Solidar Suisse Job Consultant: Mid Term Evaluation - Livelihoods, Palu - Central Sulawesi

Terms of Reference (ToR)
Mid-Term Evaluation of The Livelihood Recovery of Micro Entrepreneurs in Central Sulawesi Project (MEP)

Project/Programme Title: Livelihood Recovery of Micro Entrepreneurs in Central Sulawesi

Location: Palu, Central Sulawesi, Indonesia

Name of Partner Organisation: Muhammadiyah Disaster Management Center (MDMC)

Introduction/Background

On 28 September 2018, a series of strong earthquakes struck the Central Sulawesi Province, Indonesia. The strongest of these earthquakes was measured at 7.4 magnitude, with an epicenter in the Donggala district. The earthquake triggered a tsunami whose waves reached up to seven meters in some areas, striking Talise beach in Palu and many coastal areas in Donggala. The earthquakes also led to liquefaction on farm and urban land and several landslides. According to the latest overall figures from the Government, the death toll has reached 4.340, including 667 people who have been declared missing as well as 1.061 bodies that were unidentifiable. An overall number of 167’262 persons (52’306 HH) are still located, for their majority, in IDP camps, although a few households have already been relocated in common shelter barracks built by the Government or individual shelters built by NGOs.

Emergency Phase (October 2018-February 2019)
Solidar Suisse started its emergency response in October 2018 through a project with the network partner ASB (Arbeiter Samariter Bund – a locally registered German NGO) and implemented through five local Disabled People’s Organisations focusing on WASH in all three affected districts. MDMC has launched its humanitarian intervention shortly after the disaster happened with various partners covering the biggest part of the affected areas in Central Sulawesi with activities from food distribution over education, health to shelter and more. Officially, the emergency period has ended on 14 February 2019 and was then followed by the rehabilitation and reconstruction phase.

Rehabilitation and Reconstruction Phase (Feb 2019-April 2021)
Since March 2019, Solidar Suisse and MDMC joined forces and implemented the 4-month Coastal Communities Recovery in Donggala district of Central Sulawesi (COCORECO) project which ended June 2019. The project supported 268 fishermen households in 9 villages of Sirenja Sub-distict, Donggala Regency, by providing engines (218) and/or boats (189) to recover their pre-disaster livelihoods. In addition, the project provided cash to a total of 230 head of rural labour households for their community work in order to meet their basic needs during their unemployment period.

Following the COCORECO Project, Solidar Suisse and MDMC continued with the implementation of the Livelihood Recovery of Micro Entrepreneurs in Central Sulawesi. The overall objective of the Micro Enterprise Project (MEP) is to contribute to the sustainable economic recovery of the earthquake and tsunami affected populations in Donggala. The focus is on owners of micro enterprises whose businesses were impacted by the earthquake and/or tsunami and who will be supported through asset replacement and by improving their skills to increase their productivity and profitability. The goal is to cover all affected micro enterprises in the target area.

The project has two main outcomes:

1. Earthquake and tsunami affected households sustainably recover their pre-disaster livelihoods.
1. At least 1,200 micro enterprises are operational by the end of the project and the targeted micro entrepreneurs have recovered 70% of their previous income by the end of this project.
2. Local partner organization (Central Sulawesi chapter) is prepared to respond to humanitarian crisis.
1. MDMC’s Central Sulawesi chapter developed and/or adapted guidelines in accordance with international humanitarian standards and MDMC’s Central Sulawesi chapter developed their humanitarian response strategy.

Purpose
This midterm evaluation (MTE) shall assess the continued relevance of the project and the progress made towards achieving its planned objectives. Opportunities to make modifications to ensure the achievement of these objectives within the lifetime of the project shall be provided.

Clear and applicable recommendations will allow the project team to complete the second half of the project implementation in the highest possible quality, particularly in regards to relevance, effectiveness, efficiency, impact and sustainability.

Finally, clear recommendations for a potential project beyond the current phase will feed into the development of a subsequent livelihood proposal.

Objective
The mid-term evaluation of the Micro Enterprise Project (MEP) has three main objectives:

1. To assess the relevance of the project design and the implementation progress, including the beneficiary selection, the training approach and the conditional cash approach as the means for the earthquake and tsunami affected households sustainably recover their pre-disaster livelihoods.
2. To provide recommendations based on lessons learnt from the current project implementation as well as from best practices from other similar interventions for the project team to continue and improve the project so that its objectives will be achieved in due time and high quality.
3. To provide recommendations based on the current prevailing needs of the earthquake and tsunami affected people and taking into account Solidar and MDMC’s capacities, resources and experience gained thus far. These recommendations will feed into the development of a subsequent livelihood proposal/project.

Scope of Work
The scope of the MTE encompasses the activities implemented and results achieved thus far, (work-) plans and other relevant information of the Livelihood Recovery of Micro Entrepreneurs in Central Sulawesi Project (project duration: 1 July 2019 – 30 June 2020).

The evaluation focuses on the technical as well as management aspects of the project. It will include the social preparation, beneficiary selection, training delivery and management, cash distribution, community feedback mechanism and management of the project.

Specific Evaluation Questions
The following questions serve as guiding questions in order to assess to what extent the project implementation is on track and what is needed to enhance the project performance for the second half of the project duration and achieve the set objectives in high quality.

1. To what extent has the project already achieved its outcomes or will be likely to achieve them?
2. To what extent has the project already achieved its outputs or will be likely to achieve them?
3. What were the major factors influencing the achievement or non-achievement of the outcomes and outputs? (Also consider any which were possibly beyond the control of the project)
4. To what extent were the project activities and implementation methods appropriate and relevant in order to achieve the anticipated results and objectives?
5. To what extent has the project progressed and achieved its preliminary results in accordance to the original work plan and how well did it adapt to changing conditions on the ground and new findings?
6. How well did the project manage the overall budget (value for money), administration, staff and resources?
7. What are the current prevailing needs of the earthquake and tsunami affected people in the livelihood sector?
8. Which target group and which geographical area is still in need of support to restore their livelihoods after the natural disaster?
9. Which measures could improve the livelihood recovery of earthquake and tsunami affected people in a subsequent phase?

The consultant(s) will apply the OECD/DAC criteria.

Approach and Methods
The evaluation/review consists of several phases:

1. Contract and initial (Skype) meeting: Contract is signed and a discussion of the assignment takes place. First documents, including available data, are provided to the evaluation consultant/team.
2. Desk Study: The evaluation/review team studies all necessary project/programme documents; re-construct and analyse the intervention logical framework and its risks and assumptions. Existing data needs to be analysed and interpreted.
3. Inception-Phase: In the inception report the evaluators will describe the design of the evaluation and will elaborate on how data will be obtained and analysed. The use of a data collection planning worksheet or a similar tool is required. First interviews take place.
4. Data triangulation and quality control are very important and need to be discussed in the inception report.
5. The field trip will only take place upon official approval of the inception report by the contractor.
6. Field-phase: Data needs to be gathered, analysed and interpreted. It is expected that the evaluation will include quantitative and qualitative data disaggregated by sex.
7. Presentation: Presentation of key findings (feedback workshop) at the end of the field trip.
8. Final Report Draft: Submission and presentation of final draft report, inclusion of comments from partners and contractor.
9. Final Report: Submission of final report, see reporting requirements under point 9). For the different phases it is expected that data and information will be obtained through different methods such as: analysis of documents, structured interviews, semi-structured interviews face-to face or by phone, group discussions, online/face to face survey (if applicable), others.

All data collected needs to disaggregated by sex.
It is expected that the evaluation consultant/team will present concrete recommendations which are addressed to the specific stakeholders.

It is currently estimated that 15-25 people need to be interviewed and 35-50 people need to participate in Focus Group Discussions in 5 villages.

Timetable
A total of 12 working days is currently estimated for this assignment (2 days for desk review and inception report elaboration, 7 days for field visit including feedback workshop, 3 days for final report writing).Submission of bid (electronically) 9.12

1. Contract signed and documents provided 17.12
2. Desk Study 19-20.12
3. Submission of inception report 23.12
4. Field Visit, interviews etc. and feedback workshop 6-12.1
5. Submission of final draft report 20.1
6. Presentation of final draft report 28.1
7. Inclusion of feedback in final draft report 30.1
8. Submission of final evaluation report to contractor 31.1

The Evaluation Consultant/Team
The client can be an individual consultant or a team of consultants (international and/or national consultant/team)

Key Qualifications in the team should be:

1. Master degree in disaster management/ humanitarian/ social work/ business administration or other relevant fields.
2. A minimum of 10 years’ experience and expertise in the field/sector of livelihoods, especially micro-enterprise recovery.
3. If the contractor is a team, the team leader will have conducted at least three evaluations in the last five years ideally in the relevant field. If the contractor is an individual, s/he will have to qualify as the team leader.
4. If the contractor is a team, the team member has participated in at least three evaluations ideally in the relevant field.
5. Knowledge of Indonesia with focus on topics such as disaster response, livelihoods and microenterprise recovery.
6. Working experience in Indonesia
7. Experience in project cycle management
8. Experience preparing and analysing a logical framework analysis
9. Experience and expertise in evaluating humanitarian projects
10. Experience in social science methods
11. Knowledge of the Core Humanitarian Standard (CHS) on quality and accountability
12. Excellent oral and written English skills (state other language too, if applicable)
13. At least one member of the team has to speak Bahasa Indonesia fluently to conduct interviews and read documents
14. Sound MS Office and IT skills

The consultants must not have been involved in the design, implementation or monitoring of this MEP project.

Deliverables
The consultant(s) is responsible to produce and share the following deliverables:

Inception Report (max. 10 pages without annexes)

1. Evaluation matrix lining out the subsidiary evaluation questions
2. Methodology
3. Sampling plan
4. Draft data collection tools (survey forms, topic guides for focus groups etc.)

Debriefing workshop which is organized to validate and discuss the provisional findings with Solidar’s team in Indonesia.

Final Evaluation Report (max. 20 pages without annexes)

1. Executive Summary (1 page)
2. Methodology, analysis and key findings
3. Concrete and applicable recommandations for second phase (1-2 pages)
4. Concrete and applicable recommendations for a subsequent livelihoods project
5. Incorporation of feedback and inputs from contractor

All reports need to be written in English and Bahasa Indonesia.

The findings and recommendations of the draft final report and final report have to be structured according to the evaluation questions. An outline of the report’s structure needs to be agreed upon during the inception phase.

The quality of the reports will be judged according to the following criteria:

1. Is the results-matrix format part of the report?
2. Does the report contain a comprehensive and clear executive summary?
3. Were the Terms of Reference fulfilled and is this reflected in the report?
4. Are all evaluation questions answered?
5. Are the methods and processes of the evaluation sufficiently documented in the evaluation report?
6. Does the report describe and assess the intervention logic (e.g. logframe) and present/analyze its underlying assumptions?
7. Are the conclusions and recommendations based on findings and are they clearly stated in the report?
8. Does the report clearly differentiate between conclusions, lessons learnt and recommendations?
9. Are the recommendations realistic and is it clearly expressed to whom the recommendations are addressed to?
10. Were the most significant stakeholders involved consulted?
11. Does the report present the information contained in a presentable and clearly arranged form?
12. Is the report free from spelling mistakes and unclear linguistic formulations?
13. Can the report be distributed in the delivered form?

HOW TO APPLY:
If you are interested in this assignment and meet the requirements, please send your bid including detailed CV(s), detailed and competitive budget inclusive of all costs, fees and taxes (consultants are responsible for managing their own tax contributions) with the subject “Indonesia MEP Mid-term Evaluation” to bewerbungen@solidar.ch. Due to the urgency, the assignment will be filled on a rolling basis.

Closing Date: 09 December 2019