Background

The Project “Strengthening Thailand’s Capacity to Link Climate Policy and Public Finance” was launched in April 2013 with an aim to support Thailand in strengthening its institutional capacity to link climate change policy with its budgetary allocations and to report and measure overtime the effectiveness of these policies and expenditures. The project is funded by Swedish International Development Agencies (SIDA) and UNDP, and the Office of Natural Resources and Environmental Policy and Planning (ONEP) under the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment (MoNRE) has been the key Implementing Partner of the Project. Other government agencies in Thailand have also played a vital role in strengthening climate change planning and budgeting through the established policy platform, namely the Office of National Economic and Social Development Board and Bureau of Budget under the Prime Minister Office, Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives, Ministry of Energy, and Ministry of Transport.

During Phase I (2013-2015), the Project focused on strengthening the integration of climate change concerns (both mitigation and adaptation) into sectoral planning and budgeting of key government agencies, namely Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives (adaptation) and Ministry of Energy (mitigation).  One of the key achievements was development of a generic Guideline called “Climate Change Benefit Analysis” (CCBA) through a series of consultative dialogues among national policy and planning agencies together with budget and finance agencies.   The Guidelines was developed with an aim to serve as a common tool/framework for analyzing and determining the level of projects’ benefits related to climate change, particularly useful for:

• Functional Agencies to take into consideration of future climate change scenarios and formulate projects/programmes with climate change benefit analysis incorporated, primarily serving their functional objectives, but also addressing climate change concerns;
• Budget Agencies to make reference to this Guidelines when considering the claimed benefits of climate change incorporated in the submitted budget request, for budget allocation and tracking purposes; and
• Planning Agencies to use this Guidelines as a guiding framework for operationalizing and monitoring their national plans and strategies related to climate change and to be able to determine objectively the level of benefits related to climate change

The Guidelines also specify an appropriate institutional arrangement for coordination and implementation, whereby ONEP will take lead in the policy advocacy and endorsement, and also act as the focal body for technical support and coordination. It is expected that the implementation of the Guidelines, once endorsed by the cabinet and/or National Climate Change Committee (NCCC), will lead to the following outcomes:

• The planning and budgeting process related to climate change across key relevant ministries will become more systemic with the commonly adopted framework (CCBA) for programming, financing, monitoring, and evaluating climate related investment;
• Key related agencies will be more capable of using technical tools for appraising climate change related investment and developing budget requests with more substantive analysis, with greater understanding and knowledge about climate change; and
• Climate change related expenditure will be more systematically tracked.

For the Project’s second phase (2017-2021) which will be further funded by SIDA, the project will continue strengthening the CCBA guidelines to be practically used by relevant government agencies but also augmenting gender and human right angles into it. Other activities related to CC-Gender/human right evidence based research and advocacy will also be undertaken.  Currently, the regional project document has been signed but the detailed work plan/result framework including baseline, intervention, and indicators for Thailand need to be further developed and refined during this inception phase (May-September 2017).

UNDP Thailand country office is now seeking for a lead consultant to support the formulation of the “Climate Change Budget Integration Index - CBII” report which will help measure the level of integration of climate change into the national public financial management system, country intervention report, and work plan specific to Thailand.

Duties and Responsibilities

Objectives of the Assignment:

To support the formulation of the CCBII report, country intervention report, and work plan specific to Thailand.

Scope of Work

Perform the task of lead consultant to

• Review documents related to the Project’s Implementation during Phase I and the Project Document including the country intervention annex (Phase II) which contain the broad areas of intervention for Thailand;
• Collect secondary information and conduct desk review of climate change related policies and budget in Thailand;
• Review the work of relevant CSOs and their contribution to the climate change budgeting process;
• Discuss with UNDP Bangkok Regional Hub (BRH) technical advisors and UNDP Thailand country office on the methodology and process to develop the CCBII report, country intervention report, and the work plan for Thailand;
• Hold initial awareness and sensitisation workshop with stakeholders on the CCBII report, the country intervention report, and the work plan;
• Gather data and information as required for the development of CCBII report, the country intervention report, and the work plan which will include gender and human right components (consolidating the inputs of gender and human rights consultants);
• Prepare the CCBII report, country intervention report, and work plan and present the preliminary findings to relevant stakeholders to gather views and comments;
• Prepare a 6 months workplan for implementation of the CCBII programme in Thailand;
• Deliver the final CCBII report, country intervention report, and work plan incorporating views and comments from stakeholders.

Expected Outputs and Deliverables

 The consultant is expected to deliver the followings:

Institutional Arrangement

The consultant will work under the overall supervision of the project management team of the project on “Strengthening Thailand’s Capacity to link climate Policy and Public Finance” in consultation with UNDP BRH’s Climate Finance cross-practice team.

Duration of the Assignment

15th June 2017 – 31st August 2017 on output-based basis with total of 30 working days.

Duty Station

Home Based, with travel in Bangkok

Competencies

Corporate 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 favouritism.

Technical Competencies:

• 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;
• Proven experience in the developing country context and working in different cultural settings.

Communication:

• Communicate effectively in writing to a varied and broad audience in a simple and concise manner.

Professionalism:

• Capable of working in a high pressure environment with sharp and frequent deadlines, managing many tasks simultaneously;
• Excellent analytical and organizational skills.

Teamwork:

• Projects a positive image and is ready to take on a wide range of tasks;
• Focuses on results for the client;
• Welcomes constructive feedback.

Required Skills and Experience

• Minimum 5 years of experience in policy and planning, project appraisal, economic analysis, combined with experience in climate change;
• Familiarity with climate change mitigation and adaptation analytical tools;
• Experience in Thailand budget system and policy would be an advantage;
• Master’s degree in economics or closely related subjects. A university degree in economics with more than 13 years of experience directly related to economic analysis of climate change could also be accepted;
• Familiarity with government planning systems and institutional roles;
• Ability to interact with senior government officials;
• Team leadership experience;
• Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability;
• Ability to work under pressure and time constraint;
• Excellent written and oral communication skills; and Fluency in English required.

Price Proposal and Schedule of Payment :

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:

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.

Criteria for Selection of the Best Offer

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

• Criteria 1 Eg. Relevance of Education
• Criteria 2 Eg. Experience with policy and planning, economic appraisal
• Criteria 3 Eg. Experience with climate change issues
• Criteria 4 Eg. Experience with government institutions

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

Documents to be Included when Submitting the Proposals:

Candidates wishing to be considered for this assignment are required to submit the following documents to demonstrate their qualifications. Please group them into one (1) single PDF document/ or one ZIP File as the application only allows to upload maximum one document:

• Letter of Confirmation of Interest and Availability using the template provided in Annex III.
• 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.
• Brief description of why the individual considers him/herself as the most suitable for the assignment
• Financial proposal, as per template provided in Annex III. Note: National consultants must quote prices in Thai Baht.

Incomplete proposals may not be considered.

Annexes:

Annex I - TOR_ Lead Consultant

Annex II- General Condition of Contract

Annex III - Financial proposal and Offeror's Letter To UNDP Confirming Interest and Avail for IC

All documents can be downloaded at :http://procurement-notices.undp.org/view_notice.cfm?notice_id=37806