Background
UNDP’s Social and Environmental Standards (SES, www.undp.org/ses) underpin our commitment to mainstream social and environmental sustainability in our Programmes and Projects to support sustainable development.
The objectives of the Standards are to:
- Strengthen the social and environmental outcomes of Programmes and Projects
- Avoid adverse impacts to people and the environment
- Minimize, mitigate, and manage adverse impacts where avoidance is not possible
- Strengthen UNDP and partner capacities for managing social and environmental risks
- Ensure full and effective stakeholder engagement, including through a mechanism to respond to complaints from project-affected people
The SES are comprised of an Overarching Policy and Principles, Project-Level Standards, and a Policy Delivery Process. The overarching policy and principles at the core of the SES are: (i) human rights-based approach to development programming; (ii) gender equality; and (iii) environmental sustainability.
A key mechanism to ensure these standards are applied is through UNDP’s project-level Social and Environmental Screening Procedure (SESP). The objectives of the SESP are to: (a) Integrate the SES Overarching Principles (human rights, gender equality and environmental sustainability); (b) Identify potential social and environmental risks and their significance; (c) Determine the Project's risk category (Low, Moderate, High); and (d) Determine the level of social and environmental assessment and management required to address potential risks and impacts.
UNDP’s SES and SESP came into effect January 1, 2015. The challenge now is to ensure successful implementation and strengthened capacities of staff to apply the standards.
Duties and Responsibilities
The consultant will support the following activities upon request and based on agreed deliverables that align with the following:
1: Development of Operational Guidance and Training
UNDP is currently developing a package of operational Guidance Notes related to the Social and Environmental Standards. The Consultant will support this effort by providing the following outputs:
- Inputs to the Draft Guidance Note on Indigenous Peoples, consistent with the template to be provided by UNDP, including helping incorporate comments received through the consultation process
- Draft sections of the SES Guidance Note on Stakeholder Engagement
- Review and inputs to other SES draft Guidance Notes related to Indigenous Peoples (including those on Social and Environmental Assessment, Displacement and Resettlement, Cultural Heritage, Biodiversity, Human Rights)
2: Technical and Advisory Support Related to Implementation of the SESP
The Consultant will provide on-demand based support to support implementation of the SES, including through the following:
- Review draft SESP reports and related assessments and management plans (e.g. ESIA, ESA, SESA, ESMF, ESMP, etc.) and provide advice on how to further strengthen the quality, specifically related to indigenous peoples and stakeholder engagement.
- In some cases missions to visit Country Office to provide support may be requested. In such cases, detailed Terms of Reference will be finalized and agreed beforehand.
Travel: The consultant may be required to travel under Deliverable 2 and UNDP will arrange and cover the cost of the official travel in accordance to UNDP rules and procedures by providing tickets, travel allowances – daily subsistence allowance and terminal expenses.
Competencies
Functional Competencies:
- Technical: The consultant must demonstrate expertise in indigenous peoples and related Social and Environmental Standards and Principles, including Cultural Heritage, Displacement and Resettlement, Human Rights, both at the policy level and implementation. This includes experience with stakeholder engagement and Free Prior and Informed Consent; familiarity with international law, norms and standards related to indigenous peoples; experience implementing social and environmental safeguards.
- Communication: The consultant should be able to communicate effectively in writing to a varied and broad audience in a simple and concise manner. Experience developing practical guidance materials.
- Professionalism: The consultant should be capable of working in a high-pressure environment with sharp and frequent deadlines, managing many tasks simultaneously; Able to handle a large volume of data and reports accurately and thoroughly, with great attention to detail; Exercise the highest level of responsibility and be able to handle confidential and politically sensitive issues in a responsible and mature manner.
- Teamwork: The consultant should work well in a team; Projects a positive image and is ready to take on a wide range of tasks; Focuses on results for the client; and welcomes constructive feedback.
- Knowledge Management and Learning: The consultant should willingly share knowledge and experience and make contributions to UNDP practice areas (e.g., documented knowledge, community of practice building initiatives); actively develop substantive understanding and experience in one or more knowledge areas, including process and/or technical knowledge.
Corporate Competencies:
- Demonstrates integrity by upholding the United Nations' values and ethical standards; treats all people fairly;
- Appreciates differences in values and learning from cultural diversity;
- Promotes UNDP vision, mission and strategic goals;
- Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age-based sensitivity and adaptability;
- Demonstrating consistency in upholding and promoting the values of UNDP in actions and decisions, in line with the UN Code of Conduct.
Required Skills and Experience
Education:
- An advanced degree in international development related field. Law degree a plus.
Experience (demonstrated 10 years of experience in the following):
- Technical expertise in international law, with a focus on human rights
- Technical expertise in environmental and social safeguards, including environmental and social screening and assessment, with a focus on indigenous peoples, FPIC and stakeholder engagement (
- Experience developing standards and operational guidance related to indigenous peoples and social and environmental safeguards
- Familiarity with UN and/or UNDP policies and procedures
Language:
- Fluency in spoken and written English is required. Fluency in Spanish also desired.
Management Arrangements:
The on-call consultant will report to, seek approval/acceptance of outputs from the UNDP Policy Specialist, Social and Environmental Standards and UNDP Technical Specialist, Safeguards and Grievance Mechanisms.
Evaluation process
Applicants are reviewed based on Required Skills and Experience stated above and based on the technical evaluation criteria outlined below. Applicants will be evaluated based on cumulative scoring. When using this weighted scoring method, the award of the contract will be made to the individual consultant whose offer has been evaluated and determined as:
- Being responsive/compliant/acceptable to the criteria outlined in the section “Required Skills and Experience”; and
- Having received the highest score out of a pre-determined set of weighted technical and financial criteria specific to the solicitation where technical criteria weighs 70% and Financial criteria/ Proposal weighs 30%.
- The technical evaluation will be based on the following criteria with the corresponding points (out of a total 70 points):
- Technical expertise in international law, with a focus on human rights (up to 20 points)
- Technical expertise in environmental and social safeguards, including environmental and social screening and assessment, with a focus on indigenous peoples, FPIC and stakeholder engagement (up to 20points)
- Experience developing standards and operational guidance related to indigenous peoples and social and environmental safeguards (up to 10 points)
- Familiarity with UN and/or UNDP policies and procedures (10 points)
- Spanish fluency (5 points)
- Law degree (5 points)
Only candidates obtaining a minimum of 49 (70%) points on the technical criteria will be considered for the Financial Evaluation.
Financial Proposal (30%)
The following formula will be used to evaluate financial proposal: p = y (µ/z) where:
p = points for the financial proposal being evaluated
y = maximum number of points for the financial proposal (30 points)
µ = price of the lowest priced proposal
z = price of the proposal being evaluated
Application procedure:
The application package containing the following (to be uploaded as one file):
- 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;
- Confirm availability to take on short-term assignments that may involve travel
Note: The above documents need to be scanned in one file and uploaded to the online application as one document.
Shortlisted candidates (ONLY) will be requested to submit a Financial Proposal.
- The financial proposal should specify an all-inclusive daily professional rate
- The financial proposal must be all-inclusive and take into account various expenses that will be incurred during the contract, including: the daily professional fee; (excluding mission travel); living allowances at the duty station; communications, utilities and consumables; life, health and any other insurance; risks and inconveniences related to work under hardship and hazardous conditions (e.g., personal security needs, etc.), when applicable; and any other relevant expenses related to the performance of services under the contract.
- In the case of travel requested by UNDP, payment of travel costs including tickets, lodging and terminal expenses should be agreed upon, between UNDP and Individual Consultant, prior to travel and will be reimbursed or covered by UNDP separately. In general, UNDP should 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.
- If the 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 UNDP under a 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 UNDP.
- Payment will be made upon submission of a certificate of payment request, indicating outputs achieved and days worked to be verified and cleared for payment by the supervisor.
The Financial Proposal is to be emailed as per the instruction in the separate email that will be sent to shortlisted candidates.
Framework Agreement
Please note that the LTA does not form a financial obligation or commitment from UNDP at the time the LTA contract is signed, and that such an agreement is non-exclusive. When a specific need arises, the successful Individual Contractor will be approached and be provided with a specific TOR and deliverables (and time frame) but still within the scope of the responsibilities stated in the LTA. The successful Individual Contractor is expected to provide Confirmation of Interest on the specific services required and submit Financial Proposal based on the agreed LTA Daily Rate Consultancy Fee. Financial commitments will only be established each time a Purchase Order for the specific services/TOR for Individual Contractor is committed.
This LTA has a cumulative ceiling amount that may accrue to the individual contractor during the life of the LTA, but said amount shall remain as an upper limit, and must not and cannot be interpreted nor understood as neither a financial commitment nor guarantee of business volume.
The duration of LTA will be for initial period of one year with possibility of extension up to two additional years subject to satisfactory performance and UNDP’s demand in services.
Annexes and References:
Individual Consultant's General Terms and Conditions are provided here: