Individual Consultant-Consultant- Knowledge & Business Development

Background

Over the past two decades, India's contribution to global economic growth has doubled to almost 15 percent. Further, income poverty levels have declined, resulting in 133 million people being lifted out of poverty in the past 20 years. However, nearly 300 million people still live in extreme poverty. UNDP supports government efforts to reduce poverty and achieve sustainable development that leads to transformational change, bringing about real improvements in people's lives and leaving no one behind.

UNDP programmes aim to secure livelihoods through skills trainings, support protective legislations and access to entitlements, provide policy research and evidence, build capacity and promote South-South cooperation to eradicate poverty, and ensure government's anti-poverty policies are more inclusive.

As per census 2011, the population of Uttar Pradesh is 19.98 crores which has increased to approximately 23 crores in 2018 as per some estimates. RBI published a report in 2013 which calculated Number and Percentage of Population Below Poverty Line based on consumption (2004-2005) which showed poverty rate of 40% in Uttar Pradesh. Multidimensional Poverty Index reports shows that Uttar Pradesh has second most numbers of districts with more than 60% poverty level after Bihar.The poverty rate of approximately 30% is very important to achieve the SDG 2030 targets. Without UP achieving the SDG 2030, India cannot achieve its commitment to SDG 2030.

UNDP in last five years have engaged with state governments of Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka,  Telangana, Uttarakhand, Odisha, Maharashtra, North Eastern States etc to design and execute state-level livelihood promotion and market linkages project, women's social, economic and political empowerment, sustainable land and ecosystem management, and affordable rural housing, and others. UNDP has leveraged its technical capacity and international development experience to design and implement projects at the national level in partnership with the Government of India as well.

The UNDP implemented project- “Creating employment and entrepreneurship opportunities for women” (Disha) supported by IKEA Foundation and implemented by UNDP aims to support one million underprivileged women in India learn marketable skills and connect with income opportunities. Disha project focused on bridging information gaps related to career, jobs & entrepreneurship as well as facilitate job linkages with the private sector. Disha implemented more than 70 pilots at various scale in collaboration with civil society, the private sector, and government impacting more than 800,000 underprivileged women in Maharashtra, Telangana, Karnataka, and Delhi NCR region. The learnings led to the emergence of four model solutions in the thematic area of career counselling, employment marketplace, micro-entrepreneurship & value chain.

As part of its ongoing state outreach activities, UNDP wishes to explore working with Government of Uttar Pradesh and bring-in the valuable lessons and best practices through its learnings from the Disha project, which can be utilized by the different department in the Government of Uttar Pradesh in executing large-scale programs at the state level. It wishes to collaborate and design solutions which can benefit millions of poor & marginalized populations be it farmers, artisans, women or students.  UNDP is well placed to provide assistance to support the government of Uttar Pradesh in eradicating poverty and achieving sustainable development in order to tangibly improve the lives of people. UNDP approach of innovative partnerships and supporting greater access to national programmes for vulnerable and marginalized population, improve livelihoods, and augment skill-building for women is in line with the need of Uttar Pradesh.

In this context, UNDP seeks to engage an individual consultant to support the Government of Uttar Pradesh in scoping studies for relevant data collection, secondary research related to thematic areas of interest and design solutions with detailed implementation plans

Duties and Responsibilities

Under the overall guidance of Expert, Value Chain, UNDP the Consultant will focus on the developing the body of work with the Government of Uttar Pradesh as detailed below:

Objectives of the assignment:

• Identify critical need of departments as mentioned above of Government of Uttar Pradesh and understand the potential for partnership;
• Undertake a scoping study on the designated thematic area of career counseling, employment market place, entrepreneurship and value chain based on the need communicated by relevant department of Uttar Pradesh;
• Design solutions on the thematic areas of career counseling, employment market place, entrepreneurship and value chain based on the need communicated by relevant departments of Uttar Pradesh
• Facilitate organization of workshop on Value Chain and prepare background note for the session plan
  • Based on the discussion with various government departments, there may be the need to create background notes and PowerPoint presentation for workshops that may be planned in Uttar Pradesh  or Delhi in collaboration of interested Ministries.

Activities:

 The specific tasks to be undertaken are as follows:

• prepare working paper and background notes for value chain workshop in coordination and in consultation with Disha team members, UNDP state teams, NRLM and World Bank Team;
• meet and discuss with relevant government officials and present UNDP work and solutions in other states and understand the need for such solutions in the context of Uttar Pradesh 

• conduct desk research on the status of career counseling, employment market place, entrepreneurship, energy & environment, government system strengthening, localization of sustainable development goals and value chain based in Uttar Pradesh and prepare power point presentation of identified gaps and potential solutions 
• Support relevant departments in govt of UP on SDG based planning, dashboard and data collection
• coordinate with relevant department of Government of Uttar Pradesh to facilitate UNDP   partnership as per the scope of the work;
• establish working relationships with government department (s) for conducting scoping studies on the proposed solutions in a selected geography;
• undertake field-visit to respective location and connect with a range of stakeholders across local community, civil society, government agencies, the private sector to document the challenges and opportunities on the ground;
• develop detailed ‘suitable’ solutions with the timeline, potential timelines, activities, deliverables, budget, implementation mechanism, monitoring, and evaluation framework, knowledge management framework.

Expected Deliverables

1. Background note and working paper for each session of value chain workshop
2. Report on potential opportunities in Uttar Pradesh government in the department mentioned above and budgets in the thematic area of career counseling, employment market place, entrepreneurship, and value chain and PowerPoint presentation on the same
3. Coordinate and work closely with at least four Departments of Government of Uttar Pradesh to promote identified solutions from UNDP and to develop proposals;
4. Scoping studies on the thematic area of SDG, environment, career counseling, employment market place, entrepreneurship and value chain based on the request submitted from four Government Departments
5. Submission of four detailed solution plan to respective government departments of Uttar Pradesh with budget, timeline, and implementation mechanism

Duration of the Project

Within 9 months of signing of contract

Deliverables and Schedule of Payment:

#	Deliverable	Duration from signing of contract	% payment of the contract amount
1	Submission of work plan and strategy note on pathway to achieve deliverables	Within 5 days	20
2	Submission concept note, session plan and working paper for value chain workshop and documentation of workshop	Within 60 days	20
3	Submission of scoping visit report based on request from two government department of Uttar Pradesh and request letter from two government department seeking to submit proposals	Within 120 days	20
4	Submission of scoping visit report based on request from additional two government department of Uttar Pradesh and request Letter from two government department seeking to submit proposals	Within 180 days	20
5	Submission of four detailed solution plans to respective government departments of Uttar Pradesh with budget, timeline and implementation mechanism	Within 270 days	20

Competencies

Functional Competencies:

Job Knowledge/Technical Expertise

• Overall understanding of skill development, entrepreneurship, value chain, and related issues
• Experience working with the Central and/or State Government will be an added advantage
• Excellent drafting skills and prior experience in drafting proposals and program/study reports will be essential
• Ability to work with minimal supervision
• Excellent skills on MS office ( MS word, excel & powerpoint)

Communication skills

• Good communication, interpersonal skills, with an ability to work in a multi-cultural environment.

Core Competencies: 

• Demonstrates/safeguards ethics and integrity
• Works as a team member

Required Skills and Experience

Recruitment Qualifications: 

Educational Qualifications:  Post Graduate in Development Studies/Social Work/Rural Management etc qualification is essential

Experience:  

• At least 8 years of program management on education, livelihoods, skills and women empowerment programs etc is essential
• Experience of documentation and proposal development is essential
• Excellent communications and documentation (MS Word, Excel) skills in English
• Previous experience of working with UNDP is preferred

Language Requirements:  

Fluency in English is essential. Knowledge of Hindi would be an asset.

Evaluation Criteria

The award of the contract shall be made to the individual consultant whose offer has been evaluated and determined as Responsive to the requirement. Having received the highest score out of a pre-determined set of weighted technical and financial criteria specific to the solicitation.

Only candidates obtaining a minimum of 49 points (70% of the total technical points) would be considered for the Financial Evaluation;

•           Technical Criteria weight - 70%;

•           Financial Criteria weight – 30 %

Technical Criteria (70% of total evaluation)

1. Overall understanding of skill development, entrepreneurship, value chain, and related issues – 20 %
2. Experience of managing partnerships with civil society and government sector
3. Experience working with the Central/State Government/Private sector partners will be an added advantage- 20%
4. Demonstrated excellent communication skills and ability to network across multiple stakeholders - 10%

Financial Criteria: (30% of the total evaluation) based on the total all-inclusive lump sum amount for professional fee for tasks specified in this announcement

Submission of Proposal

Financial Proposal:

Consultant should specify his/her lump sum consultancy fee.  Please quote your professional fee only. Do not include travel costs in your financial quote as these will be reimbursed separately, as per actuals, subject to UNDP’s prevailing rules. 

Documents to be submitted by Consultants

1. Letter to UNDP Confirming Interest and Availability for the Individual Contractor Assignment
2. Updated and signed P-11 form for ICs

Note:

1. Any kind of miscellaneous charges i.e. internet, phone, relocation charges etc. would not be reimbursed;
2. Travel, lodging and boarding as per UNDP rules subject to prior approval
3. Individuals working with institutions may also apply, contract would be issued in the name of institution for the specific services of individual
4. Please note proposals without financial proposal will not be considered.