Background

The impacts of climate change on Cambodian agriculture, particularly on rice cultivation, are predicted to adversely affect food production and security in rural areas. At present, there is emerging evidence that agriculture-based livelihoods and overall food security in Cambodia are affected by increased frequency and severity of floods, dry spells and drought events.

A major constraint in moving from a focus on post-disaster relief management to anticipatory agricultural and water resources planning is the limited institutional and individual capacity in both government agencies and community organizations to understand potential climate change impacts on irrigation systems, communal freshwater availability and agricultural production and to internalize a perspective of longer-term resilience into sectoral policy and development planning processes.

The project was designed to: reduce vulnerability of Cambodia's agriculture sector to climate-induced changes in water resources availability. The project has three outcomes:

  • Improved capacity within local institutions to manage agricultural water resources in a changing climate;
  • Locally appropriate adaptation options demonstrated to reduce exposure to climate change - induced risks; and
  • Lessons learned in project pilot sites replicated in other vulnerable areas of Cambodia.

The project phase 1 was implemented over a period of four years – from September 2009 until August 2013 and financed by the Global Environment Facility’s Least Developed Country Fund (GEF/LDCF) and UNDP Core Fund. The second phase has been started from September 2013 until December 2015. The project is implemented by the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry (MAFF) under UNDP National Implementation Modality (NIM). Key line Ministries that are closely involved in the implementation are the Ministry of Water Resources and Meteorology (MoWRAM) and Ministry of Women’s Affairs, with technical oversight and inputs from the Ministry of Environment as a Project Board member. The project target areas are in Preah Vihear and Kratie provinces.

This is the first pilot project on climate change adaptation project following the priorities identified in the Cambodian National Adaptation Programme of Actions (NAPA). Lessons learned and best practices are essential for replications, scale ups and influence to policy and plan development. Knowledge sharing among key practitioners, relevant stakeholders locally and regionally is one of the key focus of the project. The Terminal Evaluation for the project phase 1 was conducted in 2013 according to the guidance, rules and procedures established by UNDP and GEF as reflected in the UNDP Evaluation Guidance for GEF Financed Projects.

Again, in the project phase 2, an independent Terminal Evaluation will take place in October 2015, will be undertaken in accordance with UNDP guidance. The terminal evaluation will focus on the delivery of the project’s results as initially planned. The terminal evaluation will look at impact and sustainability of results, including the contribution to capacity development and the achievement of global environmental benefits/goals.

Duties and Responsibilities

The evaluator is expected to frame the evaluation effort using the criteria of relevance, effectiveness, efficiency, sustainability, and impact, as defined and explained in the UNDP Guidance for Conducting Terminal Evaluations of UNDP-supported projects.  The evaluator is expected to complete and submit a set of questions covering each of the above criteria as part of an evaluation inception report in consultations with UNDP Country Office, the project team and the UNDP Regional Technical Advisor, and shall include it as an annex to the final report.
 
The evaluation must provide evidence-based information that is credible, reliable and useful. The evaluator is expected to follow a participatory and consultative approach ensuring close engagement with government counterparts, in particular the Project Board members, UNDP Country Office, project team, UNDP Regional Technical Adviser based in Bangkok and key stakeholders. The evaluators are expected to conduct a field mission to the two target provinces namely Kratie and Preah Vihear. The detailed schedule of the field mission will be developed during the inception stage when the evaluators design the evaluation methodology and approach.

Interviews will be held with the following organizations and individuals at a minimum:

  • The Project Board members;
  • The core project team based at the MAFF’s Project Support Unit;
  • Representatives of UNDP Country Office and the UNDP Regional Technical Advisor;
  • Representatives of IFAD/PADEE;
  • Representatives from the provincial administrations, district/commune councils from the target provinces and communes supported by the project;
  • Local authorities and beneficiaries.

The evaluators will review all relevant sources of information, such as the project document, project reports – including Annual Progress Report (APR), project budget revisions, quarterly progress reports, Terminal Evaluation report (phase 1), project files (phase 2), national strategic and legal documents, and any other materials that the evaluators consider useful for this evidence-based assessment.

Expected Outputs and Deliverables:

The objectives of the evaluation are to assess the achievement of project results, and to draw lessons that can both improve the sustainability of benefits from this project, and aid in the overall enhancement of UNDP programming.

The evaluation team will produce the following deliverables to UNDP CO and the Project Board:

  • The inception report with detail methodology and approach of the Terminal Evaluation process;
  • A presentation of an executive summary, jointly prepared by the International and National Consultants, including findings and recommendations to key stakeholders;
  • A detailed draft evaluation report covering scope of the terminal evaluation with detailed attention to conclusion, lessons learnt and recommendations; and
  • List of annexes prepared by the consultants including TOR’s, itinerary, list of persons interviewed, summary of field visits, list of documents reviewed, questionnaire and summary of results, and leveraged resources, etc.

The report together with the annexes shall be written in English and shall be presented in electronic form in MS Word format.

Institutional Arrangement:

  • The principal responsibility for managing this evaluation resides with the UNDP CO in Cambodia. The UNDP CO will contract the evaluators and ensure the timely provision travel arrangements within the country for the evaluation team. The team will be responsible to, reporting to, UNDP CO after getting approval/acceptance of output from the national project manager and National Project Director. The Project Team will be responsible for liaising with the Evaluator team to set up stakeholder interviews, arrange field visits, coordinate with the Government etc;
  • The evaluation team will be composed of 1 international and 1 National Evaluators. The International Evaluator will act as Team Leader. S/he is responsible for the leading of the TE mission and compiling the Terminal Evaluation final report; while the National Evaluator will provide facilitation and coordination support to the Team Leader. The National Evaluator will assist the Team Leader in collecting relevant documents and reference to support the evaluation process. S/he will work closely with UNDP CO and project team to set up stakeholder interviews, arrange field visits, and coordinate with the Government, etc;
  • In addition, if necessary, the National Evaluator will assist the Team Leader to interact also with the UNDP Regional Technical Advisor, to ensure that the approach and methodology as well as the evaluation report are sound and in line with the donor requirements.

Duration of the Work:

The duration of the work is 22 working days starting from 25 September to 25 November 2015. The field work and interview with key stakeholders are expected to be finished by 15 October 2015. A presentation of the findings and recommendations will be done by 16 October 2015. The evaluators will submit the draft final report within 3 weeks of the evaluation mission, it is expected to receive by 30 October 2015. The project team and UNDP CO as well as UNDP RTA will provide feedback/comments no later than two weeks after the receipt of the draft report. The consultants will submit the final report by 20 November 2015.

Duty Station:

The Evaluator will need to travel to Cambodia during the period of 25 September-16 October 2015 to conduct stakeholder interviews, visit the project sites and make a presentation of the initial findings of the evaluation. The consultant is expect to be based at duty station at least 12 days and other work will be home-based.
It is expected that the consultants will spend 5 days in the two provinces including travel during which UNDP CO will provide transportation.

Competencies

Functional Competencies:

  • Technical knowledge in the targeted focal area(s): Climate Change Adaptation/Disaster Management, agriculture, natural resource management and/or rural development;
  • Ability to interact with senior government officials.

Corporate Competencies:

  • Demonstrates integrity by modeling the UN’s values and ethical standards;
  • 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;
  • Treats all people fairly without favoritism;
  • Fulfills all obligations to gender sensitivity and zero tolerance for sexual harassment.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

  • A Master degree or equivalent in environmental studies, development studies, and other related field.

Experience:

  • Minimum 10 years of result-based project management, monitoring and evaluation of environmental related projects;
  • Proven experience of evaluating similar projects, preferably involving UNDP or others UN Development Agencies or major donors;
  • Team leadership experience;
  • Experience working with government, particularly with projects under National Implementation Modality is an asset;
  • Experience and knowledge of the Cambodian development context.

Language Requirement:

  • Full proficiency in English (written and spoken).

Important note:

Interested offeror is strongly advised to read the Individual Consultant (IC) Procurement Notice, which can be viewed at http://procurement-notices.undp.org/view_notice.cfm?notice_id=21664 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.

UNDP reserves right to reject any applications that is incomplete.

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. Please group all your documents into one (1) single PDF document as the system only allows to upload maximum one document.

Any request for clarification/additional information on this procurement notice shall be communicated in writing to UNDP office or send to email dalis.heng@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.