URGENT: Solidarités International Final Project Evaluation: “Improving drought resilience of populations in Northern Kenya”

Mar 21, 2016

Solidarités International
 

Terms of Reference
 

Final Project Evaluation: “Improving drought resilience of populations in Northern Kenya”

Terms of Reference

Country: Kenya

Project title: Improving drought resilience of populations in Northern Kenya 

Location: North Horr, Chalbi and Loiyangalani Sub-Counties, Marsabit County 

Starting date: 25 March 2016 

Duration of the field mission: 20 days 

Time dedicated to the desk review: 3 days 

Time dedicated to report writing: 5 days 

Under responsibility of: Country Director 

1. Presentation of Solidarités International

Solidarités International (SI) is a humanitarian non-governmental organization which provides humanitarian assistance to population affected by natural disaster or man-made crisis.

 For over 35 years, SI has concentrated its action on meeting three vital needs: Water, Food and Shelter. 

In the Horn of Africa, SI is currently implementing Food Security, WASH and resilience building programs in Somalia and Kenya. SI has worked in Marsabit County since 2007. 

SI programmes have progressed from provision of basic WASH services to evidence-based resilience projects.

Activities include: adding value to pastoral livelihoods through Pastoralist Field School (PFS) training; creation/revision of Community Managed Disaster Risk Reduction (CMDRR) and contingency plans; creation of Pasture Conservation Areas (PCA); production of livestock feed; Prosopis management and transformation; and Fisheries value chain through the provision of training, improved equipment and business skills for fish capture, processing and marketing, and establishment of Beach Management Units (BMUs). 

All income generation groups have undergone training in business skills and market linkages. 

Targeted beneficiaries of this programme include drought affected pastoralists, agro-pastoralists and fisher folks along the eastern Lake Turkana in northern Marsabit County. 

2. Presentation of the Programme 

Background: Marsabit county experiences a range of challenges, which include tribal conflict, food insecurity, fluctuating food prices, livestock disease, lacking livelihood diversification opportunities, water shortages and poor infrastructure. 

These interdependent challenges are coupled with recurring drought, which tends to subjugate efforts of rebuilding the livelihoods in an area dominated by pastoralism. 

Drought has undermined traditional coping mechanisms and early recovery efforts, which tend to become increasingly negative for vulnerable households. 

Moreover the vastness and remoteness of Marsabit County, coupled with poor road networks and access to markets, has placed inhabitants outside normative survival thresholds. 

SI has been implementing a DfID funded resilience programme in three sub-counties in northern Marsabit. 

The programme intends to increase the ability of communities to withstand recurring weather-related shocks. 

The function of SI includes 

a) strengthening of traditional pastoral livelihoods, 

b) creation or revision of community contingency plans and subsequent implementation of community managed disaster risk reduction initiatives, and 

c) diversification of income sources. 

Project outline

Overall Objective: To strengthen the coping strategies of pastoral communities in Marsabit County during climatic hazards.

Outcome 1: Targeted pastoral households have strengthened their traditional pastoral livelihoods and improved their livestock value chains as a result of training, livestock insurance and material inputs 

A.1.1. Adding value to pastoral livelihoods through Pastoralist Field School (PFS) training

• I. Pastoral Field Schools 


• II. Livestock health 


• III. Milking cans and milk handling processes 


• IV. Improved breed animals 


• V. Index Based Livestock Insurance (IBLI) 

Outcome 2: Targeted pastoralists communities have created/updated contingency plans and are supported in the implementation of disaster risk reduction initiatives 

• A.2.1 Revision of DRR contingency plans 


• A.2.2 Creation of pasture conservation areas

Outcome 3: Targeted pastoralist communities have diversified their income generation activities in Marsabit County 

• A.3.1 Production of livestock feed (fodder and Multi-nutrient Urea Blocks) 


• A.3.2 Prosopis management and transformation 


• A.3.3 Fisheries value chain in Lake Turkana 

3. Purpose of the Evaluation 

The purpose of this final evaluation is to:- 

• Assess and evaluate the results of the project and its impact on the targeted populations. 


• Draw lessons from the experiences and challenges faced by SI teams, as well as set up recommendations for future programming. 


• Cover all the dynamics of the project including evaluating each activity as per the proposal. 


• Measure the indicators against the initial targets. It will specify how target beneficiaries benefited from the project. 


• The evaluation should further look into the relevance, timeliness and attribution of resilience programming. 


• Lastly, the purpose of the evaluation will be to assess the overall management, sustainability and impact of the project,


• Draw lessons learned and recommendations. 

4. Scope and Focus 

The evaluation will focus on the operation’s approach, the implementation process and the performance of the project. 

The project should be evaluated through the following OECD/DAC criteria: relevance, effectiveness, efficiency, impact, sustainability, and attribution. 

Lessons learned and recommendations for maximising impact and improving the efficiency, effectiveness and sustainability of resilience programming should be listed. 

Furthermore, a strategic orientation for resilience programming in Marsabit County should be proposed. 

The evaluation must answer the non-exhaustive list of questions below: 

• Did the activities contribute to reaching expected results?


• Did the programme cover the initially targeted population? 


• To what extent has targeting been appropriate, taking into consideration both exclusion and inclusion errors as well as gender composition? 


• Were the implemented activities relevant to the needs of the target population? 


• Were the monitoring tools adapted to the context and do they allow information to be delivered on time? 

1. This aspect should also include an analysis of the comparative advantage of different monitoring tools/methods in place and whether they allow for triangulation of information and identification of problems 

• Did the monitoring tools in place allow a proper measurement of the proposed indicators at the end of the project? 


• Were the beneficiary feedback mechanisms functional and adequate? Why? 


• How have the financial, human, logistical resources been utilized in the course of project implementation?


• What were the major challenges of the project and how were they overcome? 


• Has the project been adapted appropriately to changing needs or context?

1. Please include a note on El Niño 

• Did the project complement other actions on the ground (either by SI or other stakeholders)? 


• Has the project been in line with the national and county’s priorities and actions? How did it fit with EDE and ICDP? 


• To which extent and how did the key stakeholders involved in the project? 


• What impact did key stakeholder involvement have on the project? Key stakeholders include (but are not limited to): 

1. County ministries


2. NDMA


3. Other NGOs 


4. Community leaders 


5. DC, Sub-county, Ward admin and chiefs 

• How has this project contributed to the resilience of target beneficiaries? 


• To which extent are the results of the activities sustainable? In particular: 

1. Formation of CIG ( PFS and BMUs) groups and training activities 


2. Community Managed Disaster Risk Reduction Contingency plans


3. Income Generation Activities implemented by (Prosopis and MUBs and fisheries groups) 

• Which components of this project can be scaled up in the future programming to sustainably contribute to the resilience of target beneficiaries? Why?


• Which components are less likely to replicate? 


• What were the hurdles and what could have been done to make them applicable/relevant? 

The evaluation should also assess the perception and appreciation of the programme by the beneficiaries. 

The evaluation should also place emphasis on the participation of communities at various levels of the project management cycle. 

Finally, the evaluation should assess how the implementation of the programme is respectful of standard ethics of humanitarian practice vis-à-vis the SPHERE, the Code of Conduct for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies and the Do No Harm principles. 

5. Evaluation Process and Methods 

• The evaluation methodology should be clearly outlined in the report. Methodological appropriateness, relative to the evaluation"s primary purpose, focus and users, should be clearly explained, pointing out the strengths and weaknesses of the methods. A description of the overall flow of the evaluation process (i.e. sequence of the key stages) should be given in the evaluation report. The evaluation approach and the methods used (advantages compared to other methods) to collect and analyse data should also be described. The evaluation team disposition (including sectoral expertise, history in Marsabit Count/ASAL, local knowledge and gender balance) and its appropriateness for the evaluation should be outlined. 


• The final evaluation is expected to encompass a perceived change survey at the household level to showcase the attribution of activities to results. These findings will constitute as the endline results and will be compared to previous internally administered household survey results.


• The evaluation report should outline the sources of biases that might affect the evaluation and how these have been addressed. 


• The evaluation should triangulate findings from the baseline and midterm evaluation ( of which data was collected at different times of the year with variance in seasonality, this led to difficulties in comparing them) and monitoring surveys conducted within the project period on specific activities such as: pre and post KAP surveys, PDM reports, CMDRR plans, Project Implementation Plan, quarterly reports, baseline/midterm reports and other project monitoring tools used. 


• The evaluation report should also present the key constraints to carrying out the evaluation (e.g. lack of access to key information sources, use of translators), and the effect of these constraints. 


• Whenever secondary sources will be referred to, the evaluator should indicate the level of reliability of the given information.


• After the field work, the evaluation team will present and discuss with the project team on the preliminary findings and the proposed recommendations. 


• A de-briefing presentation and discussion of the key findings and proposed recommendations from the evaluation will be done with coordination team in Nairobi for feedback.


• A first draft of the evaluation report should be shared with SI’s coordination team for review and feedback before a final version is sent to the donor.

6. Procedures and Logistics 

• The evaluation team must comply with SOLIDARITES INTERNATIONAL’s rules and procedures related to security and relations with the media. 


• The evaluation team must respect the ethics related to evaluation practice 


• Logistics, movement and security would be provided and organised by SOLIDARITES INTERNATIONAL team. 


• The consultant will cater for the cost of his/her meals and for the enumerators involved in data collection at field level. 

7. Deliverables 

The evaluation report should include at least: 

• One narrative report (max 50 pages), including an executive summary (3 pages maximum); 


• Summarised document with clear description of methodology, including rationale, sampling frame and tools; 


• A separate short report (max 10 pages) on sustainability of results. This short report will showcase the sustainability of programme modalities, and will feed into SI’s best practices and lessons learned for resilience programming in northern Kenya. The short report will include the following subheadings: 

1. Formation of groups and training activities (mobilization of groups, how to ensure that they will continue afterwards, gender dynamics and decision making in the group, group cohesion etc.)


2. Contingency plans (maintenance in the future, who is doing what, County alignment and involvement, sustainability of water source, relevance of contingency plan, who has access to the output etc.) 


3. Distribution of inputs (livestock, molasses, fishing gear etc.) (durability, availability, usability etc.) 


4. Products of IGAs (Prosopis management and MUBs) (income generation, willingness to engage, market linkages) 

• The consultant should suggest an appropriate exit strategy to such activities in future programming. This will necessitate sampling of some of the groups targeted in previous projects for such activities and a comparative analysis with those targeted in the current project. The findings from current and previous project will measure the immediate and long term impact at least 1 year after implementation of the activity and should be clearly stated in the report.
  A separate table summarizing the main findings and the lessons learned; 


• A separate table showing the different recommendations for future implementations;


• Relevant maps and photographs (with dates, location and short description) of the assessed zone and programme;


• A Power point presentation of the main findings and recommendations of the evaluation must be submitted to SI in order to facilitate dissemination of the results of the evaluation to stakeholders; 


• It is expected that raw data files will be sent to the coordination team for cross reference. 

8. Documents of Reference (upon request) 

• Project proposal 


• Quarterly project reports 


• Current organizational chart 


• Last Activity Progress Update of the programme 


• Existing Monitoring and Evaluation tools/framework(including DFID monitoring tools) 


• Baseline, Mid- term, KAP and PDM reports 


• Relevant maps 


• Security guidelines 

9. Qualifications / Experience Required 

• University degree (preferably Master’s degree) related to agriculture, livelihoods, project management, disaster risk management, WASH, public health or other relevant field; 


• Minimum of 5 years of proven experience in evaluating DRR/resilience/livelihoods programmes 


• Minimum of 10 years of proven experience in working with livelihood/DRM/early recovery programmes 


• Proven experience of project evaluation or assessment tasks in similar context (northern or north-eastern Kenya) 


• Strong methodological capacity and clear report writing capacity 


• Excellent communication skills 

Note: The field work for this evaluation will require qualified consultants to travel to remote locations in Marsabit County. SI strongly prefers the use of mobile data platforms for data collection. 

10. How to Apply 

Please send your proposal, highlighting the following: 

• A brief introduction of bidding firm or person, including the relevant CVs 


• Your understanding of the ToR through a technical proposal 


• Proposed methodology and approach 


• Proposed work plan 


• Confirmation of the availability of the consultant and his/her team members 


• Itemized financial proposal Proposals, including all relevant supporting information (CV, technical and financial proposal, work plan and 3 contact references), 

should be sent to info@solidarites-kenya-som.org by 21 March 2016. 

Please indicate the title of the consultancy you are applying for in the subject of your email (Final Project Evaluation: “Improving drought resilience of populations in Northern Kenya”). 

Proposals will be reviewed as they are received. 

Only short-listed applications will be contacted.