Consultancy – Documentation for Child Support Grant Policy in Thailand, Bangkok

UNICEF, for Every Child

UNICEF works in some of the world’s toughest places, to reach the world’s most disadvantaged children. To save their lives. To defend their rights. To help them fulfill their potential.

Across 190 countries and territories, we work for every child, everywhere, every day, to build a better world for everyone.

And we never give up.

For every child,

UNICEF Thailand works to ensure the rights of all children in Thailand. This means the rights of every child living in this country, irrespective of their nationality, gender, religion or ethnicity, to:

• survival – to basic healthcare, peace and security;
• development – to a good education, a loving home and adequate nutrition;
• protection – from abuse, neglect, trafficking, child labour and other forms of exploitation; and
• participation – to express opinions, be listened to and take part in making any decisions that affect them

How can you make a difference?

The Social Policy Section, UNICEF Thailand Country Office is seeking an individual consultant to document the results and experience of the child support grant in Thailand as well as supply-side interventions.

Background:

Within the framework of the country program document for UNICEF Thailand and the RTG, UNICEF has been working closely with the Ministry of Social Development and Human Security (MSDHS) and other stakeholders to support the design and the implementation of the Child Support Grant (CSG) in Thailand.

The Royal Thai Government approved the Child Support policy on March 31, 2015, aiming to guarantee newborns’ rights to survive and to be developed as stated in the Convention on the Rights of the Child.  In March 2016, the Cabinet also approved the expansion of the CSG scheme to cover children up to age three and the grant will increase from 400 baht to 600 baht per month.  This is a critical step for the RTG for making a strategic decision to fulfil social protection gaps for improving well-being of youngest children in Thailand.  The policy, thus, could help relieve the households’ burden on needed expenditures for raising their children with good quality, particularly for the poor families.

UNICEF Thailand has provided technical support for MSDHS in the design of CSG scheme and its implementation. After three years of implementation of the policy, the grant has reached a point where positive results are seen on the target population. This is therefore a time point in which the national partners are planning to document the experience of the Thai authorities with the overall implementation of the grant. The documentation of the process and results of the CSG initiation phase is deemed to be very useful for generating lessons learned to be shared with key stakeholders. This could provide information regarding successful factors and draw challenging issues of this current phase. The documentation is expected to generate necessary actions or policy recommendations to inform the subsequent expansion phases. Additionally, the experience and lesson learned from this documentation are also expected to contribute to the South-South knowledge exchange on child sensitive social transfers in ASEAN countries, for which demand has been growing over the past couple of years. Last but not least, the documentation of the CSG is expected to be used as a good example on how to guide the implementation of other similar policies for children in Thailand.

The documentation of the results achieved so far under the CSG in Thailand becomes the subject of the present terms of reference for individual consultancy.

Work Assignment, Work Schedule and Deliverables:

Under the supervision of Social Policy Officer, the consultant will:

Main deliverables:  1. Review existing materials on the Child Support Grant Policy            

Description of the task: Inception report including proposed methodology and content of the documentation    

Days required: 5 days after signing of the contract

Expected time frame: July 2018

Main deliverables: 2. Methodology and approach for documentation across different areas         

Description of the task: Inception report including proposed methodology and content of the documentation    

Days required: 2 days

Expected time frame: July 2018

Main deliverables: 3. Plan and conduct interviews and focus-group discussions with selected informants and stakeholders involved in the policy          

Description of the task: Reports from interviews and focus-group discussions     

Days required: 6 days

Expected time frame: August 2018

Main deliverables: 4. Prepare draft report for discussion with MSDHS and UNICEF            

Description of the task: First draft report             

Days required: 17 days

Expected time frame: August-September 2018

Main deliverables: 5. Organize a public discussion on the key lessons learnt from the documentation      

Description of the task: Final draft report            

Days required: 5 days

Expected time frame: September 2018

Total: 35 days (Maximum)

This document should be 20-30 pages in length and will capture all aspects of the child support grant policy including: the context and origins of the policy; partners to the policy and role they have played; policy design and implementation (registration, payment, MIS, monitoring and evaluation, capacity of officials), benefits of the policy – to children and caretakers; existing supply- side interventions (how they were developed, outcomes, plans for the future); key challenging issues in the implementation, lesson learned; recommendations.

Estimated Duration of Contract:  35 working days over the period of July-September 2018

Official Travel: Home-based assignment with possible travel in-country in agreement with supervisor.  The consultant will be required to meet with UNICEF to review progress once every two weeks. 

To qualify as an advocate for every child you will have…

• University degree in Social Science, Social Development, Social Protection or related field;
• At least five years’ experience in the field of social policy;
• Expertise and experience in research and documentation, specifically related to social protection, social welfare;
• Experience in working with Thai Government would be an added advantage;
• Previous experience carrying out similar assignments;
• Proven communication, facilitation, and writing skills;
• Excellent knowledge of English (oral and in writing);
• Fluency in written and spoken in Thai would be an advantage;
• Bangkok-based consultant preferred.

Interested candidates are requested to submit CV or P-11, full contact information of minimum 2 references, availability, and proposed daily professional fee in USD by 24 June 2018. 

 FORM P11.doc

For every Child, you demonstrate…

UNICEF’s core values of Commitment, Diversity and Integrity and core competencies in Communication, Working with People and Drive for Results.

View our competency framework at

http://www.unicef.org/about/employ/files/UNICEF_Competencies.pdf

UNICEF is committed to diversity and inclusion within its workforce, and encourages all candidates, irrespective of gender, nationality, religious and ethnic backgrounds, including persons living with disabilities, to apply to become a part of the organization.

Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted and advance to the next stage of the selection process.

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