INDIVIDUAL CONSULTANT – MID-TERM EVALUATION OF SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT GOALS COORDINATION CENTRE (SDGCC) PROGRAMME OF UNDP

Background

The UN General Assembly, and all its 193-member countries, in September 2015 adopted a global development vision entitled Transforming Our World: The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. This 2030 Agenda was designed as a plan of action for people, planet and prosperity.  It lays out 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and 169 targets, to stimulate global action over the next 15 years on issues critical to humanity and the planet. United Nations as mandated is actively working with the national and state governments to ensure the dreams of 1.3 billion people living in one of the fastest growing economy of the world. Implementing the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) requires new capacities and ways of working in coordination with all stakeholders, with strong institutional set-ups. These institutional set-ups need to be able to assist sub-national governments in integrated policy making, create inter-linkages and synergies, develop strong monitoring systems, and coordination among all.

India is actively pursuing to actualize the ambitious goals of ‘Transforming the World by 2030’ and in this pursuit National Institution for Transforming India (NITI) Aayog and Ministry of Statistics & Programme Implementation (MoSPI) are spearheading initiatives through a systematic and coordinated manner. In view of India’s commitment to the 2030 Agenda, State Governments have set ambitious targets for itself for achieving the SDGs within the state and formulation of the Vision 2030 document is a first step in this direction. Therefore, to effectively implement the 2030 Agenda, mobilizing and equipping public institutions will be required. 1 In the given context, UNDP proposed that State Governments created and harboured a special purpose vehicle called the Sustainable Development Goals the state’s Planning/Economics and Statistics/Finance Departments devoted solely to ensure effective governance and convergence between departments and stakeholders for achieving the SDGs.

UNDP has established SDGCC’s in the States of Haryana, Nagaland, Punjab, Uttarakhand and Karnataka. In addition to this, UNDP is in discussion with couple of States for establishing partnership for setting up the Special Purpose Vehicle of SDGCC. As it is more than two years since the proof of concept of SDGCC was piloted, it has been decided that a mid-term appraisal  be carried out to evaluate the contributions of SDGCCs for achieving the global goals in the State and to identify course corrections to ensure that the signature solution of UNDP remains relevant at the emerging development contexts. With just 10 years to go, an ambitious global effort is underway to deliver the 2030 promise—by mobilizing more governments, civil society, businesses and calling on all people to make the Global Goals their own.

Mid-term Evaluation purpose, scope and objectives

UNDP has implemented SDGCC projects in five states with the objective of building internal state capacity on SDGs and support public digital literacy, awareness creation, high quality knowledge management and capacity building system and partnerships; develop a communication strategy as well as IEC materials  for making government functionaries and the public aware of their roles & responsibilities to achieve SDG VISION for the state; and coordinate SDG Implementation and localization at the districts / village level; analyse and propose strategies, schemes towards acceleration of progress towards SDGs. Further, SDGCCs were set up to design monitoring and evaluation systems to track the states progress against the SDG goals, targets and indicators, including third party monitoring mechanisms;  develop and introduce tools using technology, including dashboards, citizen feedback loops, real-time monitoring technologies like sensors;  and institute  a mechanism & suggest policy level change for efficient coordination to implement SDG VISION through establishment of technical and management support group at appropriate levels. They were also instituted to facilitate the application of big data analytics for decision making; undertake bottleneck analysis in priority areas to assess service delivery bottlenecks, particularly at the last mile and propose solutions leveraging disruptive technologies; and help mobilize human, financial and physical resources and manage their utilization.  Thus, over two years of implementation SDGCCs have made great strides in realizing the SDGs across 5 states. 

In light of the progress made so far in terms of achieving SDG goals, there is need to undertake a Mid-term Evaluation (MTE) of the SDGCCs in the selected states. The Mid-term project evaluation will be conducted to identify potential project implementation issues, assess on-going progress towards the achievement of objectives, relevance and performance of the project as compared to the project document, identify and document lessons, and to make recommendations regarding specific actions that might be taken to improve the project implementation, provide recommendation in improving the project implementation during the remaining years. The Mid-term project evaluation is expected to serve as a means of validating or filling the gaps in the initial assessment of relevance, effectiveness and efficiency obtained from monitoring. The project evaluation provides the opportunity to assess project’s success or failure and prompt necessary adjustments /re-evaluations in accordance with Government’s evolved priorities and needs. Such recalibration should be reflected in the ongoing or subsequent action plans and activities.

MTE would map the progress and respond to key questions of the concerned stakeholders (SDGCC Program Unit, UNDP state project unit, CBO/NGO Partners) so that there is adequate and timely information available for pending decisions or action. An issue may concern the relevance, efficiency, effectiveness or sustainability of the intervention. In addition, MTE will address how the intervention need to strengthen the application of the rights-based approach and mainstream gender in development efforts. Overall, MTE would be critical in evaluating the progress made under the SDGCC projects, with broad contours of evaluations analysing the following:

• Progress on building awareness and capacity of all internal and external stakeholders around SDG VISION and its targets (outreach, population covered) through executing innovative IEC and digital media campaigns as well as organising stakeholder specific awareness meetings and workshops
• Implementation and monitoring of Action plans and Strategic plan for each department and propose integrated development solutions, innovations, policy changes, and digital governance solutions to accelerate SDG implementation
• Localising SDGs - Innovative SDG VISION for local district level and GP level authorities in their plans and processes.
• Forging partnership and establishing finance, plans and systems – Partnerships and interactions at Private Sector Platform to mobilize partners and resources for meeting the unprecedented need for human, financial and physical resources.
• Monitoring progress of each SDG through digital solutions including the SDG DASHBOARD, capturing trainings of Government / partners through the SDG Dashboard and instituting an innovative M & E systems to collect data from the field.

The evaluation will cover all the planned outputs and outcomes under the project, with particular attention to synergies between the components and contribution to SDGs. The evaluation will discuss, throughout the evaluation questions, how the project is addressing its main issue and the cross-cutting themes. The mid-term evaluation is expected to provide guidance for recalibrated efforts from SDGCCs to achieve Global Goals in the reference states.

Duties and Responsibilities

The primary responsibility of the Consultant is to develop a Mid-Term Evaluation Report on the current progress of SDGCCs in India. The evaluation should involve mixed methods (quantitative and qualitative), engaging with key stakeholders of the project at all levels during the design, field work, validation and reporting stages. To collect the data for analysis, the evaluation will make use of the surveys and semi-structured interviews.

The Consultant will be formally working under the supervision of the Policy Specialist, SDGs, UNDP India.

Deliverables:

The key deliverables under the Mid Term Evaluations to include:

• Inception report with evaluation methodology and timeline (10-15 pages): The inception report to be carried out following and based on preliminary discussions with UNDP/SDGCC after the desk review and should be produced before the evaluation starts (before any formal evaluation interviews, survey distribution). The inception report to contain clear methodology, theory of change approach on evaluation, timelines, outcome expectations 
• Draft MTE report (within an agreed length)2 The programme unit and key stakeholders in the evaluation would review the draft evaluation report and provide an amalgamated set of comments within an agreed period of time, addressing the content required (as agreed in the TOR and inception report) and quality criteria as outlined in these guidelines. Comments and changes by the evaluator in response to the draft report should be retained by the evaluator to show how they have addressed comments.
• Final MTE report. Debriefing/ Presentations to UNDP/SDGCC and concerned stakeholders and/or the MTE reference group

The final methodological approach including interview schedule, and data to be used in the evaluation should be clearly outlined in the inception report and be fully discussed and agreed with UNDP/SDGCC.

Implementation arrangements

The Project Manager would be representative of the UNDP/SDGCC project management team responsible for Mid-term evaluation study. He/she will provide logistical support to the Individual Consultant (Evaluator) and will assist in organizing a detailed MTE mission agenda.  He /she will also ensure that all relevant documentations are up to date and easily accessible (in electronic form in a space such as Google Drive) by the Evaluator from the first day of the contract (desk review phase).

He /she would be primarily responsible for discussion with the Evaluator on the SDGCC Project and the TOR, providing feedback on inception report, review of the Draft MTE report and adjustments by the Evaluator, circulate draft MTE report among key stakeholders and receive feedback, and consolidate feedback and share with the Evaluator for incorporation in the final MTE report. 

Evaluation ethics

The Mid Term evaluation will be conducted in accordance with the principles outlined in the UNEG ‘Ethical Guidelines for Evaluation’.3

 A length of 40 to 60 pages including executive summary is suggested. UNEG, ‘Ethical Guidelines for Evaluation’, June 2008. Available at http://www.uneval.org/search/index.jsp?q=ethical+guidelines.

Competencies

• Analytical skills: Able to synthesize large sets of inputs and data to form coherent outputs
• Ability to effectively and efficiently interact with senior members and stakeholders in the government
• Must be detail-oriented
• Communication skills: Able to communicate clear ideas across a variety of mediums
• Writing and presentation skills: Able to produce high quality reports and presentations
• Team skills: Able to work independently as well as in teams
• Great organizational and time-management skills

Required Skills and Experience

Academic Qualification:  

• Advanced degree in public policy, development studies, economics, business, governance or related areas (essential)

Professional Experience: 

• At least 10 years of directly relevant professional experience in public policy; consulting/ advisory (with focus on sustainable development or SDGs),
• Practical experience working with or supporting global development organizations or governments on policies and strategies, with a specific focus on working on topics pertaining to sustainable development.
• Strong understanding of the Sustainable Development Goals in India.
• Familiarity with domestic Indian initiatives around sustainable development.
• Strong experience in research, quantitative and qualitative analysis and in preparing recommendation notes / strategy documents.

Language Requirement:  English

Evaluation Criteria

The award of the contract shall be made to the individual consultant whose offer has been evaluated and determined as Responsive to the requirement. Having received the highest score out of a pre-determined set of weighted technical and financial criteria specific to the solicitation.

Only candidates obtaining a minimum of 49 points (70% of the total technical points) would be considered for the Financial Evaluation;

• Technical Criteria weight - 70%;
• Financial Criteria weight – 30 %

Technical Criteria (70% of the total evaluation) – Consultants to submit clear evidence on their experience and competency as per the technical criteria suggested.

1. Criteria 1: Prior Experience (30%)

1. At least ten years of relevant experience, in programme evaluation and/or mastery of data collection techniques and methods, interviews particularly, and quantitative and qualitative analysis. (15%)
2. Worked on at least 2 projects that demonstrate practical experience working on evaluation of programmes from global development organizations or governments on policies and strategies. (15%)

2. Criteria 2: Demonstrated Knowledge on Sustainable Development Goals (25%)

1. Worked on at least 2 projects that demonstrate familiarity with Indian/global initiatives around sustainable development or SDGs. 25%

3. Criteria 3: Multi-stakeholder coordination (15%)

1. Consultant should have demonstrated experience (at least 2 projects) in coordinating and working with multi-stakeholder groups (Government/UN/Community Based Organisations) for programme evaluations – 15% 

Financial Proposal:

Technically qualified consultants will be requested to submit their lump sum rate i.e. consultants who score more than 70% i.e. 49 marks with respect to the above-mentioned evaluation criteria. Consultant should not specify their consultancy fee on their CV or with the submission. The CV will not be evaluated further in case the consultant submits the same.

Payment Scheduled: Payments will be deliverable linked per the following schedule of payments:

Notes: 

• Miscellaneous charges i.e. internet, phone, relocation charges, local travel etc. would not be reimbursed separately.

UNDP strives to have a workforce which reflects diversity and gender balance, and applies an equal opportunities approach. All selection is on merit. Qualified Women Candidates are Strongly Encouraged to Apply.