UNDP Jobs - 71540- Public Finance Expert (Fiscal Incentives)

Public Finance Expert (Fiscal Incentives) – International Consultant

Location :

Home Based

Type of Contract :

Individual Contract

Starting Date :

24-Apr-2017

Application Deadline :

07-May-17 (Midnight New York, USA)

Post Level :

International Consultant

Duration of Initial Contract :

Upto 30 working day

Languages Required :

English

Expected Duration of Assignment :

24 April 2017- 31 October 2017

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 is supporting developing countries in Asia Pacific with the implementation of the 2030 Agenda. Initial country level efforts, supported by UNDP and other UN and development partners, have focused on putting in place the building blocks necessary to support SDG achievements. This includes developing institutional arrangements to promote coordination and policy coherence across sectors and government levels, aligning national and sub-national development plans and budgets with the 2030 Agenda and to assess the availability of data and capacities of data ecosystems to monitor progress. Work has also started on identifying priorities and target setting. Beyond aligning national development strategies and other policies, countries are also looking at ways to integrate the SDGs into the budget process and to come up with new, more integrated financing options. Next steps will involve the identification of interlinkages between goals and targets and ‘accelerator interventions’, interventions that can trigger progress across a range of goals and targets. Many countries are keen to learn from the experience of other countries in the region and beyond. To facilitate such exchange, UNDP’s Bangkok Regional Hub is organizing annual Regional Knowledge Exchanges, the first one took place in October 2016 in Bangkok (http://www.asia-pacific.undp.org/meetTheSDGs.html).

Fiscal incentives are one of the key mechanisms through which governments promote creation, expansion and improvement of public goods which contribute to achieving the SDGs. There are various types of fiscal incentives. These include incentives given by central governments to subnational governments to promote investments in SDGs and to reward performance in progress towards SDGs. Other incentives are given by governments to businesses and individuals, such as tax credits for green investments, plastic bag surcharges or conditional cash transfers.

Duties and Responsibilities

Objective:

The objective of this consultancy is to undertake a review of existing fiscal incentive mechanisms (from central to subnational governments) to promote investment into or spending on development and environmental sustainability priorities and to reward performance in progress towards these priorities goals/ targets.

Scope of Work:

The scope of the review is limited to central-to-subnational government incentives, and it will not cover government-to-business and government-to-individual incentives.

The review will inform the knowledge exchange among governments of Asia Pacific countries, as well as UNDP’s country-level policy advisory support in the region.

Responsibilities:

A. Review existing practices used for designing fiscal transfers and tax assignments to sub-national governments (various tiers), which will include:

Existing and emerging approaches for incentives from central to sub-national governments to achieve priority development objectives and improved performance;
The context in which these incentives are introduced, including the underlying fiscal decentralization mechanisms and the degree of decentralization, mandates and expenditure responsibilities of subnational governments, and the magnitude of transfers from the higher tier governments vis-à-vis own revenue sources of subnational governments;
Mechanisms for fiscal (typically recurrent) transfers, including formulas integrating HD/HDI, MPI or MDG related indicators;
Mechanisms for capital expenditure allocations to subnational governments;
Other established mechanisms, including those linked to borrowing/ debt (debt swaps);
Indicators for monitoring, including performance criteria;
To the extent applicable, reviewing mechanisms used by bilateral and multilateral donor institutions, through countries’ budget support, to incentivize spending or investment on social and environmental issues.

This review should be based on a desk review of the literature, as well as a more in-depth analysis of fiscal incentive mechanisms in several countries in Asia Pacific, including Indonesia, Mongolia and the Philippines, and at least two countries in other regions.

B. Based on the above analyses of country experiences and available literature, distill lessons learnt and develop guidelines/ recommendations which would include:

C. Based on above review and recommendations provide inputs to several ongoing country-level fiscal reform initiatives.

Expected Outputs and Deliverables:

The expected outputs from this assignment are;

Deliverable 1- Inception report (methodology and approach, preliminary literature review, annotated outline of final report) by 15 May 2017
Deliverable 2- First draft (review, including detailed case studies of three countries) by 15 July 2017
Deliverable 3- Second draft (review, including detailed case studies of two more countries) by 15 September 2017
Deliverable 4- Final report by 31 October 2017

Institutional Arrangement:

The consultant will report to Team Leader, Inclusive Growth Team at UNDP Bangkok Regional Hub, or a relevant delegated staff member. The consultant will work closely and in consultation with members of the Inclusive Growth Team; as necessary, the consultant will work closely and in consultation with management and staff of selected country offices of UNDP.

Duration of the Work: 24 April 2017 to 31 October 2017 (Upto 30 working days)

Duty Station: Home- based with no travel.

Competencies

Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability.
Ability to work both independently and in a team and ability to deliver high quality work on time.
Ability to liaise with stakeholders and partners, including governments, research institutions, civil society.
Strong analytical skills, communication, writing, and networking abilities;
Openness to change and ability to receive/integrate feedback;
Ability to plan, organize, implement, and report on work;
Ability to work under pressure and tight deadlines;
Demonstrates integrity and ethical standards;
Positive, constructive attitude to work;
Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

Advanced university degree in economics with a focus on public finance.

Experience:

At least 8 years of experience in public financial analysis, with focus on fiscal decentralization.
Track record of research in this area.
Experience of advising developing countries’ governments in the area of public finance is desired.

Language:

Excellent written and spoken skills in English.

Price Proposal and Schedule of Payments:

The contract will be based on Lump Sum Amount.

The total amount quoted shall be all-inclusive and include all costs components required to perform the deliverables identified in the TOR, including professional fee, travel costs, living allowance (if any work is to be done outside the IC´s duty station) and any other applicable cost to be incurred by the IC in completing the assignment. The contract price will be fixed output-based price regardless of extension of the herein specified duration. Payments will be done upon completion of the deliverables/outputs and as per below percentages:

Deliverable 1- Inception report (methodology and approach, preliminary literature review, annotated outline of final report): 20% of total contract amount
Deliverable 2- First draft (review, including detailed case studies of three countries): 20% of total contract amount
Deliverable 3- Second draft (review, including detailed case studies of two more countries): 30% of total contract amount
Deliverable 4- Final report: 30% of total contract amount

In general, UNDP shall not accept travel costs exceeding those of an economy class ticket. Should the IC wish to travel on a higher class he/she should do so using their own resources.

In the event of unforeseeable travel not anticipated in this TOR, payment of travel costs including tickets, lodging and terminal expenses should be agreed upon, between the respective business unit and the Individual Consultant, prior to travel and will be reimbursed.

Evaluation Method and Criteria:

Individual consultants will be evaluated based on the following methodology;

Cumulative analysis

The award of the contract shall be made to the individual consultant whose offer has been evaluated and determined as a) responsive/compliant/acceptable; and b) having received the highest score out of set of weighted technical criteria (70%). and financial criteria (30%). Financial score shall be computed as a ratio of the proposal being evaluated and the lowest priced proposal received by UNDP for the assignment.

Technical Criteria for Evaluation (Maximum 70 points)

Criteria 1: Relevance of education - Max 10 points
Criteria 2: Experience in public financial analysis and on fiscal decentralization - Max 20 points
Criteria 3: Track record of research in this area - Max 20 points
Criteria 4: Assessment of approach/methodology to assignment - Max 20 Points

Only candidates obtaining a minimum of 49 points (70% of the total technical points) would be considered for the Financial Evaluation.

Documentation required:

Interested individual consultants must submit the following documents/information to demonstrate their qualifications. Please group them into one (1) single PDF document as the application only allows to upload maximum one document:

Letter of Confirmation of Interest and Availability using the template provided in Annex II.
Personal CV or P11, indicating all past experience from similar projects, as well as the contact details (email and telephone number) of the Candidate and at least three (3) professional references.
Technical proposal (maximum 3 pages), including a) a brief description of why the individual considers him/herself as the most suitable for the assignment; and b) a methodology, on how they will approach and complete the assignment.
Financial proposal, as per template provided in Annex II. Note: National consultants must quote prices in US Dollar.

Incomplete proposals may not be considered.

Please click on the link below to apply:

http://procurement-notices-admin.undp.org/view_notice.cfm?notice_id=36694&view=admin