Background

Human development is about people, about expanding their choices to live full, creative lives with freedom and dignity. Economic growth, increased trade and investment, technological advance – all are very important. But they are means, not ends. Fundamental to expanding human choices is building human capabilities: the range of things that people can be. The most basic capabilities for human development are living a long and healthy life, being educated, having a decent standard of living and enjoying political and civil freedoms to participate in the life of one’s community.

For more than a decade, UNDP’s national and regional Human Development Report (HDR) teams have been supporting national actors to advance the human development conceptual framework and apply it to the most pressing development challenges of the day. They aim to generating lively debates around the policies and actions needed to accelerate human development and achieve the universally agreed goals, including the Millennium Development Goals and now the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development with its Goals.

In Lao PDR, 4 NHDRs have been published over the period 1998 to 2009. The most recent report was on Employment and Livelihoods. A 5th NHDR is currently being developed, with a focus on LDC graduation and human development. This report will be the first to be produced under the leadership of the National Economic Research Institute (NERI) at the Ministry of Planning and Investment, which has in the past supported the Lao Statistics Bureau in this role.

Lao PDR aims to graduate from its current LDC status by mid-2020s. This requires sustainable economic growth and human development. Despite significant economic growth in recent decades, the country has been facing several development challenges including high level of poverty and vulnerability, rising inequality between urban and rural areas, among provinces, and between majority and minority groups of population. Moreover, there is a sense that the rapid economic growth may not been translated into human development. The provinces where income poverty has declined substantially are still marred with high level of under-nutrition and low level of educational status. LDC graduation is not an end in itself; rather it is part of a larger development agenda, on the journey towards improving human development – the ultimate purpose of development. In view of this, the report will analyse development issues and suggest policy measures from human development lens.

The theme of the 5th edition of Lao PDR human development report is “Lao PDR Moving out of the Least Developed Country Status”, this report is to examine the different facets of underdevelopment that categorise the country as an LDC, with the ultimate purpose to propose options that would help it to move out of this grouping of countries. In this sense the NHDR supplements and complements the 8th National Socio-Economic Development Plan (2016-2020). Broadly, the report should discuss the trends of development indicators: especially those related to the three LDC graduation criteria (education/health, economic vulnerability, and incomes), but others as well, such as poverty and regional (inter-provincial) patterns in HD indicators; identify the challenges that Lao PDR would face, on and after graduation from the LDC grouping, and suggest measures to remain out of LDC and move forward; and propose policy measures in selected sectors to help the country attain and sustain the country at a post-LDC status through continuously promoting human development.

A draft report has been developed. However, further analysis and in-depth editing is required to adequately address the above points. In this regard, UNDP is seeking a qualified international consultant to be the NHDR Advisor for quality assurance. The consultant will work closely with the national lead authors to improve the quality of the report. His or her role will be to ensure high quality, accuracy and consistency of the work in adherence to the HDR guidelines.

Duties and Responsibilities

The objectives of the Advisor and Substantive Editor are as follows:

  • To review, structure, re-organize, and consolidate content of the Report for clarity and continuity of the argument;
  • To ensure clarity of structure and core themes and the Report’s political focus;
  • To review the Report’s internal consistency from analytical and stylistic point of view, addressing any analytical and knowledge gaps which may remain.

To ensure general readability and accessibility of the Report to a broad audience.

Competencies

Functional competencies:

  • Shares knowledge and experience;
  • Plan and prioritizes work activities to meet organizational goals;
  • Builds and sustains relationships with key stakeholder groups and project team;
  • Conceptualizes and analyzes problems to identify key issues, underlying problems, and how they relate;
  • Demonstrates excellent and effective written and oral communication skills;
  • Demonstrate respect to knowledge and culture and religion in a multidisciplinary working environment;
  • Applies the required depth and breadth of knowledge and expertise to meet job demands;
  • Uses information technology effectively as a tools and resource;
  • Demonstrated flexibility and adaptability in taking on this type of consultancy.

 Corporate Competencies:

  • Demonstrates integrity by modeling the UN’s values and ethical standards;
  • Promotes the vision, mission, and strategic goals of UNDP;
  • 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:

  • Advanced degree in social, economics, development and public policy, political science or related.

 Experience:

  • At least 7 years of relevant experience as a Researcher/Writer or related experience;
  • Proven experience in English editing and writing;
  • Familiarity with UNDP/HDRO style and understanding of publication requirements desirable;
  • The consultant must understand the concept of human development and Human Development Reports themes;
  • The consultant has experience in working with statistical data and statistical indicators, and be familiar with the logic and structure of complex statistical tables and concepts;
  • The consultant understands the concept of Least Developed Countries (LDC) status.

 Language requirement:

  • Excellent written English skills.

Requirements for submission of proposals:

All interested and qualified candidates should apply on-line using the following links:

 In order to make submission please read the attached relevant documents which are also available on our web-site here http://www.la.undp.org/content/lao_pdr/en/home/operations/jobs/:

  • TOR (Annex I)
  • Individual Contract & General Terms and Conditions (Annex II);
  • OFFEROR’S LETTER TO UNDP CONFIRMING INTEREST AND AVAILABILITY (Annex III)

 Documents to be included when submitting the proposals:

 Interested individual consultants must submit the following documents/information to demonstrate their qualifications:

  • Technical and Financial Proposal as per Annex III “OFFEROR’S LETTER TO UNDP CONFIRMING INTEREST AND AVAILABILITY”

(i)    Explaining why you are the most suitable for the work;

  • Providing a brief methodology on how you will approach and conduct the work including the work schedule for the delivery of outputs/deliverable;
  • CV including past experience in similar project and contact reference of at least 3 references for whom you have rendered preferably the similar services;

 Note: The financial proposal shall specify a total lump sum amount, and payment terms around specific and measurable (qualitative and quantitative) deliverables (i.e. whether payments fall in installments or upon completion of the entire contract). Payments are based upon monthly outputs, i.e. upon delivery of the services specified in the TOR.In order to assist the requesting unit in the comparison of financial proposals, the financial proposal will include a breakdown of this lump sum amount (including travel, per diems, and number of anticipated working days). All envisaged travel costs must be included in the financial proposal. UNDP accept travel costs not exceeding of an economy class air ticket.

 Please kindly refer to the Terms of Reference Annex I for detailed information on:

  • Project’s background
  • Scope of work and Responsibilities
  • Deliverables
  • Requirements for Experience and Qualifications

 Evaluation of Proposals:

Individual consultants will be evaluated based on the cumulative analysis methodology.

Evaluation of proposals and award criteria:

Cumulative analysis: The award of the contract will be made to a consultant who 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:
  • Technical Criteria weight; [0.7]
  • Financial Criteria weight; [0.3]

 Only a consultant obtaining a minimum of 49 points in the technical rating would be considered for the financial evaluation.

 Note:  Any request for clarification must be sent in writing to the following e-mail: kiettisack.senephansiri@undp.org  with CC to  anongly.phimmasone@undp.org;  phouthamath.sayyabounsou@undp.org

 UNDP Lao PDR will respond in writing by standard electronic mail and will send written copies of the response, including an explanation of the query without identifying the source of inquiry, to all consultants.

Please note that only short-listed candidates will be notified.

Qualified female candidates are strongly encouraged to apply.

For more detailed information about UNDP Lao PDR please visit our website at http://www.la.undp.org/lao_pdr/en/home.html