Social Protection Consultant (Complementary Initiative)

Organization: UNICEF - United Nations Children’s Fund
Location:
Grade: Consultancy - International Consultant - Internationally recruited Contractors Agreement
Occupational Groups:
- Social Affairs
- Legal - Broad
- Legal - International Law
- Human Rights
- Civil Society and Local governance
- Protection Officer (Refugee)
- Social and Economic Policy
- Animal Health and Veterinary
Closing Date: Closed

The Consultancy will provide the Ministry of Local Government with Technical support at all and coordinate with Catholic Relief Services in Implementation of One Stop Shop Pilot

BACKGROUND

The Kingdom of Lesotho is a small mountainous and landlocked country completely surrounded by South Africa. According to 2016 Population Census, the population of the country is estimated to be over 2 million. Seventy percent of the population lives in the rural areas compared to 30 per cent in urban areas. The country is categorized as a Middle Income Country but faces development and social challenges of a poor developing country. About 57 per cent of Lesotho population is living in poverty (the highest in Sub-Saharan Africa) with 34.0 per cent below the food (extreme) poverty line of M138 per adult per month. They are deprived of different public services. According to the National and Local Service Delivery Survey (2015) the proportion is about 52 per cent of the rural population. Children are the most victim of poverty and deprivation. About 52 per cent of Lesotho children are deprived of basic social services. Evidence shows that barriers are two folds. On the demand side, lack of information to service receiver is the key bottleneck. They do not know about the service procedures, eligibility criteria of many services and source of information. The supply side barriers include travel cost and opportunity cost of receiving services.

UNICEF is mandated by UN General Assembly to support states in realizing children's rights to life, survival, development, protection and participation to flourish their inborn qualities to be productive citizens. The organization, in line with its global mandate, organizational priority in Lesotho and the commitment and priorities of the Government, has established a partnership with the European Union (EU) to address the poverty and deprivation of basic social services through strengthening integrated social protection system. In order to address Lesotho barriers and bottlenecks in service delivery and chronic poverty, the UNICEF/EU intervention has included one complementary component to (1) link social assistance recipient families with livelihood means to help them come out of poverty through a community based approach and (2) to bring multiple services at a single point for the convenience of community people of having multiple needs met in one location through one stop shop model. The one stop shop model has two main components: (i) a permanent structure based at community council level where population can access information on different services, get specific services or referred to service providers and (ii) an outreach component where services providers at all levels (public, private and CSO) are gathered in one place close to remote community with a certain intervals to meet and provide services to the population.

UNICEF with the partnership of EU has been supporting the Ministry of Social Development to pilot a community development model, called Sustainable Poverty Reduction through Income, Nutrition and Access to Government Services (SPRING); and the Ministry of Local Government to implement one stop shop (OSS). While the SPRING is being implemented with the support of Catholic Relief Service, the Ministry of Social Development is preparing a Social Development Plan to support poor with livelihood means. On the other hand, the Ministry of Local Government has implemented one stop shop model in 7 councils under six districts beginning from 2015. The Ministry is going to expand the one stop shop in new four councils in four districts-Berea, Leribe, Butha-Buthe and Mokhotlong. The two ministries require coordination and technical support to prepare the community development plan and implement the one stop shop in four districts. Thus, this TOR has been prepared to hire a national/international consultant to support the preparation of a community development plan and implementation of one stop shop in four districts (outreach component in all 10 districts).

Purpose of the consultancy:

The consultancy provide the Ministry of Local Government with technical support at all levels and coordinate with Catholic Relief Services in implementation of One Stop Shop Pilot.

The consultant will be supported by another local consultant.

Tasks and deliverables

Tasks	Deliverables	Timeframe
Review programme documents; understand the projects; and prepare an inception report reviewing the activities and preparing a revised monthly plan with specific deliverables	Inception report	11.5 months, beginning from signing of the contract.
Organize a planning meeting with MOLGC and agree on expansion plan	Meeting minutes
Joint visits to each district jointly with MOLGC officials to discuss expansion and roll-out plan and secure their official buy-in.	Report on the visits, mentioning buy-in status
Following the visit, conduct a planning meeting with MOLGC and UNICEF and other relent stakeholders to define activities, budgets and implementation timeframe	Implementation plan
Review of manuals and guidelines based on lessons learned workshop 2016	Updated manual
Expand permanent structure of Citizen Service Centres to 4 new pilot councils. One in each of the four northern districts, so that each of the 10 districts has at least one centre	Permanent structure established in 4 new councils
Support and liaise with CRS to conduct service day trainings or other related activities- quarterly reports of SPRINGS	Training implementation report
At least one service day organised per month in one of the pilot councils	11 reports on the implementation of service days
Assist councils collect data during service days	Data on service days
Organize progress review meetings with stakeholders	Meeting minutes;
Train MOLGC staff at district and community council level and coach to implement office structure an service days- Provide any necessary capacity building of implementing partners, particularly district community council-level staff. – specifically training on data capturing and management	Report on training
Support community councils in the data collect for the online service directory	Data available
Supervision of online service directory consultants to implement the maintenance plan	Functional service directory
Update and prepare communication materials linked to OSS	Communication materials available
Facilitate MOLGC to prepare presentation for Mid-year and annual review meetings;	Presentations
Support CRS in the implementation of SPRINGS project	Monthly report
Lessons Learned workshop organized with all stakeholders	Report on lessons learned workshop
Participate in Sections monthly meetings	Plan and progress report
Consolidate quarterly reports to track progress on output 5.6	Quarterly reports
Prepare an annual report on the implementation of the pilot	Annual report

Supervision: The consultant will report directly to the Chief of Social Policy in UNICEF Lesotho Country Office.

Qualifications

Master's degree in social science;

Experience

Minimum 5 years of relevant work experience (planning, decentralization, community development and social protection)
Experience in decentralization process is preferred;
Experience in working in multi-sectoral approaches;
Experience in analytical report writing and presentation;
Experience in negotiation;
Excellent English writing skills;
Proven experience in implementing time-limited projects and working under tight deadlines;
Experience in working with Government, UN or NGO is an asset; and
Good interpersonal and communication skills.