Background

Background:

The Poverty-Environment Initiative of the UN Development Programme and UN Environment is a global UN-led programme that supports country-led efforts to mainstream pro-poor environmental and climate change issues into national and sub-national development planning, budgeting and investment management systems. The Initiative assists government partners to strengthen institutional and technical capacity with the aim of influencing policies and investments in environmental sustainability and poverty eradication. The Initiative works with relevant government ministries including planning, finance and environment, and with other relevant actors at the country level such as leading practitioners and knowledgeable organizations, civil society, and the private sector.

PEI has extensive experience in nearly 30 countries in pioneering an integrated approach to core development planning, budgeting and investment management. PEI has produced global and country-level knowledge products on integrating environmental sustainability and climate change into national, sectoral and sub-national development planning and budgeting as well as in managing social and environmental impacts of investments in natural resources (refer to www.unpei.org). For instance, the Handbook on Mainstreaming Environment and Climate for Poverty Reduction and Sustainable Development (2015) provides the rationale and general approaches for poverty-environment mainstreaming.

PEI in Asia Pacific has been developing communications and knowledge products since its first phase. The programme has produced country level videos (shared on the PEI YouTube channel), publications, policy briefs that are all available on the PEI website. Dedicated pages to country programmes on the website, social media channels on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube and mailing lists have been used to disseminate content on poverty-environment issues, results from the programme, impacts of policies and plans and acknowledge partnerships.

Achieving the SDGs is a very complex policy challenge, which includes the inter-linkages between the social, environmental and economic dimensions of sustainable development. A large number of countries are requesting UN support for achieving the SDGs in an integrated manner. PEI has valuable knowledge and lessons learned in operationalizing an integrated approach to inform the SDGs implementation process. With the adoption of the new 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda, there is an increasing need to document and share PEI’s experiences and lessons learned in a way that is relevant to country-level efforts for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. Communicating in the context of the SDGs is an opportunity that PEI can leverage. Demonstrating the trade-offs between goals, highlighting nexus issues that speak to multiple goals and drawing attention to good practices by countries on the road to the SDGs- these will be the niche of PEI’s communications activities closing this phase and looking forward.

Duties and Responsibilities

Scope of Work:

The purpose of this assignment is to develop targeted communication products at the regional level and country-levels.

 More precisely, the Consultant will be required to complete the following tasks:

  • Take stock of existing PEI communication products and assess opportunities for new narratives,
  • Map current and potential audiences and dissemination channels,
  • Review and collate current results of the programme and develop a regional narrative that will form the basis of the regional communications product,
  • Review country level products against results and develop communication products in collaboration with the regional team and country teams,
  • Frame the most important results from an accessible and impact-based perspective to communicate the programme’s results, experiences and lessons learned to audiences and partners,
  • Collaborate with the regional communications consultant to write, design, edit/ produce the products, including feedback from regional team or country team as relevant. Finalize products and suggest dissemination channels,
  • Travel on country missions as necessary to shoot video footage of results and interviews with key stakeholders,
  • Through the regional team, work to get testimonial footage or quotes to incorporate in products,
  • Provide communications support to package PEI’s SDG Tools Compendium into a multi-media communications product, e.g. video, animation or a webpage, etc.

Expected Outputs and Deliverables:

The expected outputs from this assignment are;

  • Deliverable 1: Inception Report describing a set of regional and country communications products to be delivered including target audience and dissemination strategies, 5 working days.
  • Deliverable 2:  1 (One) Regional brochure communicating PEI’s results and experiences in the region over 2008-2017 which include texts, infographics and images, 10 working days.
  • Deliverable 3: 1 (One) Regional multi-media communications product (e.g. video, webpage), based on the above regional brochure, 10 working days.
  • Deliverable 4:  10 (Ten) Country-level communications brochure or multi-media products for selected countries which include Lao PDR, Nepal, and the Philippines, 15 working days.
  • Deliverable 5: 1 (One) Multi-media product for the PEI SDGs tools compendium, 5 working days.

The start of the contract is envisioned for 1 June 2017 and should conclude on 31 August 2017. The exact delivery and sequence of the products will be determined in discussion with the UNDP-UNEP Poverty-Environment Initiative and respective assigned focal points for the various products.

Institutional Arrangement:

Under general supervision of the Asia-Pacific Regional Team Leader, Inclusive Growth and Sustainable Development, the consultant is required to work in close consultation with and under the guidance of the PEI Asia-Pacific regional manager based at the UN Environment Asia and the Pacific Office. The consultant will work closely with the Communications Consultant for PEI at UN Environment and team members of the Asia-Pacific UNDP-UN Environment Poverty-Environment Initiative based in Bangkok and the PEI country teams.

Duration of the Work:

1 June 2017 to 31 August 2017 (Up to 45 working days).

Duty Station:

The consultancy is home-based with travels to Bangkok office, Lao PDR, Nepal, and the Philippines.

Competencies

  • Demonstrates integrity by modelling 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.
  • Proven experience in the developing country context and working in different cultural settings;
  • Analytic capacity and demonstrated ability to process, analyse and synthesise complex, technical information;
  • Proven ability to support the development of high quality knowledge and training materials, and to train technical teams.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

  • Advanced university degree (at Master level or equivalent) in Communications, Journalism, Online Media, Video Production, Sustainable Development or related field is required. A first-level university degree in combination with two additional years of qualifying work experience may be accepted in lieu of the advanced university degree.

Experience:

  • 5 years of experience working with UN or INGOs, specifically in designing communications products and strategies for environment/ development related projects.
  • Fully proficient in written and spoken English.
  • Proficient in video editing software and production, film and photo editing.
  • Proficient in web content development and knowledge of HTML and other content management software.
  • Functional Knowledge of Adobe Illustrator/ Photoshop/Indesign and Final Cut Pro/ Adobe Premier Pro/ After Effects and social media tools.
  • Incumbent is required to carry his/her own computer, production equipment and software.

 Language:

  • Fluency of English language is required

Price Proposal and Schedule of Payments:

Consultant must send a financial proposal 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]: 10% of total contract amount.
  • Deliverable 2 [Regional Brochure]: 20% of total contract amount.
  • Deliverable 3 [Regional Product]: 30% of total contract amount.
  • Deliverable 4 [Country Products]: 30% of total contract amount.
  • Deliverable 5 [PEI SDG Compendium product]: 10% 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.

Travel costs shall be reimbursed at actual but not exceeding the quotation from UNDP approved travel agent.  The provided living allowance will not be exceeding UNDP DSA rates. Repatriation travel cost from home to duty station in Bangkok and return shall not be covered by UNDP.

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 of Application (Maximum 70 points)

  • Criteria 1 Relevance of education - Max 10 points
  • Criteria 2 Experience in producing print, video, digital communications products- Max 20 points
  • Criteria 3 Regional experience in communicating sustainable development and/or experience working with UNDP and/or UNEP (or other UN bodies) - Max 20 points
  • Criteria 4 Portfolio, sample or links to products produced – Max 20 points

Only candidates obtaining a minimum of 49 points out of 70 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.
  • 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.
  • Cover letter, on why the individual considers him/herself as the most suitable for the assignment
  • Portfolio/ Samples/ Links to writing and products produced
  • 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 for documents related to this application:

http://procurement-notices.undp.org/view_notice.cfm?notice_id=37412