UNDP Jobs - 48852- National Consultant to Rview the the Banking and F

National Consultant to Rview the the Banking and Financial Policies and Assess their Supportiveness to Service Delivery to Crop and Livestock Farmers

Location :

Kampala, UGANDA

Type of Contract :

Individual Contract

Starting Date :

04-Sep-2014

Application Deadline :

26-Aug-14 (Midnight New York, USA)

Post Level :

National Consultant

Duration of Initial Contract :

30 working days spread over 3 months

Languages Required :

English

Expected Duration of Assignment :

30 days

UNDP is committed to achieving workforce diversity in terms of gender, nationality and culture. Individuals from minority groups, indigenous groups and persons with disabilities are equally encouraged to apply. All applications will be treated with the strictest confidence. UNDP does not tolerate sexual exploitation and abuse, any kind of harassment, including sexual harassment, and discrimination. All selected candidates will, therefore, undergo rigorous reference and background checks.

Background

The cattle corridor of Uganda has experienced dramatic land and vegetation degradation driven by a combination of inappropriate land use (agricultural encroachment into reserves) and the weakening of pastoralism as a production system. These are in turn driven by high population growth, high dependence on natural resources coupled with poor resource management, and poor economic development, poverty and more recently climate change. Pastoralism is the main economic activity in the corridor, but crop and charcoal production are also significantly sources of income from utilization of natural resources.

The Government of Uganda through the Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries (MAAIF) with support from United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Global Environmental Facility (GEF) is implementing the project "Enabling environment for sustainable land management (SLM) to overcome land degradation in some of Uganda’s Cattle Corridor Districts, namely Kamuli and Nakasongola.

The overall goal of the project is Sustainable Land Management providing the basis for economic development, food security and sustainable livelihoods while restoring the ecological integrity of the Cattle Corridor ecosystem. The objective of the project is to provide land users and managers with the enabling policy, institutional and capacity environment for effective adoption of SLM within the complexity of the cattle corridor production system. This objective will be achieved through strengthening the policy, regulatory and institutional frameworks to support sustainable land and charcoal management in the cattle corridor, use of Knowledge as a basis for land use planning and improvement of dryland farming and pastoralism, and, facilitation of Local economic development through diversification and access to finance and insurance.

Uganda’s financial system is composed of formal, semiformal and informal institutions. The formal institutions include banks, Microfinance Deposit-taking institutions, Credit Institutions, Insurance companies, Development Banks, Pension Funds and Capital Markets. The semi informal institutions include Savings and Credit Cooperative Associations (SACCO) and other Microfinance institutions, whereas the informal ones are mostly village savings and loans associations. Formal institutions are less prominent in rural areas than urban areas and they only serve 14% of the rural population. Informal institutions play an important role in the rural service provisions and serve approximately 12% of the rural population.
These numbers indicate that Uganda’s financial system is still quite shallow. With regard to access to finance, 62% of Uganda’s population has no access whatsoever to financial services. The number of the population holding accounts in banks is 4 million or 33% of the 12 million who are bankable. The savings to GDP ratio is still low at 16%. In addition, financial intermediation is poor as indicated by the stock of private sector credit of 11.8% of GDP.
The formal sector encompassing the Central bank, 15 commercial banks (Tier 1), 8 credit institutions (Tier 2), and since 2004 microfinance deposit-taking institutions (Tier 3), National Social Security Fund (NSSF), a Post bank, 18 insurance companies, 82 Forex bureaux, 3 development institutions, and a stock exchange. The informal sector comprises of a wide range of moneylenders. While Uganda has a well-developed and diversified microfinance industry; it nonetheless suffers low capitalization and legal restrictions. These handicaps limit the industry’s ability to meet the development finance needs of the rural and micro enterprise sector that forms the bulk of Uganda’s productive enterprises and account for more than 50 percent of GDP. Thus, microfinance cannot overcome the chronic shortage of larger and longer-term loans to small scale enterprises, especially in the commercial farming sector.

The UNDP in partnership with MTIC is therefore, seeking the services of a Consultant whose assignment will be to carry out a comprehensive review of all policies and legislation relevant to ensure that national policies are or can be made more enabling for service delivery by financial institutions. The consultant will propose policy and regulatory measures, as well as define optimal institutional arrangements for attaining effective financial services to crop and livestock farmers.

Objective of assignment;

Overall the assignment is to review existing policies and legal /institutional arrangements that relate to banking and financial services delivery with a view of identifying gaps and recommend appropriate policy and legal measures to ensure appropriate and effective inclusion to financial services to crop and livestock farmers. The activity will focus on identifying policies that form the basis for regulation of financial service delivery to farmers, analyse the opportunities presented and the barriers to service delivery, finally generating a policy brief and suggesting measures that can be taken nationally to improve service delivery to farmers.

Specific objectives;

Identify the need for and the financial services required by the crop and livestock farmers;
To review existing policies and legal arrangements in the banking and finance sector (particularly Tier 4) with a view of: identifying opportunities; identifying gaps; and barriers in the existing policies that limit growth of financial service delivery systems to crop and livestock farmers.
To propose a mechanism for establishment and operationalization of financial services delivery systems to mobile pastoralists and crop farmers in the dry lands;
To recommend appropriate policy and legal measures to ensure appropriate and effective financial services delivery to crop and livestock farmers.

Duties and Responsibilities

Scope of work;

The Consultant will carry out the following tasks:

Identify all the stakeholders in the financing sub-sector and analyze the effectiveness of their operations in ensuring sustainable and effective service delivery to crop and livestock farmers;
Carry out a comprehensive review (including stakeholder consultations) of the existing policies, legislations and institutional arrangements in the banking and financing systems to identify barriers, opportunities and gaps to effective service delivery to crop and livestock farmers in the cattle corridor of Uganda;
Review banking and financial policies and regulatory frameworks from other EAC and COMESA, with respect to support to crop and livestock farmers to foster learning and adoption of good practices in Uganda;
Identify appropriate financing options for livestock and crop farmers in the cattle corridor;
Propose the most appropriate policy, legislative and institutional measures for ensuring appropriate and effective financial services delivery in the ‘cattle corridor’ and in Uganda;
Present a draft report for stakeholders validation
Prepare a final report and policy brief(s) with recommendations to inform policy.

Final Deliverables;

An inception report explaining the approaches, schedules of the detailed activities and expected time of delivery of the assignment. Estimated Duration - 2days;
Draft report presented for validation,including reports of stakeholder consultative meetings. Estimated Duration - 20days;
Final report/policy brief(s) submitted. Estimated Duration - 8 days.

Note:

All the above deliverables are to be review and approved by Directors: MTIC and MoFED , PC MAAIF and Team Leader E&E, UNDP

Institutional Arrangement;

The consultant shall work closely with the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Cooperatives and MoFPED under the supervision of the Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries (MAAIF) through the SLM steering committee. The Project Management Unit (PMU) in MAAIF shall monitor progress against planned activities/deliverables and report to UNDP. Disbursement of funds from UNDP to the consultant shall be made upon receipt of certification from MAAIF. S(he) will consult with relevant stakeholders and will report to the UNDP Country Director on all contractual obligations.

Competencies

Demonstrates integrity and ethical standards;
Mature judgment and initiative;
Ability to present complex issues in a simple and clear manner;
Ability to work under pressure;
Initiative and independence;
Goodorganisational skills.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

Ugandan National holding at least a Master’s Degree in Economic Policy or related field with a bias in development financing, and from a recognized and reputable institution.

Experiences required:

A solid track record in policy analysis, with at least five years of experience;
The consultant must have undertaken similar or related assignment in East Africa or Uganda in the last 5 years;
Familiar with socio-economic set up of crop and livestock producing communities in semi-arid / dry land farming systems;
Demonstrated experience of working with agriculture financing mechanisms, government agencies and communities will be an added advantage;
The consultant should have a clear understanding of the financing sector systems of Uganda.
Demonstrated evidence of capacity to produce and present good reports.

Language

The language of the assignment shall be English. All deliverables shall be in English language. Therefore, excellent English communication skills (Oral, written, and presentation) are essential.

Price Proposal and Schedule of Payments;

Payments shall be made on certification of work following agreed deliverables as shown below:

On completion of deliverable no.1 - 20%;
On completion of no.2 - 40%;
On completion of no.3 - 40%.

Evaluation Method and Criteria:

Cumulative analysis

The award of the contract shall be made to the individual consultant whose offer has been evaluated and determined as:

Responsive/compliant/acceptable; and
Having received the highest score out of a pre-determined set of weighted technical and financial criteria specific to the solicitation.
Technical Criteria weight; - 70%;
Financial Criteria weight; - 30%.

Only candidates obtaining a minimum of 49 points (70% of the total technical points) would be considered for the Financial Evaluation

Technical Criteria – Maximum 70 points

Criteria

Education (Advanced degree) - 15;
Knowledge of in policy analysis and familiar with socio-economic set up of crop and livestock producing communities in semi-arid/dry land farming systems - 15;
Relevant experience in conducting similar assignments - 10;
Relevance of experience in report writing and drafting - 10;
Description of approach/methodology to assignment - 20.

Application procedure:

The consultant is required to submit an on line application with the documents/information in one single PDF document:

Duly accomplished Letter of Confirmation of Interest and Availability using the template provided by UNDP (Annex II);
Personal CV or P11, indicating all past experience from similar projects, as well as the contact details (email and telephone number) of the Candidate and at least three (3) professional references.

Technical proposal:

Brief description of why the individual considers him/herself as the most suitable for the assignment;
A methodology, on how they will approach and complete the assignment;
Financial proposal that indicates the all-inclusive fixed total contract price, supported by a breakdown of costs, as per template provided (Annex II).

For further information, please email fredah.zawedde@undp.org and copy justine.naiga-bagonza@undp.org .
Annexes:

Annex I: Individual Contractor General Terms and Conditions;
Annex II: Template to Confirmation of Interest and Availability and Submit the Financial Proposal.

Annexes (to be downloaded from UNDP Uganda website, procurement notices section:http://www.ug.undp.org).