Background

In April 2018, Green Climate Fund (GCF) board secretariat approved a 7-year (August 2018- July 2025) project for Georgia entitled: “Scaling-up Multi-Hazard Early Warning System and the Use of Climate Information in Georgia” (hereafter GCF project). Together with GCF project, in November 2018, UNDP has started a project “Strengthening the Climate Adaptation Capacities in Georgia” which was funded by Swiss Development Cooperation (SDC).  These two interrelated projects form a unified programme, which aims at reducing exposure of Georgia’s communities, livelihoods and infrastructure to climate-induced natural hazards reduced through a well-functioning nation-wide multi-hazard early warning system and risk-informed local action. The Ministry of Environmental Protection and Agriculture of Georgia (MEPA) is playing an executing entity’s/implementing partner’s role for both projects.

An overall objective of the GCF project is to reduce exposure of Georgia’s communities, livelihoods and infrastructure to climate-induced natural hazards through a well-functioning nation-wide multi-hazard early warning system and risk-informed local action. The GCF project will provide critical climate risk information that would enable the Government of Georgia to implement a number of nation-wide transformative policies and actions for reducing exposure and vulnerability of the population to climate-induced hazards. The project will thus catalyse a paradigm shift in the national climate risk management, climate-proofed disaster risk reduction and early warning approaches. The project innovation and transformative change will also include (a) participatory “Last Mile” communication solutions tailored to the needs of local communities, including Community Based Early Warning Systems (CBEWSs); (b) increasing implementation capacities for carrying out cost-effective risk reduction and community resilience measures through such innovative approaches as watershed/floodplain restoration, agroforestry, etc., and combination of structural and non-structural protection measures aimed at reducing exposure and increasing effectiveness of the early warning; (c) combining best available science and local knowledge for vulnerability assessment, hazard and risk mapping, disaster modelling and forecasting; (d) (e) carrying out a comprehensive community, municipal and national-wide awareness raising, education and capacity development activities on multi-hazard risk reduction, including preparedness, response and Early Warning Systems.

The project objective is to reduce exposure of Georgia’s communities, livelihoods and infrastructure to climate-induced natural hazards through a well-functioning nation-wide multi-hazard early warning system and risk-informed local action. The project will achieve transformative change in disaster risk reduction and risk management in Georgia as follows:

The project objective will be achieved through three major project outputs/components:

1. Expanded climate-induced natural hazard observation network and modelling capacities secure reliable information on climate-induced hazards, vulnerability and risks
2. Multi-hazard early warning system and new climate information products supported with effective national regulations, coordination mechanism and institutional capacities.
3. Improved community resilience through the implementation of the Multi-Hazard Early Warning Systems (MHEWS) and priority risk reduction measures.

The public awareness and capacity building of communities and the other users of the MHEWS is a critical component of the successful and effective MHEWS. One of the lessons learnt is that sustainability of both structural and non-structural risk reduction measures is dependent on the understanding, acceptance and ownership by the local communities. The GCF project will assist the government of Georgia in shifting from ad hoc project based awareness and education efforts to a planned, consistent and sustainable national-led information and communication system for enhanced climate and disaster risk management.

Activity 3.2 of the GCF project aims at introduction of Public awareness and capacity building programme at all levels to effectively deliver climate risk information and training to communities and local first-responders.

This activity will be led by the Environmental Information and Education Centre (EIEC) under the MEPA who has a mandate as well as experience in environmental outreach, education and capacity building. National and municipal level response trainings for officials will be carried out through cooperation of the EIEC and EMS. Community level awareness raising, and informal education activities will be carried out in close cooperation with NGOs having grassroots capacity building and information.

SDC project is conducting the capacity assessment on institutional and technical levels of the stakeholders responsible for all components of multi-hazard risk management and MHEWS, develop the capacity assessment score of the relevant stakeholders and prepare the Capacity Development Plan.

Duties and Responsibilities

The awareness raising expert is expected to work closely with the EIEC and the international technical experts hired within the GCF project, as well as the International Expert in Institutional Capacity Assessment hired by the SDC project and to prepare the long term awareness raising programme and training strategy for different stakeholders at national, sub-national and local levels. The expert will report to the Project Coordinator as well as Team Leader in community-based processes and structural measures and work closely with PMU staff, other stakeholders, and implementing partners.

Duties and Responsibilities:

• Work with EIEC national experts in stakeholder mapping to identify needs of the target groups for awareness raising and training in Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR), Disaster Risk Management (DRM), Community-Based Disaster Risk Management (CBDRM), and Community-based Early Warning System (CBEWS) at sub-national and community level. 
• To work with the international technical experts (Agrometeorology, Hydrometeorology, Environmental Economist etc.) to include the capacity/training needs of national level stakeholders into the overall training strategy.
• Use the findings of the Capacity assessment scorecards (to be prepared by the SDC Project) in the preparation of the long- term awareness raising and training strategy;
• Development the long-term awareness raising and training strategy for EIEC and other relevant institutions. The strategy should take account of vulnerable groups and should select the most relevant approach to reach and influence their behavior, taking account of polarity in views and ensuring that disseminators/multipliers, influencers and policy makers are included in the awareness raising campaign. Strategy should be designed to reach the widest possible audience and should include the short- medium and long-term perspective.
• Develop ToT strategy for the implementation of awareness raising and training in DRR, DRM CBDRM, and CBEWS
• Develop a comprehensive campaign plan, including the clearly defined short-term, medium and long-term and SMART objectives and establish realistic goals to develop each promotional activity.  Campaign should include participatory monitoring methods that optimize opportunities for equal participation
• Provide guidance to the national experts in preparation of the nationally applicable methods, tools and technical educational materials on DRR, DRM CBDRM, and CBEWS. Development of the methods, materials, and tools for awareness raising and training in DRR, DRM CBDRM, and CBEWS should make use of all available technologies and methods - social media and other web-based technologies, print, art and creativity, workshops, focus groups, forums
• Develop operational procedures, manuals, guidelines and training of EIEC and other institutions in the use of awareness raising and training methods, materials and tools.
• Support in preparation and participate in the annual community forum, which will be organized on MHRM and CBEWSs with participation of target communities and representatives of vulnerable groups to exchange information, lessons learned, successes and impediments;
• Work with the Project Management Unit (PMU) to ensure reporting, monitoring and evaluation; providing a well-documented, evidence-based compliance reports to be incorporated into the project annual reports.

Deliverables:

1. Report on Stakeholder mapping and identification of target groups (by November 28, 2019);
2. Guidance document for the national experts on preparation of the nationally applicable methods, tools and technical educational materials on DRR, DRM CBDRM, and CBEWS (by December 16, 2019).
3. Report on the stakeholder forum engagement (by December 20, 2019).
4. Draft design of the awareness raising campaign to be implemented by GCF project (by February 20, 2020)
5. The final design of the awareness raising campaign to be implemented by GCF project (by April 15, 2020).
6. Draft long-term training strategy (by July 14, 2020)
7. Final long-term awareness raising programme and training strategy (by September 15, 2020)

The consultancy is expected to allocate up to 40 working days within one year period (October, 2019 – September , 2020), including two (2) mission trips with 10 working days to Georgia. 

Payment Schedule:

• 20% of the consultancy fee: upon submission and clearance by UNDP Project Team Leader of the deliverable 1 (November 28, 2019)
• 30% of the consultancy fee: upon submission and clearance by UNDP Project Team Leader of the deliverables 2 and 3 (December 20, 2019)
• 10% of the consultancy fee: upon submission and clearance by UNDP Project Team Leader of deliverable 4 (February 20, 2020)
• 10% of the consultancy fee: upon submission and clearance by UNDP Project Team Leader of deliverable 5 (April 15, 2020)
• 20% of the consultancy fee: upon submission and clearance by UNDP Project Team Leader of deliverable 6 (July 20, 2020)
• 10% of the consultancy fee: upon submission and clearance by UNDP Project Team Leader of deliverable 7 (September 15, 2020)

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 favoritism.

Functional Competencies:

• Ability to work as a part of a team, sharing information and coordinating efforts within the team;
• Ability to work under tight deadlines;
• Very good inter-personal skills and demonstrated ability to engage and work with local communities;
• Strong analytical skills;
• Full computer literacy;
• Exceptional ability in communication and networking, negotiations and mediation.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

• Bachelor’s degree in public relations, communication, awareness raising, training, journalism or other relevant (minimum requirement: Bachelor’s degree – 7 points, Master’s - additional 3 points)

Experience:

• At least 5 years of professional experience in the field of public relations/communication (minimum requirement: 5 years – 10 poitns, more than 5 years – additional 5 points);
• At least 3 years of experience in developing awareness raising and training strategies, campaigns, tools and materials. The candidate will be requested to provide relevant samples to verify this requirement (minimum requirement: 3 years – 13 points, more than 3 years – additional 2 points). NOTE: candidates will be requested to provide relevant samples to verify this requirement. 
• At least 5 years of experience in stages of activity planning and implementation of public relations and/or awareness raising campaigns in international donor funded projects/organizations (minimum requirement: 5 points);
• Experience in awareness raising and training in the field of DRR, DRM, CBDRM and CBEWS is an asset (3 points);
• Experience in training of trainers will be an asset (2 points);
• Previous working experience in Georgia will be an asset;
• Experience in developing social media accounts/website of public or private institution/international organization/corporations will be an asset.

Language Requirements:

• Excellent command of written and spoken English.

Evaluation:

Individual consultants will be evaluated based on the cumulative analysis method: Offerors will be evaluated against combination of technical and financial criteria. Maximum obtainable score is 100, out of which the total score for technical criteria, that includes desk review and interview scores and in total equals to 70 and for financial criteria – to 30. Technical evaluation composes of desk review (50 points) and interview (20 points). Offerors that do not meet Minimum Qualification Criteria will be automatically rejected, while the rest will form up the long list. The offerors who obtain minimum 35 points as a result of the desk review will be invited for the interview. Offerors who pass 70% threshold, i.e. obtain minimum 14 points, as a result of the interview will be requested the financial proposal.

Financial Proposal:

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 output, 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. Maximum 30 points will be assigned to the lowest price offer. All other price offers will be scored using the formula (inverse proportion):  Financial score X = 30* the lowest price offer/suggested price offer. All envisaged travel costs must be included in the financial proposal as well.