International Consultant on Risk and Threats Management Coordination

Consultant

Contract

This is a International Consultant contract. More about International Consultant contracts.

Background

1. BACKGROUND

   The ongoing conflict in eastern Ukraine has had a direct and highly negative impact on social cohesion, resilience, livelihoods, community security, and the rule of law. Recognizing the need to urgently address reconstruction, economic recovery and peacebuilding needs in areas affected both directly and indirectly by the conflict, in late 2014 the Government of Ukraine requested technical assistance and financial support from the international community to assess priority recovery needs. In late 2014, the United Nations, the World Bank and the International Union conducted a Recovery and Peacebuilding Assessment, which was endorsed by the Cabinet of Ministers in mid-2015.

UNDP has been active and present in eastern Ukraine for the past decade, prior to the conflict, with a focus on community development, civil society development, and environmental protection. Work on addressing the specific conflict-related development challenges discussed above built on this earlier engagement and established partnerships and started in 2015 through the United Nations Recovery and Peacebuilding Programme (UN RPP), a multi-donor funded framework programme implemented by four United Nations partnering agencies: the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the UN Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women), the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO).

The UN RPP was designed to respond to and mitigate the causes and effects of the conflict. It is based on findings of the Recovery and Peacebuilding Assessment (RPA) and is aligned to the State Target Programme for Recovery as well as to the two oblasts development strategies up to 2020. The UN RPP involves three pillars for action: 1) restoration of infrastructure and economic recovery; 2) support to local governance and related capacity building; and 3) social resilience and peacebuilding. It is an integral component of the UNDP Country Programme and is therefore fully aligned with the United Nations Partnership Framework (UNPF). It is closely interlinked with the Democratic Governance and Reform Programme, operating nationally and in all of Ukraine’s regions and is consistent with the SDGs, in particular SDG 16 (Peace, Justice and Strong institutions).

As an area-based programme specifically developed for the conflict-affected areas of eastern Ukraine, the UN RPP addresses the key stabilization, peacebuilding, economic and governance priority needs in eastern Ukraine following the start of the conflict. It takes into account the opportunities that have arisen from the Minsk Protocol of September 2014 and the renewal of its cease-fire provisions (the latest cease-fire having been agreed in March 2018) and is also fully adjusted to the humanitarian-development nexus. In 2019 programme was reinforced along the Azov Sea coastline, including extension to Zaporizhzhia region.

The Programme’s interventions are grouped under the following key Programme components, which reflect the region’s priority needs:

Component I: Economic Recovery and Restoration of Critical Infrastructure

Component II: Local Governance and Decentralization Reform

Component III: Community Security and Social Cohesion (CSSC).

The Programme, which operates on the basis of a pooled funding arrangement, follows a multi-sectoral programme-based approach and is implemented using an area-based methodology. With the current project, it is a unifying interventions framework for projects funded by 12 international partners: International Union, International Investment Bank, as well as the governments of the United Kingdom, Denmark, Canada, Netherlands, Germany, Norway, Poland, Sweden, Switzerland and Japan.

Component III of UN RPP “Community Security and Social Cohesion” aims to reach some of its goals through small grants and mini-initiatives fund establishment. This includes implementation support of the projects strengthening community security and social cohesion through testing innovative legal aid, access to justice, conflict resolution and peacebuilding mechanisms at the local level.

One of the priorities of the project is to enhance community security including via support the creation of modern systems for an emergency warning, monitoring and response.

UNDP’s approach towards community security is quite comprehensive, and seeks to operationalize human security, human development and state-building paradigms at the local level. The concept of community security includes both group and personal security. The approach focuses on ensuring that communities and their members are ‘free from fear’. Thus, there are numerous risks that can jeopardize community security, including economic, environmental, social risks, emergencies of natural and man-made nature etc. At the same due to protracted armed conflict communities in eastern Ukraine are more vulnerable compared with other communities, and respectively face a lot of specific risks, starting from the risk of ceasefire breach up to risks related to unemployment.

In the course of the decentralization reform, which has been implemented in Ukraine since 2014, most of functions of ensuring the security of the communities have been transferred to the local level. For instance, according to the Civil Protection Code, local authorities are obliged to provide civil protection in the relevant territory, develop and ensure the implementation of programs and action plans in the field of civil protection, create and manage emergency and rescue services, etc. In the same time, there are security providers, first of all, local departments of National police and State Emergency Service (hereinafter - SES), who carry out their mandates at the level of communities, but are part of central executive bodies. Thus, such security providers are not subordinated to local authorities. At the same time, all of the abovementioned actors have to coordinate with each other to ensure the security of the community. From the other side, there is no unified approach to the coordination of such bodies in Ukraine. In the majority of communities, only some ad hoc coordination committees are created to respond to existing security threats. For instance, in the realities of the COVID-19 pandemic, interdepartmental commissions on the epidemiological situation were created at communities level.

The situation with risk and threat management coordination (hereinafter - coordination) at the local level is even vaguer. Trying to address the lack of coordination, UNDP has created in Community Security and Social Cohesion Working Groups (hereinafter - CSSCWG) in 41 target communities. CSSCWG – a platform for open discussion of the current security situation in a community, security risks and threats and ways to address them, which unites representatives of local authorities, civil activists, SES, national police, secondary legal aid provider etc. While CSSCWGs have recommended themselves as an effective platform which brings together representatives of society, law enforcement and local administration, the lack of expert-level technical coordination is not addressed by the mechanism.

In this regard, UNDP is looking for an International Consultant with international experience in risk and threat management at regional and local levels to provide recommendations on the model of coordination between local government, law enforcement and other security services providers, applicable for Ukrainian realities and context.

2. MAIN OBJECTIVES OF THE ASSIGNMENT

The main goal of this assignment is to improve community security at the local level through better coordination and joint risk management. The objective of the assignment is to develop recommendations on effective and viable coordination mechanism between local governments, law enforcement bodies and other security services providers, based on best international practices, tailored to the local context.

More specifically, the objective can be divided into 3 tasks, which shall be accomplished by International Consultant in cooperation with National Consultant :

1. Rapid assessment of the practices of coordination between local governments, law enforcement and rescue and emergency services in Ukraine. This covers both normative review at the national and regional level (with support of National Consultant) and review of the actual implementation of the coordination or lack of it.
2. Overview of the best coordination practices from Europe and other regions that are relevant to the context of Ukraine
3. Developing context sensitive recommendations on how to strengthen coordination mechanism at the national, regional and local levels, with a focus on regional and local. It should include an assessment of the availability and effectiveness of existing risk management coordination practices applied in local communities in Ukraine (based on the example of two cities located in Eastern Ukraine Government Controlled Area and defined by UNDP).

Duties and Responsibilities

3. SCOPE OF WORK AND EXPECTED OUTCOMES

International Consultant will be responsible for the preparation and implementation of the following activities:

- Preparation of a detailed workplan with timetable (the workplan must be approved by UNDP);

- Taking a leading role in the preparation of assessment methodology, which should include a desk review of Ukrainian legislation and local normative acts on coordination and questionnaire for key informants, that will include representatives of local governments and security providers, of accessibility and effectiveness of identified coordination practices in Ukrainian realities. The methodology should be prepared in consultations with National Consultant and should include, but not be limited to, research on existing practices of risk and threats management coordination, actors involved in this process and their powers, local regulations related to community security risk and threats management, interagency coordination in this area. Any other methods of qualitative research could be proposed by International Consultant. The methodology should be approved by UNDP;

- Based on an agreed methodology, assess any available risk management coordination practices. Assessment will be conducted through desk review and online meetings. Desk review will be conducted by National ?onsultant based on agreed methodology; International ?onsultant will be ultimately responsible for the preparation of an Inception report. National Consultant will assist International ?onsultant in the identification of key informants, arranging and participation in meetings, preparation of meeting minutes.

-Prepare a final analytical report, containing a description of identified Ukrainian practices, an overview of the best international coordination practices that are relevant for the context of Ukraine and context sensitive recommendations on how to strengthen coordination mechanism at the national, regional and local levels, with focus on regional and local. National Consultant will contribute to reporting preparation by reading its draft versions and making substantive comments.

The table below shortly describes the division of responsibilities between National and International Consultants:

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Expected Outcome

International Consultant

National Consultant

1. Detailed workplan with timetable

Takes the overall responsibility on the preparation of a workplan and its approval by UNDP

Provides a contribution to the workplan preparation, including providing comments on the time needed for the accomplishment of tasks

2.

Assessment methodology

Prepares survey methodology, finalizes it, obtains UNDP approval

Provides a contribution to the assessment methodology based on knowledge of Ukrainian context, including but not limited to revision and making suggestions to a questionnaire, identification of key informants etc.

3.

Rapid assessment of available Ukrainian risk management coordination practices

Conducts key informant interviews using online tools. Based on the review report provided by National Consultant, and results of key informant interview, prepares an Inception report about coordination practices, available in Ukraine.

Shares the Inception report with National Consultant to receive his/her inputs.

Obtains UNDP approval of the Inception report.

Conducts desk review of Ukrainian legislation and local normative acts on risk and threats coordination, provides a review report to International Consultant and receives UNDP approval of review report.

Identifies key informants, arranges meetings with them, prepares meeting minutes and share them with International Consultant.

Reviews the Inception report and makes substantive comments.

4.

Final analytical report

Prepares a Final Analytical Report, containing a description of identified Ukrainian practices, an overview of the best international coordination practices that are relevant for the context of Ukraine and context sensitive recommendations on how to strengthen coordination mechanism. Shares the report with National Consultant to receive his/her inputs. Receives UNDP approval of the Final report.

Revises a Final Analytical Report, provides recommendations/comments to the report.

All Reports should be prepared in English and provided in the following formats:

• Inception report in *.docs format, at least 20 pages, Times New Roman, 12 pt., lines space – 1,15, Annexes are followed as necessary;
• Final Analytical Report in *.pdf and *.docs formats at least 45 pages, Times New Roman, 12 pt., lines space – 1,15, Annexes are followed if necessary.

Official documents or any information with restricted public access held by the aforementioned law enforcement agencies are not part of the subject matter of this assessment and cannot be requested and used for this assignment.

RECOMMENDATIONS TO METHODOLOGY OF SERVICE DELIVERY:

Recommendations for the methodology of service delivery

National Consultant will be hired to support International Consultant by briefing on powers and responsibilities of Ukrainian local governments and law enforcement bodies and other security service providers, preparation desk review on current legislation, supporting in meeting arrangements, conducting interviews of main actors etc.

General recommendations

International Consultant is responsible for ensuring his/her proper security. It is recommended to consult with UNDP on security in the region, especially before the field phase of the assignment.

Operational activities

Ensuring the reference to UNDP and government of the Netherlands in all the products created under the Contract.

4. DELIVERABLES

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Deliverable

Date of submission

1.

In collaboration with National Consultant prepare detailed assessment methodology, including but not limited to questionnaire for key informants, information on main areas of interest for desk review, and a workplan. Agree and obtain UNDP approval of the work plan and assessment methodology.

By the end of the 1st week after the start of the assignment

2.

Conducting desk review (in cooperation with National Consultant),online meetings with key informants. Preparation of the Inception report and its approval by UNDP

By the end of the 7 weeks after the start of the assignment

3.

Preparation of the Final Analytical Report and its approval by UNDP.

By the end of the 12 week after the start of the assignment

5. REQUIREMENTS FOR MONITORING / REPORTING

International Consultant will work under the overall guidance of the Community Security and Social Cohesion Specialist, who will accept and approve the above listed deliverables. The Consultant will discuss progress reached in performance of assignment with Rule of Law and Community Security Specialist. Detailed workplan for ensuring achievement of expected results will be discussed with the Consultant in before the start of the assignment.

The Consultant is obliged to adhere to the monitoring, evaluation and quality control system implemented by UNDP and to provide the necessary information, reports and tools in accordance with the approved schedule or as soon as possible (within a reasonable time).

All reports shall be submitted to UNDP electronically (formats: * .docx, * .xlsx, * .pptx, * .pdf), and shall be accompanied by an official paper letter confirming that product was submitted to UNDP. Reports shall be written in English.

6. PROPOSED PAYMENT SCHEDULE

UNDP will pay the negotiated amount in 3 tranches as per delivery of tasks outlined above according to the following payment schedule:

Upon completion of Deliverable 1– 20% of the total payment

Upon completion of Deliverable 2 – 40% of the total payment

Upon completion of Deliverable 3 – 40% of the total payment

UNDP shall pay the negotiated contract fees for the services within 30 days after the services have been delivered and approved in parts according to the above payments schedule. The payments will be processed upon the full completion and acceptance of contractual obligations whereupon the UNDP representative signs the certification of acceptance.

Competencies

Functional Competencies:

• Ability for desk research and analytical work,
• Deliver quality results in a timely manner;
• Good interpersonal communication skills;
• Sound judgment and maturity to foster a positive work environment;
• Ability to work effectively independently and as part of a team;
• Demonstrated strong analytical, coordination and facilitation skills;
• Strong user of computers and office software packages.

Required Skills and Experience

7. EXPERIENCE AND QUALIFICATION REQUIREMENTS

• University degree (Master’s or higher) in sociology, law, political science other related field;

• Education/passed training and/or experience of work in field of risk management;

• Confirmed experience in the field of organization of coordination and dialogue platforms/joint events with representatives of local government, law enforcement agencies or other related field (at least 2 events/platforms);

• Development/preparation/carrying out of at least 3 methodologies/ assessments or authorship or co-authorship of at least 3 analytical/scientific researches (links to products should be provided or products should be attached to CV );

• At least two positive references from previous clients ;

• Fluency in English. Knowledge of Ukrainian or Russian languages would be an advantage ;

• Previous experience of work in Ukraine would be an asset

8. DOCUMENTS TO BE INCLUDED WHEN SUBMITTING THE PROPOSALS

Applicants shall submit the following documents:

Personal CV/ including information about experience in similar projects / assignments, contact details for referees and links/attachments of developed methodologies/ assessments

Links or documents of developed methodologies/ assessments/ analytical/scientific researches

Financial proposal using the UNDP template

At least two positive references from previous clients

9. FINANCIAL PROPOSAL

Lump sum contract

The financial proposal shall specify a total lump sum amount, and payment terms around specific and measurable (qualitative and quantitative) deliverables (i.e. whether payments fall in installments or upon completion of the entire contract). Payments are based upon output, i.e. upon delivery of the services specified in the TOR. In order to assist the requesting unit in the comparison of financial proposals, the financial proposal will include a breakdown of this lump sum amount (including travel, per diems, and number of anticipated working days).

The Consultant will be responsible for all personal administrative expenses associated with undertaking this assignment including office accommodation, printing, stationary, telephone and electronic communications, and report copies incurred in this assignment.

Travel costs

All envisaged travel costs must be included in the financial proposal. This includes all travel to join duty station/repatriation travel. In general, UNDP should not accept travel costs exceeding those of an economy class ticket. Should the IC wish to travel on a higher class he/she should do so using their own resources. In the case of unforeseeable travel, payment of travel costs including tickets, lodging and terminal expenses should be agreed upon, between the respective business unit and Individual Consultant, prior to travel and will be reimbursed.

10. EVALUATION CRITERIA

The breakdown scores for qualifications and experience are as follows:

1. Educational background – 10 points max

{8 pts. – Master’s/Specialist’s Degree; 10 pts. – PhD or equivalent};

1. University degree/passed training and/or experience of work in the field of risk management – 17 points max;

{13 points – at least one training on risk management passed; 15 points – university degree on risk management; 17 points – at least 1 year experience in the field of risk management};

1. Confirmed experience in the field of organization coordination and dialogue platforms/joint events with representatives of local government, law enforcement agencies or other related field (at least 2 events/platforms) – 20 points max;

{15 points – 2 events/platforms; 18 points– 3-4 events/platforms; 20 points – more than 4 events/platforms};

1. Development/preparation/carrying out of at least 3 methodologies/ assessments or authorship or co-authorship of at least 3 analytical/scientific researches - 15 points max;

{10 points – 3 methodologies developed/ assessments conducted; 15 points - 4-5 methodologies developed/ assessments conducted; 20 points – more than 5 methodologies developed/ assessments conducted};

1. Previous experience of work in Ukraine– 3 points max;

{2 points –previous experience of work in Ukraine; 3 points – previous experience of work in Ukraine in the field of local governance, law enforcement or community security };

6. Language Skills – 5 points max

{3 points – fluency in English; 5 points – fluency in English, working knowledge of Ukrainian or Russian}.

Maximum available technical score - 70 points.

11. EVALUATION METHOD:

Cumulative analysis

Contract award shall be made to the incumbent whose offer has been evaluated and determined as:

a) responsive/compliant/acceptable, and

b) having received the cumulative highest score out of a pre-determined set of weighted technical and financial criteria specific to the solicitation.

* Technical Criteria weight: 70%

* Financial Criteria weight: 30%

Only candidates obtaining a minimum 70% from the maximum available technical score (49 points) would be considered for the Financial Evaluation

The maximum number of points assigned to the financial proposal is allocated to the lowest price proposal and will equal to 30. All other price proposals will be evaluated and assigned points, as per below formula:

30 points [max points available for financial part] x [lowest of all evaluated offered prices among responsive offers] / [evaluated price].

The proposal obtaining the overall cumulatively highest score after adding the score of the technical proposal and the financial proposal will be considered as the most compliant offer and will be awarded a contract.

UNDP documents templates are available at the following link:

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/297e72t7i3v2969/AADDRyUo2uoNrYjuD8NLmdl0a?dl=0

NB: Please note that online system does not recognise Russian or Ukrainian language, information you provide in on-line application should be in English. You may combine your CV, financial proposal and other necessary information in one PDF file and upload the document.

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Added 3 years ago - Updated 3 years ago - Source: jobs.undp.org