Background

UNITED NATIONS CAPITAL DEVELOPMENT FUND (UNCDF)

Country Lead for India, Better Than Cash Alliance

Project Description  

UNCDF is the UN’s capital investment agency for the world’s least developed countries (LDCs). It creates new opportunities for poor people and their communities by increasing access to inclusive finance and investment capital.  UNCDF focuses on Africa and the poorest countries of Asia and the Pacific, with a special commitment to countries emerging from conflict or crisis.  It can provide seed capital both grants and loans as well as technical support that will improve poor peoples’ lives.

UNCDF works to enlarge peoples’ choices: it believes that poor people and communities should take decisions about their own development. UNCDF works in challenging environments – remote rural areas, countries emerging from conflict – and paves the way for others to follow. Its programmes are designed to catalyze larger investment flows from the private sector, development partners and national governments, for significant impact on the Millennium Development Goals, especially Goal 1: Eradicate Extreme Poverty and Hunger, Goal 3: Promote Gender Equality and Empower Women, and Goal 7: Ensure Environmental Sustainability.

Established by the General Assembly in 1966 and with headquarters in New York, UNCDF is an autonomous UN organization affiliated with UNDP.

Based in UNCDF, the Better Than Cash Alliance (BTCA) is a partnership of governments, companies and international organizations that accelerates the transition from cash to digital payments in order to reduce poverty and drive inclusive growth by:

• Advocating for the transition from cash to digital payments in a way that advances financial inclusion and promotes responsible digital finance;
• Catalyzing the development of inclusive digital payments ecosystems in member countries to reduce costs, increase transparency, advance financial inclusion-- particularly for women-- and drive inclusive growth; and
• Conducting research and sharing the knowledge and experiences of our members to inform strategies for making the transition.

Billions of dollars in cash payments and transfers are made daily in emerging and developing economies, including payment of salaries, social welfare and relief, payments to suppliers, remittances, etc. The problems with these cash payments include a lack of transparency, accountability and security, as well as inefficiency.

Furthermore, the individuals who receive the cash payments are often part of the 1.7 billion excluded from the formal financial sector.  This means they are excluded from access to a range of appropriate and affordable financial services to help them save safely take advantage of economic opportunities and reduce their vulnerability to risk.

Shifting these payments from cash to digital has the potential to improve the lives of low-income people, particularly women, while giving governments, the development community and the private sector a more transparent, time and cost efficient, and often-safer means of disbursing payments.

BTCA is looking to hire a Country Lead for India. For more information on BTCA, please visit the website: http://www.betterthancash.org/

Duties and Responsibilities

Scope of Work

Under the supervision and direction of the Asia Pacific Regional Lead, this assignment will ensure the implementation of the overall country strategy for BTCA and manage relationships with key stakeholders in India. Key responsibilities are as follows:

1.    Manage and coordinate the overall delivery of BTCA services to members in India as part of the yearly country strategy and member workplans.

a.    Manage overall workplan for delivery of BTCA services in India. BTCA services to be delivered include:
i.    Training workshops, peer learning exchanges and virtual learning sessions to increase digital payments capabilities of India BTCA members as follows:

• State level government - Coordinate and manage the overall delivery of 3 inter-state government exchanges to help states address their digital payments ecosystem development;
• Federal level government - Support the organization an international peer exchange of various BTCA government members to learn how India has developed a digital payments ecosystem;
• Private sector members - Coordinate and manage various capability building workshops with members as part of country strategy.

ii.    Implementation support to help government and corporate members increase the uptake of digital payments in key states and values chains
iii.    Research support to capture digital payments learnings/experiences of BTCA members in India to share across India and globally
b.    Provide overall coordination and periodical tracking/reporting of BTCA activities in India;
c.    Provide project management support to 3rd party consultants / consultancy firms contracted by BTCA to deliver services to members based in India as part of country strategy.

2.    Manage and increase engagement with BTCA members, funders and other stakeholders in India.

a.    Further develop strategic relationships and increase engagement with BTCA’s member focal points across the Government of India including Ministry of Electronic and Information Technology, Ministry of Finance, DBT Mission, Reserve Bank of India, NITI Aayog, and others, as well as relevant federal government ministries and key state governments, both diplomatically and effectively;
b.    Manage relationships with corporate members in India, especially with the goal of increasing the delivery rate of BTCA services to India corporate members;
c.    Periodically engage with BTCA funders in India to keep them abreast and updated with the progress of services delivered to government and corporate members in India and to keep abreast with the latest developments in the Indian digital payments ecosystem;
d.    Engage with various players of India’s digital payments ecosystem, to drive collaborative, mutually reinforcing and beneficial actions addressing jointly identified barriers to a digital payments ecosystem in India, as necessary and in accordance with the UN rules of neutrality.
    
3.    Create and maintain an up-to-date high-level analysis of digital payments ecosystem development across India (including digitization status, progress, achievements, challenges, opportunities, players, initiatives in India) through desktop research and stakeholder discussions, and providing these inputs into BTCA’s work on the overall country strategy and portfolio for India.

a.    Prepare detailed analysis, including background research on BTCA’s members, funders and other various organizations’ work on the digitization of payments and digital financial inclusion across India;
b.    Help identify partnerships with key national/regional platforms and initiatives for BTCA to work with to scale up the digital payments agenda across India;
c.    Work closely with the Asia Pacific Regional Lead to prepare quarterly portfolio reporting; mid-year and annual progress report and others as directed by the Managing Director.

4.    Provide general support for India-related requests from BTCA Secretariat.

a.    Respond to ad-hoc general queries and desk-top research requests related to the India digital payments landscape;
b.    Provide key information to BTCA secretariat on India-related queries;
c.    Support mission trips to India from BTCA Managing Director, Asia Pacific Regional Lead and other members of the BTCA Secretariat.

Expected Outputs and Deliverables

Any delay in the completion of the outputs, if not attributed to the performance of the consultant, shall be addressed through a no-cost time extension.

Institutional Arrangement

Under the supervision and direction of the Asia Pacific Regional Lead, the assignment will manage BTCA’s work with India and the implementation of the overall country strategy of BTCA.   

Duration of the Work

This is an assignment that will have an initial duration of twelve (12) months with 250 working days.  However, the performance control/ monitoring mechanism will be applied from the start date. Additionally, before the end of the twelve (12) months, UNCDF will determine the viability of extension subject to availability of funds and the performance.

Duty Station

a)    The duty station/location for the contract duration is New Delhi, India;
b)    If there is any approved travel, UNCDF will pay separately travel expenses (economy airfare, terminal expenses and per diems which include hotel and food expenses) according to standard UN rates based on evidence of approved and actual travel.

Competencies

Core Competencies

• Demonstrates ethics and integrity;
• Demonstrates political acumen and calculated risk taking;
• Impeccable diplomatic skills and knowledge of protocol; essential
• Demonstrated excellent writing, editing and communications skills to an international standard including correspondence, reports, talking points and briefing material; essential
• Builds own competence, creating an environment of creativity and innovation;
• Creates and promotes open communication;
• Remains calm, in control and good humored even under pressure;
• Conducts fair and transparent decision making;
• Displays cultural and gender sensitivity and adaptability;
• Shows strong corporate commitment.

Functional Competencies

Professional

• Project management lifecycle
• Ensures the full implementation of a project to obtain results;
• Conceptualizes more effective approaches to programme development and implementation and to mobilizing and using resources;
• Anticipates constraints in the delivery of services and identifies solutions or alternatives;
• Makes effective use of UNCDF’s and other BTCA member resources and comparative advantage to strengthen partnerships;
• Creates networks and promotes initiatives with partner organizations;
• Creates an environment that fosters innovation and innovative thinking.

Technical

• Working knowledge of current developments in payment technologies, including innovative payment methods (e.g., digital government, mobile financial services, pre-paid/reloadable/other cards, etc.);
• Impeccable diplomatic skills, particularly in working with governments of emerging economies in South Asia;
• Solid skills in market assessments, business case/strategy development and data analysis/management (spreadsheets, data visualization tools like Tableau, etc.);
• Understanding of key issues and international good practice relating to financial inclusion and digital payments;
• Excellent presentation and representation skills in multicultural contexts;
• Ability to translate complex technical ideas to a non-technical audience in both verbally and in writing.

Required Skills and Experience

Education

• Advanced university degree (Master’s level) in public/business administration, finance, engineering, economics, international affairs, development, political science, or other relevant fields.

Experience

• Minimum 7 years of professional experience in digital payments, financial services, financial inclusion, ICT4D, economic development or digital government is required;
• Minimum 7 years of experience in effectively leading or managing services to a very diverse group of clients or members and maintaining positive relationships with peers is essential;
• Minimum 7 years of experience in dealing with high level governments officials and senior level management in companies, particularly in emerging economies; essential;
• Working knowledge of current developments in digital financial services including innovative payment methods (e.g., mobile financial services, pre-paid cards, etc.) essential;
• Working knowledge of policy, legal and regulatory issues related to inclusive payment technologies and digital government; desirable;
• Minimum 7 years of experience in event management and organization of high-level meetings with senior government officials and senior business leaders; desirable.

 Languages

• Fluency in English and Hindi, both oral and written, is required;
• Working proficiency in other languages is highly desirable.

Recommended Presentation of Offer

The following documents are requested:

a)    Duly accomplished Letter of Confirmation of Interest and Availability;
b)    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; link to P11: http://sas.undp.org/documents/P11_Personal_history_form.doc
c)    Brief description of why the individual considers him/herself as the most suitable for the assignment, and a methodology, if applicable, on how they will approach and complete the assignment.
d)    Financial Proposal that indicates the all-inclusive Daily Fee price. If an Offeror is employed by an organization/company/institution, and he/she expects his/her employer to charge a management fee in the process of releasing him/her to UNCDF under Reimbursable Loan Agreement (RLA), the Offeror must indicate at this point, and ensure that all such costs are duly incorporated in the financial proposal submitted to UNCDF.  Link: Template for Confirmation of Interest and Submission of Financial Proposal

Criteria for Selection of the Best Offer

Consultants will be evaluated based on UNDP’s cumulative analysis method. When using this weighted scoring method, the award of the contract shall be made to the consultant whose offer has been evaluated and determined as:

• Responsive/compliant/acceptable vis-à-vis the requirements of the TOR and the project operating environment; and
• Having received the highest score out of a pre-determined set of weighted technical (70%) and financial (30%) criteria.

The Better Than Cash Alliance will conduct a review of a profile (technical evaluation) that matches applicants experience and expertise to the key tasks outlined in the consultancy. These are detailed under each of the following Key work areas noted above:

• Programme Development and Management (20 points);
• Programme Support (50 points);
• Stakeholder and Partner Consultation (30 points).

Only the top candidates obtaining a minimum of 70 points in the review of profile will be considered for Technical Interviews.  Technical interviews will explore the same key work areas, in greater depth, with the same weighting.

Technical proposal = Review of a profile through desk review (30%) + Technical Interview (40%).

Individual Consultants are responsible for ensuring they have vaccinations/inoculations when traveling to certain countries, as designated by the UN Medical Director. Consultants are also required to comply with the UN security directives set forth under dss.un.org

Both individual consultants and individuals employed by a company or institution are welcome to apply. Any individual employed by a company or institution who would like to submit an offer in response to a Procurement Notice for IC must do so in their individual capacity (providing a CV so that their qualifications may be judged accordingly).

Women candidates or women-owned businesses are strongly encouraged to apply. UNCDF 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.

References

UNDP’s Individual Consultant’s General Terms and Conditions are provided here:
http://www.undp.org/content/dam/undp/documents/procurement/documents/IC%20-%20General%20Conditions.pdf