RFN seeks proposals for mid-term review of NICFI-funded agreement

Background/Context

Rainforest Foundation Norway (RFN) is one of Europe’s leading organisations in the work to protect the world’s rainforests and strengthen the rights of indigenous peoples, in cooperation with indigenous and environmental organisations in South-East Asia, Central Africa and the Amazon.

RFN’s program “Forest for People – People for Forest” is a five-year agreement with Norway’s international climate and forest initiative (NICFI). It started in 2021 and ends in December 2025. RFN implements the agreement together with 17 partners, in six different countries, building on results and experiences from a previous five-year grant agreement for the project “Rights-based REDD+: Indigenous peoples as guardians of the rainforest” (2016-2020). The annual budget is about 47 mill NOK.

The grant agreement is divided into seven units, six at country level and one at the global policy level, each with individual results frameworks. All sub-units contribute to six overall and long-term outcomes (of which two will be in focus for this review). The overall aim of the grant agreement is to contribute to rights-based sustainable rainforest management and protection of forest ecosystem integrity.

Read more in the Terms of reference (lenke)

The task

The mid-term review shall assess:

• 1) The effectiveness of the grant agreement in achieving changes in
• a) land use policies/legal frameworks (National and sub-national level in DRC, Brazil and Peru), that will strengthen or preserve rights-based rainforest management and protection of forest ecosystem integrity (outcome 3)
• b) improved measures against forest crime (national and sub-national level) in Peru and PNG (outcome 5)
• 2) The coherence between RFN’s and partners work under outcome 3 and 5 of this grant agreement and other RFN interventions and efforts/initiatives from other organizations/institutions.
• 3) The relevance of the strategies and actions under outcome 3 and 5 for enabling policy change/changes in legal measures or frameworks.
• 4) Contributions to NICFI outcomes 1 and 7 (RFN’s outcome 3 and 5).
• 5) The impact on women’s rights and gender equality.

We foresee that this review will require approximately 110-120 days of work (including potential travelling), and we would like to have a final report in hand by March 2024. The maximum budget is NOK 800 000. We ask the interested candidates to submit a proposal with hours, rates and possible deadlines for deliveries (see below under “Consultant’s proposal”).

For further details on evaluation questions, scope, methodology and deliverables, see the Terms of reference (lenke).

Desired qualifications and composition of the team

We are seeking one or more consultants, who can be based either in or outside of the countries identified under scope in the Terms of reference. The combined qualifications of the evaluation team shall as a minimum constitute least five years’ experience on evaluation or work experience from working with civil society organizations (ideally also indigenous) at local, national or international levels. The consultancy/evaluator team is expected to consist of highly qualified and skilled staff with documented expertise with large-scale data collections and/or mid-term reviews of project implementation.

RFN will select the team that provides best value for money based on a consideration of a) to what extent the team is well suited for the task, emphasizing in-depth expertise (including academic work) and the relevance of the specific technical expertise and experience of the team member(s), and b) the costs expressed in daily fees.

When assessing the qualifications of the team, RFN will look particularly for the following:

• Demonstrated research and evaluation skills, including multiple methods for data collection and analysis, and ability to design study to fulfill purpose.
• Good understanding of monitoring and results management as practiced in ODA-funded NGOs.
• Experience from reviewing/evaluating activities of similar nature, including projects run by small and/or indigenous organizations.
• Good understanding of indigenous peoples’ rights and collective sustainable forest management.
• Language proficiency in Portuguese, Spanish and French, in additional to solid English. If all languages can not be covered by team, please present a plan (incl. budget) for the use of translators.
• A team with clear leadership who can ensure quality of work through well-organized management, quality control mechanisms, technical support and back-up for team members.
• A gender balanced team.

Consultant’s proposal

The proposal shall be sent to ane@rainforest.no no later than August 6th, 2023. Please write Mid-term RFN NICFI in the subject heading.

The proposal must include the following:

• Consultant’s interpretation of the task, including how to organize a team around solving the task, if relevant.
• Proposed methodology.
• Suggested timeline for the deliverables.
• A budget for solving the task, including daily fees based on 8 working hours per day. If team members have different fees, the expected division of labour between them must be indicated.
• Any other costs necessary to carry out the review.
• Proposed composition of team and overview of the qualifications of the consultants to be part of the team (maximum three pages combined), in addition to resumes/short CVs of all consultants in the team.
• Summary of 3 recent and relevant evaluations (2 pages max in total).
• 2 recent references.

Candidates will be given the theory of change and results framework for the agreement upon request. Questions regarding the assignment can be submitted to ane@rainforest.no and the answers will be shared with all candidates who demonstrate interest in the consultancy. Due to vacation time in Norway in July, answers should be expected within a week, and not the same day.