Background

Those who previously applied need not re-apply.

Cambodia’s progress towards the Cambodian Millennium Development Goals (CMDGs) has been substantial but varied. Analysis of Cambodia’s progress towards CMDG1 reveals that Cambodia has achieved impressive growth and significant reduction of poverty over the past decade. Cambodia’s uneven growth dynamics have a strong geographic dimension.

Important capacity gaps across all levels of government and society hinder the development of strategies to address these challenges. As pointed out by the National Strategic Development Plan (NSDP 2009-2013) and its Mid-Term Review Report, the quality, efficiency, scale and reach of public services remain key challenges for the attainment of the CMDGs, whether they relate to social service delivery or local economic development. It is increasingly acknowledged that MDG targets can only be achieved fully if services and inputs are available to, and managed by, local governments and communities and if their capacities to do so are further developed.

At sectoral level, while targets have been set for NSDP/CMDG at the national level, there are currently no sub-national targets to support sub-national planning and monitoring of progress. Localizing the MDG monitoring and connecting it to national MDG monitoring would help improving integration of sectoral strategies.

The NSDP/CMDG Monitoring Support Program (NMSP) is a five-year programme (2011-2015) designed to support the implementation of the Ministry of Planning Strategy Plan to address the key challenges above. The goal of the NMSP is to support monitoring and policy dialogue on NSDP implementation to accelerate achievement of CMDG at both national and sub-national levels.

The NMSP has three objectives:

  • Strengthen the monitoring and analysis of the NSDP by the Ministry of Planning (MoP) and Line Ministries leading to evidence based policy decisions to accelerate progress in lagging NSDP/ CMDG areas;
  • Harmonized and integrated national and sub-national planning focusing upon the NSDP / CMDG targets within selected line ministries;
  • Use of sub-national scorecards and other products to assess budget allocation and NSDP / CMDG performance at the sub-national level.

The draft of the NSDP 2014-2018 makes special mention of the need to further decentralize planning through developing more Public Investment Programme (PIP) from the local level. The PIP was initiated in 1995 by the Ministry of Economy and Finance and the MOP under technical assistance of the Asian Development Bank (ADB). The government, in this regard, had produced and adopted PIP since 1996.

Currently, PIP has been implemented within 24 line ministries and 14 line agencies and managed by MOP. PIP has been used for tracking record of all projects raised by ministries/agencies under Official Development Assistance (ODA) and Government's budget. Priorities of PIP have been used as inputs for the preparation of budget strategic plan of Line Ministries/Line Agencies and National budget preparation. The government wants to use PIP as a monitoring tool to track the achievements of each project being implemented by LMs/LAs and report those achievements against the expended budget.

To collect information through a bottom up process on the costs of public investment requirements to implement RGC’s prioritized policies/NSDP, the MOP has been asking each line ministry/agency (LMs/LAs) to provide information on their Public Investment Requirements to be incorporated into the three-year Public Investment Program (PIP). The three-year rolling PIP for 2015-2017 and onwards will be prepared based on a methodology that will enable the harmonization of the PIPs and development cooperation financing and also it will be prepared within the time schedule for the preparation of the Annual National Budget.

The purpose of the assessment is to assess the efficiency of the PIP process and its implementation and to provide recommendations for future improvement.

Duties and Responsibilities

Scope of Work:

The consultant will work closely with General Directorate of Planning (GDP) of Ministry of Planning to carry out the assigned tasks. To begin with, the assessment will focus on the health sector and will be conducted at both national and provincial levels. The consultant will meet concerned agencies i.e. Ministry of Health (MOH), Ministry of Economic and Finance (MEF), Council for the Development of Cambodia (CDC), European Union (EU) and National Committee for Sub-National Democratic Development to gather relevant information.

The main duties are to: (I) Review and assess the current PIP process and its implementation(II) Provide recommendations to improve the tool to support quality planning, budgeting and monitoring and (III) Redesign and propose  the improved PIP process for health sector.

To address main duties, the consultant shall to perform the following tasks:

  • Review PIP document and its technical guideline and other related documents i.e. sectoral strategic plan/policy and budget strategic plan of Ministry of Health (MOH) and NSDP;
  • Develop the assessment methodology along with questionnaires format;
  • Map and assess current PIP process; review and document current practices and identify key challenges in each of the PIP planning cycle;
  • Assess the extent to which all programs/projects under ODA are incorporated into the PIP, and identify existing gaps
  • Assess the linkages/alignment between PIP, sector policy and NSDP priorities;
  • Assess the use of PIP outputs for preparing budget strategic plan of MOH;
  • Review PIP database to identify if the system can be used as part of the national M&E system for NSDP annual monitoring and reporting;
  • Identify lessons learned/best practices related to PIP implementation;
  • Provide recommendations on how to improve PIP as an effective tool for planning, budgeting and monitoring as part of the National M&E System;
  • Provide recommendations and specifications for the design of an efficient and adapted health sector PIP process.

Expected Outputs and Deliverables:

The consultant will produce the following outputs:

  • Inception report: As result of desk review, the consultant will prepare and submit inception report to UNDP/MOP and NMSP team for review and comments. The report will present methodologies, tools and questionnaires to be used in the course of the assessment and describe the first finding of the study, the foreseen degree of difficulties in collecting data, other encountered and/or foreseen difficulties in addition to the work plans of field assessment;
  • Draft report:   At the end of field phase, the consultant will debrief on the findings and recommendations to the Reference Group members and receive initial comments/feedbacks.  The draft report will also be submitted by the consultant to the UNDP and MOP Team at least two weeks before the debriefing session;
  • Final report: The consultant revises the draft report based on comments received from the Reference Group members during the debriefing session and submits the revised draft report to the UNDP and MOP team. The revised report will be shared with Reference Group members for final review and comments. The consultant will submit the Final Draft Report based on the comments from the Reference Group.

Institutional Arrangement:

The assessment will be administered by the UNDP Poverty Reduction Team Leader and NMSP Team in Cambodia with assistance of a Reference Group consisting of MOP, and UNDP Country Office.

The Reference Group member’s main functions are:

  • To ensure that the consultant has access to and has consulted all relevant information sources and documents related to the PIP;
  • To validate the assessment questions developed by the consultant;
  • To discuss and comment on notes and reports delivered by the consultant. As necessary, comments by individual group members may be compiled into a single document by the Project Manager and subsequently transmitted to the consultant; and
  • To assist in feedback of the findings, conclusions, lessons and recommendations from the assessment.

The consultant will bring his/her own personal computer to conduct this assessment and will also make his/her own travel arrangement by him/herself i.e. air tickets, accommodation etc.

Duration of the Work:

  • The assignment will be 30 working days from mid July to mid October 2014;
  • The consultant is expected to be on board from mid July and complete assignment not later than 30 September 2014. She/he has to submit the work plan prior to the assignment;
  • The consultant should be in Cambodia for 20 days and is expected to travel and work at provinces for 4 days. She/he is expected to be in Cambodia on 15th July 2014;
  • Consultant has to submit her/his outputs in accordance to the defined work plan and payment is issued only with satisfactory outputs accepted/approved by MOP/UNDP;
  • All expected outputs could not be delayed as result of assignment; therefore, the consultant has to commit to deliver these outputs as planned.

Duty Station:

The consultant will be based in Ministry of Planning and some time in UNDP Country Office. She/he is expected to travel to selected provinces for assessment purpose. A driver along with a vehicle will be provided by the NMSP project to support the consultant during the field assessment.

Competencies

Functional Competencies:

  • Good facilitation and presentation skill;
  • Demonstrated ability to communicate effectively with various partners including the government, UN and other development donors and high quality liaison and representation at local and national levels;
  • Excellent organizational and time management skills;
  • Strong interpersonal skills, ability to work with people from different backgrounds to deliver quality products within short timeframe;
  • Be flexible and responsive to changes and demands;
  • Be client oriented and open to feedback.

Corporate Competencies: 

  • Demonstrates commitment to UNDP’s mission, vision and values;
  • Exerts strict adherence to corporate rules, regulations and procedures;
  • Familiarity with the internal control framework and results-based management tools is a must;
  • Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:   

  • At least advanced university degree i.e. Master Degree in the field of planning, socio-economic, public policy, social science and other related field of study.

Experience: 

  • At least 5 years of professional experiences in socio-economic research/survey and policy and planning systems assessment;
  • Prior experience in planning system development is a must. In particular, the expert must be fully conversant with Public Investment Programme preparation;
  • Knowledge of planning and budgeting systems of Cambodia is an advantage;
  • Expertise in result-based budgeting, and capacity building are also important;
  • Local knowledge and understanding of cultural, social and political condition of Cambodia is an asset;
  • Understanding of the United Nation System.

Language Requirement: 

  • Full proficiency in English, and excellent report writing skills.

Important note:

Interested offeror is strongly advised to read the Individual Consultant (IC) Procurement Notice, wich can be viewed at http://procurement-notices.undp.org/view_notice.cfm?notice_id=15562 for more detail about term of references, instructions to offeror, and documents to be included when submitting offer.

Documents to be included when submitting the application:

Interested offeror/individual must submit the following documents/information:

Please be informed that we don’t accept application submitted via email.

Interested candidate is required to submit application via UNDP jobsite system, because the application screening and evaluation will be done through UNDP jobsite system. Please note that UNDP jobsite system allows only one uploading of application document, so please make sure that you merge all your documents into a single file. Your on-line applications submission will be acknowledged where an email address has been provided. If you do not receive an e-mail acknowledgement within 24 hours of submission, your application may not have been received. In such cases, please resubmit the application, if necessary.

Any request for clarification/additional information on this procurement notice shall be communicated in writing to UNDP office or send to email vannara.chea@undp.org and/or procurement.kh@undp.org. While the Procurement Unit would endeavor to provide information expeditiously, only requests receiving at least 5 working days prior to the submission deadline will be entertained. Any delay in providing such information will not be considered as a reason for extending the submission deadline. The UNDP's response (including an explanation of the query but without identifying the source of inquiry) will be posted in Individual Consultant (IC) Procurement Notice page as provided above. Therefore, all prospective Offerors are advised to visit the page regularly to make obtain update related to this Individual Consultant (IC) Procurement Notice.