Evaluation specialists in conflict analysis, agriculture and food and nutrition security

Organizational Setting

The Office of Evaluation (OED) anchors the evaluation function in the Organization. Evaluation in FAO provides results accountability to both member countries and the Director-General, giving more in-depth understanding and objective basis for their decision-making and oversight. Evaluation also contributes to corporate learning, feeding lessons into a robust feedback loop. Evaluation provides a sound basis for improvements in the Organization's programmes in terms of their relevance to countries, definition of objectives, their design and implementation. The Office also participates in system-wide evaluation initiatives and joint evaluations thereby contributing to assessments of development effectiveness by the United Nations (UN) system and the aid architecture.

Organizational Purpose of the call

The Office of Evaluation (OED) of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) will be is conducting a series of final evaluations of the projects financed by the UN Secretary General’s Peacebuilding Fund (PBF), supporting activities and programmes that contribute to building lasting peace in countries emerging from conflict. The PBF was established by the UN Secretary General in 2005 as a multi-year funding mechanism for post conflict and peace building activities. Their focus is on: (i) implementing and sustaining peace agreements; (ii) dialogue and peace coexistence; (iii) peace dividends; and (iv) Re-establishing basic services.

FAO’s principal activities in these projects have centred on training, education, capacity building, rehabilitation of infrastructure, distribution of seeds, agricultural kits and livestock. The projects are carried out by the FAO country offices in partnership with other international agencies, and local and civil society organizations, and all aim to enhance and address issues on food security, livelihood support, natural resources management and resilience in post-conflict and fragile countries. Project evaluations to be covered by this effort include six PBF projects in Niger, Central African Republic (CAR), Chad, and Gambia. The interventions in these countries have centred around the following key thematic areas:

• Strengthening the capacities of local institutions to take better account of gender and diversity in its operational system, and train a critical mass of women mediators for the reduction of conflicts between farmers and herders and the strengthening of social cohesion
• Strengthen dialogue between cross border countries for better management of transhumance and to regulate movements. The intervention thus seeks to contribute to stabilization efforts through activities focused, in particular, on training dialogue committees, mapping transhumance corridors and rehabilitating pastoral infrastructure.
• Strengthening dialogue and peace at the community level for the prevention and management of conflicts between pastoral and agro-pastoral communities and through the development of resilient pastoralism in the cross-border areas
• Addressing conflict over land and natural resources through strengthening resource management and the capacity of dispute resolution systems, improve and restoration of citizen’s confidence in land dispute resolution systems

As all the projects aim to support and enhance social cohesion and peace in the country, the Office of Evaluation seeks to develop a overall framework and approach to undertake the project evaluations. This will ensure overall findings and lessons are captured for future FAO programmes and projects, and build the evidence base for conflict sensitive programming in conflict, post-conflict, and fragile countries in areas related to FAOs mandate (agriculture, food security, natural resource management, and environmental sustainability). The aim is to contribute evaluative learning to FAO’s pathways to contributing to local peace in the six main thematic areas of intervention and provide lessons for programming at country level.

The Team Leader will develop the overall scope and approach to be applied to project Based on this preliminary round, the approach would be adapted for a second round of PBF-funded projects in 2021. In additional, the Team Leader will and provide guidance and inputs to the individual project evaluation teams who will conduct the different individual final project evaluations.

Project evaluation team members will implement the evaluation of the individual projects following the defined guidance and scope, and assess the achievements of each of the six individual project evaluations (to be evaluated by January 2021).

Reporting Lines

Consultants respond to the OED Evaluation Manager under the general responsibility of the Office of Evaluation.

Technical Focus

The OED Evaluation Manager will recruit a team composed of one international consultant as team leader, as well as national and regional consultants to conduct the individual project evaluations. The team as a whole will be qualified in the following areas:

• Evaluation of conflict management programmes
• Evaluation, particularly evaluation of agricultural projects, in fragile or conflict countries
• Pastoralism, livestock production and management, resource and land management;
• Capacity development at the policy, programme and community level;
• Sustainable development, in particular food security, livelihood enhancement and resilience
• Social inclusion and cohesion programming, inclusive programming for vulnerable and marginalized populations, and gender inclusive programming.

Tasks and responsibilities

The FAO Office of Evaluation (OED) will guide this evaluation. The evaluation team responsibilities are to:

• Work in close collaboration with the OED Evaluation manager responsible for this evaluation;
• Review relevant background documentation made available by OED;
• Team Leader, in collaboration with OED Evaluation Manager, to develop overall framework and approach to the evaluations.
• Lead and/or contribute to the design of the methodologies for the overall evaluation framework, the single evaluations and the learning and knowledge exchange activities. The evaluations will use mixed methods. Conduct the evaluation: Work from home and travelling to/within project countries (as applicable) as part of this assignment;
• Lead or participate (depending on job title) in the collection and analysis of primary and secondary data by the evaluation team through, inter alia, online surveys and interviews and focus group discussions (face to face or virtual) with FAO concerned officers in HQ, country and regional offices as well as the targeted policy makers; and during the country visits, with key stakeholders including the Government, the FAO Representation, external partners, project teams and individuals, households, communities and local groups and organizations involved in the activities as appropriate;
• Participate and present in briefing and debriefing meetings, discussions and field visits, with the evaluation team and relevant stakeholders;
• Prepare the inception report (incl. evaluation matrix and evaluation tools) and evaluation report (both products by the team leader) and contribute to the evaluation with written inputs (team member), and synthesis of lessons (Team Leader).
• Contribute to a learning and dissemination strategy for results and pro-actively facilitate and contribute to related activities

Expected timeframe

• The project evaluations are expected to take place October 2020 - February 2021; with data-collection expected to start no later than November. The synthesis and final lessons are expected to be completed by June 2021.

CANDIDATES WILL BE ASSESSED AGAINST THE FOLLOWING

FAO Core Competencies

• Results Focus
• Teamwork
• Communication
• Building Effective Relationships
• Knowledge Sharing and Continuous Improvement

Technical/Functional Skills

• Extent and relevance of experience in project evaluation;
• Extent and relevance of experience in conflict analysis and management, peacebuilding, social cohesion and sustaining peace in areas of FAO’s mandate is a distinct advantage
• Extent and relevance of experience in conflict settings.
• Experience in evaluating projects and programmes at field level and facilitating evaluation processes. In particular, good capacity to carry out focus group discussions, use participatory evaluation techniques and the design and usage of online surveys;
• Extent and relevance of experience in pastoralism, livestock production and management, resource and land management;
• Work experience the project countries is a plus.

Independence

• The evaluation team members must be independent from both the formulation and implementation of the project. Therefore, applications will not be considered from evaluators who have had any direct involvement with the design or implementation of the project. Any previous association with the project, the executing partners, and other partners/stakeholders must be disclosed in the application.

Minimum Requirements

• Advanced University or University degree in agro-economics, economics, policy analysis, international development studies, or another related field;
• A minimum of 5 years of relevant experience in evaluation, preferably of agricultural development project and/or programs;
• A minimum working knowledge of English language skills required; additional working knowledge of French (for evaluation work to be conducted in Africa), Spanish, and/or Arabic (level B/C) is required for the field work;