Antecedentes

UNCDF is the UN’s capital investment agency for the world’s least developed countries. It creates new opportunities for poor people and their communities by increasing access to microfinance and investment capital.  UNCDF focuses on Africa and the poorest countries of Asia and the Pacific, with a special commitment to countries emerging from conflict or crisis.  It provides seed capital – grants and loans – and technical support to help microfinance institutions reach more poor households and small businesses, and local governments finance the capital investments – water systems, feeder roads, schools, irrigation schemes – that will improve poor peoples’ lives.

UNCDF works to enlarge peoples’ choices: it believes that poor people and communities should take decisions about their own development.  Its programmes help to empower women – over 50% of the clients of UNCDF-supported microfinance institutions are women – and its expertise in microfinance and local development is shaping new responses to food insecurity, climate change and other challenges.  UNCDF works in challenging environments – remote rural areas, countries emerging from conflict – and paves the way for others to follow. Its programmes are designed to catalyze larger investment flows from the private sector, development partners and national governments, for significant impact on the Millennium Development Goals, especially Goal 1: Eradicate Extreme Poverty and Hunger, Goal 3: Promote Gender Equality and Empower Women, and Goal 7: Ensure Environmental Sustainability.

Established by the General Assembly in 1966 and with headquarters in New York, UNCDF is an autonomous UN organization affiliated with UNDP.

Despite the rapid growth of the microfinance industry in the past ten years, it is estimated that between two and three billion people still lack access to a broad range of financial products and services on a sustainable basis. The situation is particularly dire in the LDCs, where often more than 90 per cent of the population is denied access to financial services from the formal financial system. UNCDF focuses its strategy on Financial inclusion, which is universal access, at a reasonable cost, to a wide range of financial services, provided by a variety of sound and sustainable institutions. The range of financial services includes savings, short and long-term credit, leasing and factoring, mortgages, insurance, pensions, payments, local money transfers and international remittances.

UNCDF manages a number of initiatives related to digital financial (DF).  It is in discussion to consolidate the technical assistance and research aspects of these programmes into a single team.  This team will serve UNCDF’s needs in regard to DF, particularly for two programmes:  Mobile Money for the Poor and the Better than Cash Alliance, but DF also requires support in a number of UNCDF country and global programmes. 

Mobile Money for the Poor (MM4P) .

With support from Australian Government, Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (“DFAT” formerly AusAid) and by the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida), UNCDF launched Mobile Money for the Poor (MM4P) in March 2012, a global thematic initiative to address the opportunities and challenges of implementing branchless banking and mobile money in challenging markets in Africa and Asia.  MM4P’s long-term mission is to help low income and rural households in LDCs increase their financial security through appropriate, affordable and secure means to receive, manage and save money through these “digital financial services” (DFS).   UNCDF’s starts by defining the different stages of a market’s development and the range of interventions needed at different levels (i.e. macro, meso, micro, client) to move it across the stages. This combines a making markets work for the poor approach with UNCDF’s traditional operational model of directly supporting the most crucial level – retail service providers. UNCDF is currently implementing this in five countries (Laos, Nepal, Liberia, Malawi and Uganda), often in partnership with other UNCDF programmes. 

In 2014, UNCDF secured a partnership with the MasterCard Foundation (MCF), the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to support the roll out MM4P activities in four additional countries.  It is also working with USAID/Nepal to expand its activities in those countries. These agreements suppose a significant increase of workload for MM4P. To address this workload, MM4P has put forward a new staffing strategy and plan which has been approved by the UNCDF Executive Secretary. This includes placing most technical positions in MM4P countries, with emphasis on the most high profile and advanced in each region.  In the case of Asia, Nepal is currently the most advanced country in UNCDF’s portfolio. 

Better Than Cash Alliance.

The Better Than Cash Alliance is an alliance of governments, private sector and development organizations committed to accelerating the shift from cash to electronic payments. 

Billions of dollars in cash payments are made daily in emerging and developing economies, including payment of salaries, social welfare and relief, payments to suppliers, etc. The problems with these cash payments include a lack of transparency, accountability and security, as well as inefficiency. Furthermore, the individuals who receive the cash are excluded from the formal financial sector. There were approximately 2.5 billion people excluded from the formal financial sector in 2012.

Shifting these payments from cash to electronic has the potential to improve the livelihoods of low-income people by advancing financial inclusion and enabling people to save, while giving governments, the development community and the private sector a more efficient, transparent and often safer means of disbursing payments

The Better Than Cash Alliance seeks to leverage the leadership of governments, the networks of development organizations and the expertise of the private sector in payment technologies to replace the use of cash in their programming and payment streams with electronic payments, where appropriate. It also seeks to build the financial capability of low-income clients who will benefit from electronic payments and a wider range of financial services.

  • Advocates for the use of all forms of electronic payments where they provide a preferable payment option to cash;
  • Collaborates with program partners to mobilize available technical expertise and resources to identify;
  • Implements the most effective approach to make the transition from cash to electronic payments;
  • Conducts research, documents good practices and produces knowledge products to address the barriers to adoption and drive the effective shift from cash to electronic payments globally. 

BTCA is actively working the membership of Nepal in the alliance. 

UNCDF in Nepal.

UNCDF has been active in Nepal in the digital finance space for over a year with funds from UNCDF’s MM4P program laying the groundwork for a full-scale country interventions and programs including MM4P.  The preparatory phase of MM4P has been done in consultation with the NRB and with the permission of the Ministry of Finance, with a focus on research, awareness raising, assistance in strategy and business planning and working with the NRB.  UNCDF worked in partnership with a single consulting firm during this period to implement a range of activities.  UNCDF also received permission recently from the government of Nepal (GoN) to expand MM4P activities under UNCDF’s Inclusive Finance Country Framework – known as the Accesss to Finance (A2F) – UNNATI Programme.

The Government of Nepal and the Government of Denmark are working together through the UNNATI 5-year programme to promote sustainable inclusive growth by reducing poverty and raising living standards in Nepal. The strategic focus of UNNATI is on private sector development in accordance with both Nepalese and Danish development policies and strategies for inclusive growth, employment creation and poverty reduction. The programme focuses on the value chains of three agricultural commodities – tea, ginger and dairy in seven hilly districts in the Eastern part of the country (EDR). A2F is a sub-component of UNNATI being implemented by NRB and UNCDF. Among other components of A2F is the expansion of DF in the Eastern Region in order to benefit at least 250,000 small holder farmers and MSMEs.

This new phase of the DF support supposes a significant increase of workload for UNCDF, with  greater focus on:  working with the NRB to build capacity, improve policies and regulations, and facilitate data collection and analysis on DFS; providing expert advice to partners on their DF operations; building partnerships between providers and others for service delivery; and designing interventions that reach rural areas, including small holder farmers. 

Deberes y responsabilidades

UNCDF is looking for a retainer consultant, preferable based in Kathmandu, who is able to work on a daily basis with UNCDF, the NRB and its partners.  The consultant will be based with the UNCDF team in Nepal, bus is expected to spend 50% or more of his/her time on the premises of the NRB and UNCDF’s other partners. 

The consultant will report to the UNCDF Technical Specialist, Digital Finance (TS DF) based in Kathmandu (currently under recruitment) for technical matters, as well as the UNCDF National Programme Coordinator (NPC), who oversees A2F/UNNATI.  (Until the TS DF post is filled, the DF Expert will report to the MM4P Lead Technical Specialist, based in Brussels, Belgium).

The Consultant will specifically:

  • Support UNCDF in reaching its overall DF objectives in Nepal;
  • Support MM4P programme in the full implementation of its country plan for Nepal;
  • Provide high quality DF technical inputs, training and advice to all stakeholders to accelerate the development of DF ecosystem in country;
  • Develop and implement activities at country level (“ecosystem activities”) to raise stakeholders knowledge and capacity on DF;
  • Assist all stakeholders in the development of innovative ideas, plans and projects to enter or expand in the DFS (ecosystem, regulatory, customer, high volume, agent workstreams) that result in direct technical assistance and/or performance based grant agreements.  Support and/or participate in direct technical assistance projects with selected partners;
  • Coordinate and support UNCDF on reporting;
  • Perform other related tasks as required by TS DF and NPC.

The outcome of this work will be: 

  • Based on MM4P Theory of Change, help and hasten the shift of Nepal DF market from start-up stage until they are firmly in the expansion stage at end of 2019, so that 15% of the adult population in Nepal are active DF users (90 days) at end of 2019.
  • The Nepal DF market is becoming an innovative and creative ecosystem where several stakeholders are testing and implementing new ideas and innovative business models.
  • The NRB and Ministry of Finance have become supporters and enablers of responsible DF.

Key activties:

Act as primary DF technical resource for all UNCDF DF work in Nepal.

  • Support the TS DF and NPC in developing, implementing and updating the DF Country Strategy and Work Plans;
  • Manage range of technical activities implemented by the UNCDF team;
  • Become the DF technical point of contact in country for all stakeholders willing to enter or expand in the DF market;
  • Provide high quality technical input on various DF topics (regulatory, product design, agent network, etc.).
  • Challenge existing DF ideas and ways of working in order to raise the discussions between stakeholders to more impactful and innovative business models;
  • Promote innovation and entrepreneurship in the country and seek all potential ways to accelerate the DF development in country;
  • Identify need for additional experts on key topics (agent network, product design, processes, technology, etc.) to support partners, draft technical TORs for the same;
  • Coordinate with UNCDF DF experts in other countries to share experience, lessons and innovative ideas between the programme.

Manage the development and the implementation of policy and regulatory issues, working with policy makers and regulators knowledge and capacity on DF.

  • Support TS DF and NPC to set-up and animate a DFS working group gathering key DF stakeholders (Central Bank, Government, Banks, MFIs, Telecom Operators, donors, etc.), providing technical input and support, so that it may act as the key coordination body on all DF aspects and promote communication between all stakeholders;
  • Through regular contact and training, build a strong relationship with the Central Bank and raise all departments’ knowledge and capacity.  Provide training on key issues in DF. Promote open and innovative DF ecosystem and continuous communication between public and private sectors;
  • Work with the NRB to animate its internal DF working group, to assist this group in becoming a decision-making and planning body within NRB;
  • With support from policy and regulatory expert consultants, support NRB to draft policies and regulation in regard to DF (e-money, agents, proportional know your customer rules, consumer protection, etc.), helping to implement recommendations from consultants and other donor agencies;
  • Work with Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Federal Affairs and Local Development (MoFALD) to support their interest in efforts in digitizing payments to the mass market, including social welfare payments. Help these ministries and other private sector and other donor agencies.

Manage the development and implementation of ecosystem activities, including conducting/organizing trainings and workshops, providing high quality technical advice to key stakeholders and building partnerships for better product and service delivery.

  • Based on the work plan, take lead role in implementing ecosystem activities. Based on the country strategy and work plan, plan, organize, animate and participate in various workshops/trainings on DF topics open to all stakeholders to raise their knowledge (strategy, agent, customers experience, product development, partnerships, etc.);
  • Based on the work plan, participate and coordinate market research activities (customer experience, customer demand, agent network diagnosis, agent network challenges, payment flows diagnosis, data analytics, etc.) in order to gather the necessary information and market knowledge to reach MM4P objectives in country;
  • Involve key stakeholders during market research work to raise their field knowledge.  Furthermore, work with these stakeholders to improve their DF services based on lessons learned from the market researches;
  • Based on workshops, trainings and research, write briefing notes, research highlights and knowledge documents tailored responding to specific expectations and challenges of the Nepal DF market;
  • Disseminate key information to all stakeholders to raise their DF capacities.
  • Organize regular informal exchange sessions with key stakeholders to share information within the market.

Assist all stakeholders in the development of innovative ideas, plans and projects to enter or expand in the DFS (ecosystem, regulatory, customer, high volume, agent work streams) to develop a pipeline of projects.

  • Take the technical lead in identifying, vetting, and developing DF projects and monitor their progress;
  • Build good and continuous relationship with all existing and potential DF stakeholders and have regular contact (at least monthly) to be aware of all DF market dynamics;
  • Assist specific stakeholders individually on DF related topics according to their needs;
  • Challenge stakeholders about their DF businesses and strategies in order to raise the level of innovation and creativity in country;
  • Foster partnerships between stakeholders to develop new business models and innovative ideas;
  • Based on outcomes from workshop/training, market research and stakeholders’ contacts, establish a ranking of most promising. stakeholders for direct support from UNCDF.  Update this ranking continuously based on market dynamics;
  • For most promising stakeholders, develop project descriptions and support the TS DF in assessing and appraising the projects;
  • Collect necessary documents for UNCDF project endorsements and appraisals.

Support and participate in direct technical assistance to selected partners (providers work stream).

  • Support DF TS in procuring consultants and consulting firms for DF projects at selected partners, by drafting TORs, defining outputs and timelines;
  • Work closely with other consultants and consulting firms working with MM4P partners to provide background and context. Provide the necessary programme knowledge in order to have consultants aligned with programme objectives in country;
  • Coordinate and regularly follow-up work of consultants.  Assist DF TS in quality assurance of consultant outputs;
  • For some selected partners, provide direct technical assistance to support project implementation.

Coordinate and support TS DF on reporting at country and stakeholders level.

  • Plan, organize and animate the monthly progress call with TS FD.  Prepare agenda for the call and write meeting minutes.  Develop monthly action plans;
  • Plan, organize and animate the quarterly progress call with MM4P partners in Nepal;
  • Support MM4P in collect reporting information from MM4P partners on a quarterly basis;
  • Support MM4P in collecting information from Central bank;
  • Support the TS DF to report on DF activities and developments in country.

Competencias

Functional Competencies:

  • Excellent speaking and writing skills in English are necessary;
  • Excellent analytical skills;
  • Proven ability to manage projects;
  • Strong IT skills, including ability to work regularly with MS Word, Excel, Outlook and PowerPoint;
  • Proven cross-cultural communication. The candidate(s) should be able to function effectively in an international, multicultural environment and manage a team consisting of multiple nationalities.

Core Competencies:

  • Promotes ethics and integrity, creating organizational precedents;
  • Political acumen;
  • Builds staff competence,  creating an environment of creativity and innovation;
  • Builds and promoting effective teams;
  • Creates environment for open communication and fosters a culture of knowledge sharing and learning;
  • Takes fair and transparent  decisions; calculated risk-taking;
  • Demonstrates integrity and fairness by modeling UN values and ethical standards;
  • Displays cultural and gender sensitivity and adaptability;
  • Treats all persons fairly without favoritism;
  • Shows strong corporate commitment;
  • Promotes the vision, mission and strategic goals of UNCDF and UNDP.

Habilidades y experiencia requeridas

Education:

  • A Master’s degree in technology, economics, public/business administration, social sciences, or related discipline or the equivalent experience.

Experience: 

  • A minimum of four (4 years’ experience in progressively more responsible positions in the financial services and/or telecommunications field;
  • A minimum of three (3) years’ experience working with branchless banking and mobile financial services;
  • Experience in working with the implementation of branchless banking and mobile financial services projects;
  • Experience in project management.
  • Experience in Nepal  is a plus

Language Requirements:

  • Fluency in  English

Consulting fees, standard travel costs and living expenses:

  • Consulting fees/personnel costs: Applicants should note that the maximum daily rate under UNCDF policy is us$1000 for individual consultants;
  • Travel: Any travel expenses to join duty station (Lusaka) must be quoted in the financial proposal. Occasional travel may be required and will be compensated according to UNCDF polices.    

Application:

Please refer to application date above. Applications will be rated on both technical and financial submissions.  The best proposal that will be awarded the contract shall be selected through the following method: 

Highest rated proposal using the combined scoring method, which assigns the weight distribution between the technical and financial proposals as set out in the Request for Proposal. The weight distribution shall be 70% technical and 30% financial. 

All applications must contain the following information in one word or PDF document combining the following:

Other:

Both individual consultants and individual employed by a company or institution are welcome to apply. 

Any individual employed by a company or institution who would like to submit an offer in response to a procurement notice for Individual Contractor must do so in their individual capacity (providing a cv so that their qualifications may be judged accordingly). Please not that in such case the company institution will be asked to issue a Reimbursable Loan Agreement.   http://www.vn.undp.org/content/dam/vietnam/docs/Legalframework/Reimbursable%20Loan%20Agreement.doc

Women candidates or women-owned businesses are strongly encouraged to apply.