Request for Proposal (RFP) at the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF)

The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), is a United Nations agency responsible for providing humanitarian and developmental aid to children worldwide. The agency is among the most widespread and recognizable social welfare organizations in the world, with a presence in 192 countries and territories.

Applications are invited for:

Title: Request for Proposal (RFP) Evaluation of the joint SDG programme on institutionalizing social protection in Nigeria

Reference: RFP 9173686

Preamble
UN Nigeria has been implementing the two-year Social Protection for SDGs in Nigeria programme since January 2020 with the end date of January 2022 but now extended to June 2022. To promote accountability and enhance learning and documentation, UN Nigeria in partnership with relevant government ministries (see annex 2 for list of MDAs) is commissioning a country-led evaluation of Social Protection for SDGs in Nigeria programme. These Terms of Reference (ToR) set out the purpose and objectives, scope, and methodology for an institutional contract with a team of at least three evaluation consultants. Findings and recommendations from this evaluation will strengthen the result of this project and inform the replication and scale-up of integrated social protection programmes in Nigeria. The evaluation is expected to be conducted between April 15 2022 to June 15, 2022 for a total duration of approximately 50 days.

Before the closure of the joint programmes, a final, independent and gender-responsive evaluation is expected to be carried out. The final evaluation will be managed jointly by the PUNOs as per established process for independent evaluations, supervised by the RCO Data Management Results Monitoring/Reporting Officer, UNICEF Evaluation Manager, and in coordination with Evaluation Steering Committee not involved in the implementation of the joint programme. The evaluations will follow the United Nations Evaluation Group’s (UNEG) Norms and Standards for Evaluation in the UN System, using the guidance on Joint Evaluation and relevant UNDG guidance on evaluations.

The management and implementation of the joint evaluation will have due regard to the evaluation policies of the PUNOs to ensure the requirements of those policies are met; and with use of appropriate guidance from PUNOs on joint evaluation. The evaluation process will be participative and will involve all relevant programme’s stakeholders and partners. Evaluation results will be disseminated amongst governments, donors, academic institutions and stakeholders of civil society (including workers’ and employers’ organizations) and a joint management response will be produced upon completion of the evaluation process to be made publicly available on the evaluation platforms or similar of the PUNOs

Purpose

• The purpose of this evaluation is to undertake an independent assessment of the relevance, coherence, effectiveness, efficiency, impact and sustainability of the SDG Joint Programme outcomes, interventions, and strategies and its contribution to the Nigerian Social Protection programme.
• In addition, the evaluation will examine the strengthens and weaknesses for replication and accountability of United Nations towards Government and relevant Partners vis-à-vis the return of this SDG joint investment: What Works well for Whom, What didn’t work, Why and What to do better in the future.
• The Evaluation Report will be disseminated to Government, UN RCO, UN agencies, UN Secretary-General and Development Partners. The evaluation is also for knowledge generation and learning.
• The evaluation will determine the reasons why certain results occurred or not to draw lessons, derive good practices and pointers for learning.
• It will provide evidence-based findings to inform the replication and scale-up of integrated social protection programmes in Nigeria.

Objectives
The objectives of the evaluation are as follows:

• To assess the relevance, effectiveness, efficiency, coherence, and sustainability of the joint programme with a focus on how it responded to the needs of the most vulnerable households, including people with disabilities.
• Assess the Performance of the JP in achieving expected results (outcomes and outputs) as committed within the Results Frameworks and Theory of Changes
• Determine the effective benefit (impact) and/or intended or unintended, higher-level effects of social protection interventions implemented in pilot Sokoto State on marginalized population regarding HH income generation and social coverage;
• To assess the extent the joint programme design, implementation and monitoring have been inclusive of men, women, boys and girls and persons with disabilities (accessibility, nondiscrimination, participation of organization of persons with disables, data disaggregation by disability and gender)
• To measure the impact of Social Assistance on Livelihoods of marginalized households or population beneficiaries.
• To assess key success factors as well as key setbacks in the implementation of the SDG joint programme.
• To assess level of innovation, leveraging financing for social protection, strategic communication, and the capacity and leadership of governments and other stakeholders for ensuring that JP results are (institutionally and financially) sustainable.
• To identify and document good practices, innovative approaches and draw lessons and forward looking recommendations to support future joint programmes and/or adapt in expanding the programme to other states including partnerships.
• To measure the contribution of the JP to UN reform and contribution of JP to acceleration of the SDGs

The evaluation would focus on the 3 main results of the Joint Programme.

• The implementation of a legally and financially strengthened social protection system (SDG 1.3). The JP is expected to have a draft SP bill which will include financial provisions on social protection expenditure of the Government presented to the National Assembly by the end of the JP. Reinforcement of Institutional framework which will accelerate progress of social protection in Nigeria.
• The integration of cash transfer programme to alleviate out-of-pocket expenditure in contributory health insurance under a State-financed health insurance scheme for the poorest and most vulnerable (SDG 3.8). 5,000 poorest and most vulnerable groups are being identified to be enrolled in the State health insurance scheme. In addition, 2,100 pregnant women enrolled will be provided with transportation reimbursement through cash transfer and basis for cash transfer to pregnant women will be laid down in the State. In particular, the state cash transfer institutions will be provided with a foundation to adopt a shock- responsive social protection approach using their cash transfer mechanism in the event of future shocks.
• Established and built the capacity of 6 state SDGs offices, to serve as innovation hub for other states' SDGs offices. The six pilot states will provide a platform to share some implementable innovative solutions that will use social protection to overcome bottlenecks and expand financing in order to accelerate SDG achievement. The JP will ensure the achievement of social protection-related SDGs can be accelerated and learning and sharing across states can be improved.

Roles and Responsibilities of the Evaluation Team
The evaluation will be conducted through an institutional contract with an evaluation firm. The proposed evaluation team for the consortia will consist of at minimum one (1) senior-level consultant (Team Leader) to conduct the evaluation that will be supported by at least two (2) additional consultants (Team Member/Technical Experts). Additional researchers/enumerators can be considered by the bidders to conduct the data collection.

The Team Leader should bring the following competences:

• Having extensive evaluation experience (at least 10 years) with an excellent understanding of evaluation principles and methodologies, including evaluability, capacity in an array of qualitative and quantitative evaluation methods, and UNEG Norms and Standards.
• Having extensive experience on social protection interventions – planning, implementing, managing or M&E.
• Holding an advanced university degree (Master or higher) in economics, social policy, international development, public policy, public administration, or similar, including sound knowledge of social protection; familiarity with human rights.
• Bringing a strong commitment to delivering timely and high-quality results, i.e., credible evaluations that are used for improving strategic decisions.
• Having in-depth knowledge of the UN’s human rights, gender equality and equity agendas.
• Having a strong team leadership and management track record, as well as excellent interpersonal and communication skills to help ensure that the evaluation is understood and used.
• Specific evaluation experience of social protection is essential, as well as a strong mixed-method evaluation background; previous experience in conducting developmental evaluation is considered an asset.
• Previous work experience in Africa is desirable, together with an understanding of the Nigeria context and cultural dynamics.
• The Team Leader must be committed and willing to work independently, with limited regular supervision; s/he must demonstrate adaptability and flexibility, client orientation, proven ethical practice, initiative, concern for accuracy and quality.
• S/he must have the ability to concisely and clearly express ideas and concepts in written and oral form as well as the ability to communicate with various stakeholders in English.

N/B: The Team Leader will be responsible for undertaking the evaluation from start to finish, for managing the evaluation, for the bulk of data collection, analysis and consultations, as well as for report drafting in English and communication of the evaluation results.

Two (2) Team Member/Technical Experts responsible for assessment of one outcome each:

• Holding advanced university degrees (Masters-level) in statistics, economics, international development, public policy, public administration, or similar coursework.
• Strong training and experience in social protection.
• Hands-on experience in collecting and analyzing quantitative and qualitative data, especially in relation to socio-economic interventions.
• Strong expertise in equity, gender equality and human rights-based approaches to evaluation and expertise in data presentation and visualization.
• Be committed and willing to work in a complex environment and able to produce quality work under limited guidance and supervision.
• Having good communication, advocacy and people skills and the ability to communicate with various stakeholders and to express concisely and clearly ideas and concepts in written and oral form.
• Excellent English communication and report writing skills.
• Familiarity with the local language and culture are required in Sokoto

N/B: The Team Members will play a key role in data collection, analysis and presentation, and preparation of the debriefings, and will make significant contributions to the writing of the main evaluation report.

Application Closing Date
1st April, 2022.

Submission of Documents
All proposals should be submitted via email to: ngrsupply@unicef.org Note that the technical proposal should be separated from the financial proposal and the RFP number should be used as email subject title.

Conditions

• The contractor will work on its own computer(s) and use its own office resources and materials in the execution of this assignment.
• The contractor’s fee shall be inclusive of all office administrative costs
• The contractor’s fee should be inclusive of all travel cost.
• Covid 19 related costs should be included in financial proposal
• Please also see UNICEF’s Standard Terms and Conditions attached.

Related Documents

• Evaluation of the joint SDG led programme for institionalizing social protection In Nigeria (PDF).
• Annex B TOR (PDF).