UNDP Jobs - 49567- Consultant for Conducting Study on Structural Issu

Consultant for Conducting Study on Structural Issues in Agriculture of Ajara AR

Location :

Batumi, GEORGIA

Type of Contract :

Individual Contract

Starting Date :

Application Deadline :

25-Sep-14 (Midnight New York, USA)

Post Level :

International Consultant

Duration of Initial Contract :

Languages Required :

English

Expected Duration of Assignment :

22 days with 20 days in Ajara

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

UNDP implements EU and Government of Ajara supported project ENPARD Ajara – Support to Agriculture Development of Ajara AR which is a part of ENPARD Georgia Program. The project has two main objectives (1) to increase returns to farming in Ajara and (2) to strengthen the capability of the Ministry of Agriculture of the Autonomous Republic of Ajara and its agencies in policy analysis and related tasks.

In the course of achieving these objectives, and in responding to the priorities set out in the Ajara Regional Development Strategy, support will be provided under the three components:

Increasing and improving services to small farmers;
Development of business oriented small farmers’ groups, associations and other forms of profit-based collaborative actions between farmers; and
Institutional development of the Ministry of Agriculture of the Autonomous Republic of Ajara.

Agriculture is treated as a as a priority sector for development of Georgia by the Government. Various state programmes are implemented by the central and Ajara AR Governments in to support to development of the agriculture sector.

Long-standing issues in agriculture, such as value chains, shortage of investments, low productivity, access to modern effective and efficient technologies, competitiveness of products on foreign and local markets, access to machinery and finance, as well as high segmentation result in high rural poverty. There is no strong tendency toward resolution of these issues, while the new ones, such as climate change, resource scarcity and loss of biodiversity are emerging as global threats.

The situation on the ground is increasingly complex, with strong inter-relations between different forms of agriculture. Proximity to a large agriculture products producer – Turkey makes an additional pressure on the agriculture sector of Ajara which, at this stage is less competitive, making the farms’ incomes more vulnerable and instable. As it is well known structural changes that may occur affect primarily the small farming systems and consequently the rural community which dominantly rely on the agriculture related incomes.

A specially tailored policy should be elaborated on the background of the recent issues and trends in global agriculture. Though, the existing information systems fail to provide a reliable picture about the existing situation in agriculture, as its (agriculture) performance evaluation needs a complex set of data which is difficult to regularly obtain and renew. The data needs relate to the different farming systems, the transformations taking place and their implications on food production, employment, income distribution, rural communities and the environment and primary data on land use, harvest, livestock and others.

The MoA of Ajara intends to hold a policy planning process for renewing its Agriculture Development Strategy. It is important that various stakeholders are involve into the process of analysis and background – farmers’ organizations, policy makers and agricultural development partners and ensure that the evidences collected are valid and adequate. The study should contribute to the development of new Agriculture Development Strategy of Ajar AR.

Duties and Responsibilities

The overall objective of the consultancy is to provide Ajara Government with analysis of the structural issues impeding the development of the sector to support the evidence based policy elaboration process and elaboration of the new Agriculture Development Strategy.

Organize and conduct the interviews with relevant groups (companies (processors, inputs suppliers, traders and consolidation business owners, farmers, government agencies’ staff and others) for identification of the main structural issues of the sector – 3 days;
Develop the outline of the study and agree it with the ministry of Agriculture of Ajara AR, EU and UNDP– 2 days. The outline should describe the content and description of the main parts of the study. The outline will demonstrate the missing data needs and gaps, as well as the list of interviews (organizations and individuals).

Draft the Ajara Agriculture Structural Issues Study including but not limited to analysis of the following topics (16 days):

Background analysis of economic and social data on the historical performance of the sector;
Value chains macro analysis for the main existing products and at the degree possible for the new products (some of them are tested at the nursery of Agroservice Centre with the perspective for wide application in Ajara);
Review and provide analysis of investment scarcity issues (based on the study on Investment Profile and Investment Attraction Policy Study to be developed under the same project in parallel to this study);
Analysis of factors for access to finance (loans, micro-credits, investments and other funding).

Provide the MoA of Ajara with recommendations on:

New technologies application approach – the good practice related role of public sector and its programmes;
Public programmes and other measures’ design, related to support to small farmer holders and business models oriented on consolidation of primary production and achieving economies of scale;
Measures on facilitating the access to new export markets for traditional and perspective products, including markets for bio and organic products and food;
New cooperation mechanisms with the private sector;
Hold a workshop with presentation of the findings of the study to wider audience of stakeholders (agriculture policy makers, entrepreneurs, farmers, donor community and others) – 1 day.

The Consultant is expected to base his/her suggestions on good international practice of extension of the agriculture sector development in the countries and/or regions with the same socio-economic context.

Deliverables:

The selected Consultant is expected to deliver below deliverables in accordance to the paragraph three of given Terms of Reference – Duties and Responsibilities:

Outline of the study;
Study on Structural Issues of Agriculture in Ajara AR;
Workshop with presentation of the findings of the study.

Payment and reporting modalities:

The payments will be made in two installments via bank transfer upon certification of successful submission of deliverables from ENPARD Ajara Project Manager. The first installment will be provided to the Consultant upon arrival to Georgia and include the DSA, daily fee for the initial 10 days and ticket price, while the rest of the amount will be paid upon timely submitting of high quality deliverables (please, refer to the section 4 'Major Deliverables').

The selected Consultant will be accountable to the Project Manager of the ‘ENPARD Ajara - Support to Agriculture Development in the Ajara Autonomous Republic’ project and UNDP Georgia Economic Development Team Leader

Evaluation:

Individual consultants will be evaluated based on cumulative analysis method:

Offerors will be evaluated against combination of technical and financial criteria. Maximum obtainable score is 100, out of which total score for technical criteria equals to 70 and for financial criteria – to 30.Offerors obtaining minimum of 40 points as a result of the desk review, will be invited for an interview. The maximum score for interview will be 15 points. Those Offerors who pass 70% of maximum obtainable scores of the technical criteria (i.e. desk review and interview, 70 x 70% = 49 points) will be considered as short-listed offerors.

The short-listed offerors will be asked to provide financial proposals (lump sum) for the scope of work defined in the Terms of Reference in detail.

Financial Proposal

Offerors passing 70% threshold of the technical criteria, i.e. min 49 points, will be considered as shortlisted candidates and requested to submit financial proposals.

The financial proposal shall specify a total lump sum amount, and payment terms around specific and measurable (qualitative and quantitative) deliverables should be accompanied by the proposed number of installments. All envisaged travel costs must be included in the financial proposal as well.

Competencies

Core Competencies:

Excellent writing, presentation/public speaking skills;
Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability;
Treats all people fairly without favoritism.

Functional Competencies:

He/she should have strong communication and analytical skills related to Agriculture support policy development;
Proven strong analytical abilities and knowledge in agriculture support services, consolidation and extension models and value chains;
Ability of interpretation, development and analyses of related documentation;
Ability to work under pressure with several tasks and various deadlines;
A pro-active approach to problem-solving;
IT literacy.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

Master's degree in development policy and or agribusiness related disciplines (agriculture economics, agro-technical practices, agriculture policy development) or other related fields (minimum qualification requirement: Master's degree - 10 points; PhD - 15 points).

Experience:

At least 5 years of professional experience in planning and developing of agriculture sector (minimum qualification requirement: 5 to 7 years - 15 points; more than 7 years - 20 points);
At least 5 years of professional experience in monitoring and evaluation of performance of Agriculture Service Organizations and/or regional/local Agriservice development projects preferably in Eastern European countries (minimum qualification requirement: 5 to 7 years - 15 points; more than 7 years - 20 points);
Experience in working with public sector, private sector and donor organizations on institutional development or similar projects will be an asset.

Language:

Fluency in English is a must;
Knowledge of Georgian or Russian languages will be an asset.