods
stability. In addition, the programmes aimed to reduce risk through improved
and diversified crop production, post-harvest management as well as improved
access to investment capital, markets and market information and advocacy.
Furthermore, the programme aimed to build agribusiness management capacity at
both household and farmer group/association level as well as to strengthen
group marketing skills for creating links to the private sector, access to
market information for informed decisions, and strengthening the capacities of
women to improve their household status.

The strategy for
delivering the programme focused on partnership with CBOs and direct
implementation. It has sought to engage in new partnerships with strategically
positioned organisations (civil society and the private sector) at district and
national level to ensure that wider impact is attained. At a national level,
the programme has engaged in advocacy and marketing as well as on research
activities. A vigorous monitoring and evaluation system was instituted and
included the use of participatory monitoring techniques as well as real time
monitoring with digital data gathering devices.

****Objective of the
Initial Support Visit:****

The objective of
this consultancy is to conduct a rapid HEA endline assessment in the four
pre-defined (at baseline) livelihood zones and to compare baseline and endline
figures for specific programme indicators.

In theory it should
be possible to attribute the impact of the programme by comparing changes in
the livelihoods of participants and non participants. The endline will
therefore need to disaggregate the beneficiaries according to the year they
joined the programme to see if there is a gradient of impact; disaggregate by
gender to see if there are any gender specific impacts; and disaggregate by
wealth group to see if poverty status impacts on the ability of a HH to achieve
real change.

The below table
outlines the key programme indicators along with their baseline values which
will need to be reassessed. The Endline will also document any changes in the
proportional size of each wealth ranking group in each livelihood zone, based
on the initial wealth ranking criteria.

Programme
Objectives, Key Indicators, Benchmarks & Monitoring Arrangements ~ FIM II
Results framework****Overall Objective:****Increased food security and
livelihood stability for extreme rural poor in Nsanje, Nkhotakhota and Lilongwe
Districts of Malawi Programme Outcome Indicators Baseline Indicators for
monitoringOutcome 1: Extreme rural poor have increased and diversified
agricultural production leading to improved nutritional security. Decreased
hunger gap for poor households in the target communities as defined by HEA ·
100% households meet their survival threshold (target is to maintain this)

· 71% of households
meet their livelihood protection target is to have (100% able to meet on their
own) or reduce the 9% average deficit

· Very poor and poor
cover 7 months and 9 months from own production. Crop production disaggregated
by beneficiaries and non beneficiaries. Increased yield per hectare for (a)
extreme poor rural farmers directly benefitting from the programme (b) all
farmers in the programme 40% of annual food needs/ acre of land for the very
poor

75% of annual food
needs/acre for all households

Yield by crop in
baseline (****t/acre****)

Very poor Poor Maize
0.7 1.1 Sorghum 0.6 0.8 Rice 1.5 1.9 Millet 0.6 0.8 Cowpeas 0.8 1.0 Beans 0.8
1.0 Cassava 0.9 1.2 Sweet potatoes 4.3 4.7 Groundnuts 1.1 1.2 Land area
cultivated and production disaggregated by crop type and farming practice for
beneficiaries and beneficiaries. ****Outcome 2:**** Extreme rural poor
households have improved income and access to markets through an enabling
environment Increased average income from crop sales amongst targeted poor
households Mk60,143.00 average annual income for poor (Mk73,951)and very poor
(Mk46,376) Quantity and price changes to income sources ****Outcome 4:**** The
extreme rural poor have strengthened capacities to mitigate against hazards
Reduction in negative coping strategy index amongst the targeted poor rural
households. The average CSI is 40 for poor (39) and very poor (41) and 38 for
all households

49% of households
are using high cost coping strategies Routine use of the CSI tool at the same
time each year.

The consultant will
analyse the endline data and compare the results with the baseline to
determine:

· Changes in
cropping patterns, crop diversity and crop production.

· Changes in dietary
diversity

· Changes in income
levels, and sources of income

· Changes in
expenditure levels, patterns of expenditure and discretionary expenditure.

· The impact of any
shocks in the past three years, changes in coping strategies/ response to
shocks and any evidence that CA has increased resilience to climatic shocks.

· Price changes and
the impact on income and expenditure.

· Changes in wealth
ranking – have the farmers moved into a higher or lower wealth group since the
reference year?

· Any gender
specific impacts of the programme.

SpecificActivities

The consultant will
be required to complete the following activities:

Define
the HEA methodology, including tools, human resources and timeline to
complete the necessary data collection (to satisfy above objectives) in
each of the four livelihood zones.
Read
the baseline report and data tables and ensure the proposed HEA Endline
methodology will give comparable data.
Assess
existing capacity of Concern staff to complete the field work and conduct
refresher training if necessary.

a. The FIM team has
seven staff who each have conducted at least one HEA in the past.

Supervise
field data collection by the Concern team.
Compile
and analyse the results of data collection.
Present
findings to the Concern Worldwide team in Malawi.
Compile
findings, clearly illustrating the differences between baseline and
endline, into a concise endline report.

****Methodology****

The consultant will
prepare a proposal, including the methodology and a schedule of work for
his/her visit and submit one month before the start of the visit. During the
visit the consultant will work closely with the FIM Programme Coordinator or
their delegate, liaising closely with the Programmes Director.

****Responsibilities****

Concern
Worldwide will be responsible for

Providing
any key documentation required by the consultant (proposals, M&E
framework, baseline report, baseline datasets etc.)
Ensuring
all transport and other logistical arrangements, including flights, are in
place during the support visit.
Making
staff available to conduct the field work and to attend any necessary
trainings.
Providing
input and feedback on draft report

The Consultant
will be responsible for

Reviewing
key project documents including programme/project proposals, baseline
(including data sets), M&E plan, relevant reports etc.
Defining
the schedule for the support visit (according to requirements in this ToR)
and agreeing with FIM Coordinator at least one month before the visit.
Conducting
capacity assessement of staff to do HEA data collection. This will be done
remotely before the start of the field work.
Conducting
refresher training of Concern Worldwide staff as mandated by results of
capacity assessment.
Coordinate
Concern Worldwide staff to complete the data collection during the
specified timeframe.
Collating
and inserting the data into the HEA tables and analysing the results with
Concern Worldwide staff.
Presenting
the initial findings to Concern Worldwide Malawi team.
Preparing
a brief endline report and incorporating Concern Worldwide feedback.

****Outputs from the
Consultancy****

Agreed
proposal and schedule of work – pre support visit.
Staff HEA
capacity assessment and subsequent refresher training schedule, prior to
visit.
A
concise endline report (20 pages max in .doc and .pdf format) detailing:

o The changes
between baseline and endline figures for the key indicators cited in this ToR.

o Relevent graphs as
agreed with the Food, Income and Markets (FIM) Coordinator.

o Any differences in
proportions of HH in each wealth ranking between baseline and endline.

o Attribution for
any differences noted.

o Conclusions on the
success or otherwise of the programme at allieviating poverty.

o Practical and
SMART recommendations for future programming.

§ These must be
provided with space for Concern Worldwide management to respond, include
timelines and responsible persons.

The HEA
datasets (storage and analysis spreadsheets) in excel format must be
annexed to the report.

****Person
Specification****

· Experience in the
Household Economy Approach (HEA), both field data collection and analysis.

· Involved in at
least 5 previous HEA studies, with 2 at Team Leader level.

· Experience in
training HEA field teams.

· Experience in HEA
Outcomes Analyse.

· Experience in
explaining HEA analysis to non-specialists.

****Timeframe****

This field portion
of the consultancy must be completed by September 18th so as to
ensure the final report is available for the endline evaluation, which will
begin at the beginning of October. It will be up to the consultant to submit a
schedule of work that meets these criteria when submitting an initial draft
proposal for this work.

****Lines of
communication****

The consultant will
report directly to the Food Income and Markets (FIM) Coordinator. They will
liaise closely with the Director of Programmes, the Country Director and the
Project Managers.

[1] TITUKUKE is a
Chichewa word meaning “Let us come together for our Development!”

How to apply:

Please submit an
Expression of Interest by July 17th 2015 toemily.bradley@concern.net
outlining exact availability in line with the approximate timeline. The
expression of interest should contain: (a) a technical offer and (b) a
financial offer, comprising:

Technical
offer:
Up to
date CV of the consultant
Technical
proposition detailing proposed methodology and resources needed (max 3
pages).
An
example of a report from similar work which demonstrates evidence of the
skills and experience required.
Financial
offer:
A list
of all expenses expected to be incurred by the consultant including a
daily rate. (Please note that any per diems will be paid in line with
Concern’s policies and that accommodation and transport arrangements will
be managed by Concern).