2021-06-13

Terms of Reference (ToR) for Final Evaluation of Emergency Food Security Project – EFSP II Somalia/Somaliland

Somalia/Somaliland
Posted on June 13, 2021

CARE international

Terms of Reference (ToR) for Final Evaluation of Emergency Food Security Project – EFSP II Somalia/Somaliland

CARE INTERNATIONAL IN SOMALIA/SOMALILAND

Terms of Reference (ToR) for Final Evaluation of Emergency Food Security Project – EFSP II

Introduction

CARE is a leading humanitarian NGO reaching approximately 6.8 million people in the largest crises around the world. CARE’s programming is implemented with strict adherence to international quality standards, as referenced throughout this proposal. In Somalia, CARE is a leader in food security/livelihoods (mainly CVA), WASH, education, nutrition and protection. Since 2018 CARE also started health sector activities when it adopted the multi-sectoral and integrated approach to humanitarian assistance in order to meet the multiple needs of the disaster-affected population.

CARE has access to isolated communities and works through partners, such as Daryeel Bulsho Guud (DBG), WARDI Relief & Development Initiatives (WARDI), and Wajir South Development Authority (WASDA), to reach communities where other international NGOs cannot reach. It seeks to maximize synergies and complementarity with programs funded by donors such as WFP, UNICEF, ECHO, Global Alliance Canada (GAC) and USAID/FFP, and avoid duplication. CARE Somalia draws upon the global technical expertise and resources of the organization’s experts and proven methodologies.

About the Project

Food security in Somalia remained fragile due to the ongoing impact of climate events and conflict of past years now compounded by developments in 2019-2020. While the most recent Deyr rainy season (October-December 2019) brought improvements in crop and livestock production in some areas of Somalia, 1.3 million people across Somalia were still expected to face food consumption gaps or depletion of assets—Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) indicative of Crisis (Phase 3), or worse outcomes through mid-2020. In addition, 963,000 children under the age of five were likely to face acute malnutrition though December 2020 of which 162,000 were likely to be severely malnourished^. The number of internally displaced people (IDPs) remained high at 2.6 million. Of the 11 major IDP settlements, 42% were classified as IPC Phase 3 from January to March 2020, but it was/is projected that food security in IDPs deteriorated from April to June 2020 resulting in all IDP settlements classified as IPC Phase 3^. Emergency food assistance from July to December 2019 reached an average of 1.7 to 2 million people per month according to the Somalia Food Security Cluster. This humanitarian assistance mitigated more severe outcomes in many geographies.

In the four regions CARE proposed to work in the costed extension of the Emergency Food Security Program II (EFSP II)—Galgadud, Mudug, Sanaag, and Sool;—FSNAU/FEWSNET estimated that from January to March 2020, a total of 208,000 people were at IPC 3 Crisis and 50,000 people at IPC 4 Emergency. Food security in these four regions was/is expected to deteriorate. The number of people at IPC 3 Crisis was/is projected to increase by 15 percent to 208,000 and the number of people at IPC 4 Emergency projected to increase by 19 percent to 50,000 from April to June 2020. These four regions made up 19-22% of the total Somalian population in IPC 3 and IPC 4. These projections did not reflect 2020 Gu seasonal rains underperforming, flooding and/or Desert Locust damage as most likely scenarios. If any of these events materialized, food security across Somalia could deteriorate more than anticipated.

The Emergency Food Security Project was/is a two-year project which started August 2019 and expected to run until July 2021. The purpose of the project was to improve food security for vulnerable drought, flooding/cyclone, COVID-19 and conflict impacted households in the Galgadud, Mudug, Sanaag, and Sool regions through UCTs and CCTs supplemented with complementary, integrated nutrition interventions. The proposed intervention targeted to increase food access for 107,362 HHs; 644,172 individuals (60% women, 40% men). The project prioritizes/d the needs of specific vulnerable groups including newly displaced IDPs, pregnant and lactating women (PLW), sick, elderly, individuals with disabilities, children, infants, and child-headed households.

Evaluation Purpose

The purpose of the evaluation is to assess the extent to which the program has achieved its target objectives and indicators. The final evaluation will assess if the project met its strategic objective of improved food security to drought affected households in the target locations by analyzing questions of impact, relevance/appropriateness and effectiveness of the project interventions. This end-line evaluation for an Emergency Food Security Program-EFSP II in Somalia is meant as a comparison for a baseline evaluation that was done at the beginning of the project.

CARE intends to capture emerging results from this final evaluation to inform decisions about future programming. The overall effectiveness and efficiency of the program will be measured by tracking observed changes are as a contribution of project interventions. In addition, the evaluation will identify best practices and key lessons in technical aspects as well as the program management approach to facilitate continued learning and improvement of humanitarian emergency response. The findings of this final evaluation will be shared with USAID/FFP and with the other humanitarian community working in Somalia/Somaliland, through the Somalia NGO Consortium, the UN Cluster system, as well as through local networks. The key audience for the End-line evaluation report includes program staff, CARE’s country office leadership and the donors.

Final evaluation questions

Impact-

What was the impact of the project interventions on food security levels of the targeted households?
How did the project interventions lead to increased nutritional level of children and pregnant and lactating women that accessed the nutritional services of the project?

Relevance

To what extent did the project meet the needs of the beneficiaries?
Were/Are the activities and outputs of the programme consistent with the overall goal and the attainment of its objectives? (test theory of change/Log Frame)

Effectiveness (performance)

What were the major factors influencing the achievement or non-achievement of the project objective and Intermediate result?
What changes—expected and unexpected, positive and negative—did targeted participants, community members and other stakeholders associate with the activity’s interventions?

Evaluation Design, Approach and Methodology

This end-line study will adopt a non-experimental research design where the consultant is expected to use a comparative analysis approach from baseline to establish the change on key project performance indicators on food security and nutrition. The researcher will not control, manipulate or alter the predictor variables or project beneficiaries, but will instead rely on interpretation, observation and interactions to concluded, through correlations.

The consultant will employ mixed-methods involving both quantitative and qualitative data collection entailing beneficiary household survey; document reviews, beneficiary and stakeholder interviews. A comparative analysis approach will be used to report on project achievements for selected indicator values.

Its expected the consultant to propose a suiting and detailed evaluation methodology encompassing the appropriate evaluation method, sampling, data analysis, presentation and reporting and ethical consideration of the evaluation.

The quantitative methodology for end-line survey will collect data on the following food security and nutrition key indicators:

Food Consumption Score (FCS): Percentage of households with poor, borderline, and adequate food consumption score.
Reduced Coping Strategy Index (rCSI):
Household Hunger Score (HHS): Prevalence of households with moderate or severe hunger and other food security indicators in the log frame.
Number of households enrolled in the cash transfer program
Percentage of cash transfer used to meet basic food needs (utilization of cash assistance).
Proportion of infants 0-5 months of age who are fed exclusively with breast milk
Proportion of children 6-23 months of age who receive foods from 4 or more food groups

Deliverables and Reporting Requirements

The evaluation deliverables are:

Inception Report: For review, the evaluation team should submit to CARE an inception report presenting findings from the desk review and/or examination of data to date. The inception Report should include
1. Demonstrate clear understanding of the evaluation ToR
2. Detailed evaluation methodology
3. Proposed sample size with specific detail on sampling approach and methodology
4. Evaluation Matrix
5. Procedures for ethical consideration
6. Revised work plan
7. Data collection methodology, including data collection tools for all indicators
8. Proposed data analysis methods and the tools and technologies to be used.
Draft Evaluation Report: The evaluation team should share a draft evaluation report that addresses all the questions identified in the TOR and any other issues the team considers to have a bearing on the objectives of the evaluation including providing recommendations for future programming. Once the initial draft evaluation report is submitted, CARE will have 5 working days to review, comment on the initial draft and submit the consolidated comments to the evaluation team. The evaluation team will then be asked to submit a revised final draft report within 5 working days, and again CARE will review and send comments on this final draft report within 3 working days of its submission.

Final Evaluation Report: The evaluation team will be asked to take no more than 7 working days (or as agreed upon in the work plan) to respond to and incorporate final evaluation report comments from CARE. The evaluation team lead will then submit the final report to the MEAL Specialist in CARE International in Somalia/Somaliland.

Submission of Dataset(s) to the Development Data Library: The consultant must submit the report to CARE in a machine-readable, non-proprietary format, any dataset created or obtained in performance of this award. The dataset should be organized and documented for use by even those not fully familiar with the intervention or valuation. The data sets to be submitted include
All data collection tools used for the assignment
Raw and cleaned data sets (Qualitative and Quantitative)

Generated codebooks and syntaxes preferably in SPSS or STATA formats

Qualitative codebook, audio types, transcriptions and translations.
All Photos documented for evaluation purposes
GPS Coordinates for all sampled locations

Presentations

Evaluator Profile

The evaluation will be external. The consultant/s will have to be a team or persons with vast experience in performing evaluations for similar projects funded by USAID as well as someone with vast experience in Somalia/Somaliland to better understand the context. Other qualifications for the consultant/s are listed below.

10 years’ international humanitarian and development experience for each member of the consultancy team
Proven humanitarian evaluation experience
Solid experience and understanding of cash policy and delivery, including various delivery mechanisms
Solid experience and understanding of CVA and its inter-connectedness to other sectors especially food security, nutrition and livelihoods.
Strong knowledge of the drivers of malnutrition and poor health in the Somalia context and experience in evaluating health and nutrition programs.
Strong knowledge and experience in the Somalia context (teams including Somali speakers are desirable and if unfeasible, it should be outlined how the team will obtain local feedback in their methodology.
Knowledge and understanding of the World Humanitarian Summit’s Grand Bargain and OECD DAC Criteria
Strong experience and knowledge in application of humanitarian standards like SPHERE and Core Humanitarian Standards (CHS)
Good understanding of integrated approach to programming and ability to make recommendations based on the evaluation findings
Ability to see the big picture and make practical recommendations for delivery and improvements on the ground
Ability to absorb, consolidate analyse and communicate large amounts of data and information simply and concisely
Experience and ability to operate in security volatile environments
Experience of working with local partners and private sector in particular the financial/payments sector
Willingness to travel to Somali/Somaliland under the CARE international security framework.
Excellent English report writing skills

Evaluation Team Composition

This assignment is open for both individuals and companies who deem to have the required technical and professional capacity to apply, however, the consultant must provide information about evaluation team members, including their curricula vitae, the roles and responsibility for each while also explaining how they meet the requirements in the evaluation TOR. They are also required to demonstrate appropriate team structure that can enable timely and quality data collection and submission of required deliverables.

Application Requirements

The bellow requirements will be considered as part of the selection process and therefore, all interested applicants are encouraged to send;

A technical and financial proposal highlighting their understanding of the ToR and how they propose to respond to the ToR requirements including the evaluation design, tools and technologies in place for them to perform the assignment, implementation plan etc and financial quote.
Team structure: details of consultant’s capacity and how they structure the evaluation team. This also includes the CVs of key evaluation teams including the lead consultant(s).
Sample work: at least three (3) samples of similar work (evaluation reports) performed for peer organization in Somalia or in the Horn of Africa region for the last 3 years.
References: Names and contact details of at least three (3) organizations that has been performed similar work.

NB: Proposed key personnel used for bidding are expected to be the people executing the work of this contract.

Duration of the Assignment

The duration of the assignment is 25 working days after signing of contract. Days are inclusive of travelling, fieldwork and reporting. The field data collection is expected to take place in June, 2021. The first draft of the evaluation report is to be submitted no later than 10 working days after data is completed.

How to Apply

All applications MUST be accompanied by a technical and financial proposal including a brief outline of the proposed methodology, 3 references with contact details, a tentative work plan and the candidate’s availability.

Interested consultants or firms are expected to submit their applications, updated CVs of individuals to conduct the study or profile of applying company to: SOM.Consultant@care.org. Please indicate FINAL PROJECT EVALUATION OF “EFSP II PROJECT” as the subject heading and submit not later than Sunday 27^th June 2021.

Food Security and Nutrition Analysis Unit and Famine Early Warning System Network. Technical Release February 3, 2020.

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