J.6_-_Illustrative_Task_Statement_of_Work.docx

End of Project Performance Evaluation for Kenya Commercial Investment Entrepreneurs (KCIE), Feed the Future

Statement of Work

I. Purpose:

To evaluate the performance and progress of the USAID/Kenya and East Africa (KEA) Kenya Community Investment Entrepreneurs (KCIE) program. The KCIE activity aimed to bring new and innovative technologies in horticulture, dairy, maize and staple food crop to market through identifying, incubating and scaling innovative agriculture value chain, private sector led businesses. The purpose of the evaluation is to assess the project’s design, in order to inform relevant future designs for innovation activities. It will also inform management on whether the approach successfully met its goals of scaling new innovations for market-based solutions, and how it can be improved to bring new innovation to market. The performance evaluation will provide lessons learned to shape future programming, including current procurements as well as future work plan design.

II. Background:

The Feed the Future KCIE program was designed to address Kenya‘s most pressing food security, poverty and malnutrition challenges. KCIE aims to achieve this by harnessing the power of innovative private sector approaches to leverage resources and integrate new approaches to agricultural solutions in the horticulture, dairy, maize and staple food crop (e.g. cereals and pulses) value chains. The project supports the creation, scaling and adoption of solutions to accelerate change in the value chains, and is intended to support the Government of Kenya’s priorities for food security and nutrition.

The KCIE activity was authorized in the FTF PAD, approved on August 2013. In January 2014, Freedonia Ltd (P&WL) was awarded a contract of $13.1 million to undertake a range of interventions in support of Feed the Future Kenya Innovation Engine (KCIE). KCIE will be ending on January, 2019. The key results targeted under the activity include: i) offering opportunities for innovators in agriculture and nutrition to address fundamental needs in Kenya by proactively identifying, testing, incubating and scaling up their ideas; ii) providing avenues through which these innovators can bring forth their best solutions; and iii) facilitating an interactive process of learning and knowledge management.

The Kenya Innovation Engine identifies, fosters, and brings to scale innovative market-driven solutions to persistent food insecurity, under-nutrition and poverty. It partners with entrepreneurs who design new concepts, products and services to maximize their commercial potential, as well as nutritional and livelihoods benefits to the targeted communities. The Innovation Engine supports experimentation and rewards proven successes that represent game-changing approaches for thousands of Kenyan families.

In August 2017, KCIE received additional funding to expand its reach through a J&A modification, enabling P&WL to award and manage Stage Two and Stage Three grants. These grants had previously been procured and managed by USAID through direct awards, with P&WL providing short-term technical assistance.

KCIE was intended to seek and promote approaches that enhance women, youth, and other vulnerable groups access to productive resources and broad participation in the agricultural economy. It has been using innovation champions to educate farmers on the use of new farming technology giving a special focus especially to the youth and women.

The KCIE Program Goal is: To harness innovation for cutting-edge results through private sector strategies with the potential to generate significant measurable increases in household income and/or nutrition in selected agricultural value chains: maize, dairy, horticulture, and staple food crops such as sorghum and millet.

Program Objectives:

1. To systematically test, cultivate, and adapt high-impact innovations which further the objectives of the USAID/Kenya Feed the Future (FTF) Strategy and promote equal opportunities for women, youth, and other vulnerable groups.

2. To support broad adoption of innovative approaches across target populations in the Kenya FTF regions.

3. To generate sustainable and scalable private sector solutions to further FTF goals .

4. Where appropriate, to identify and promote innovations with the potential for cross national and/or global adoption, which may also be eligible for USAID/Washington Development Innovation Ventures (DIV) support.

5. To identify and support Kenyan for-profit and not-for-profit entities in the agricultural value chain to enable the development and adoption of high-impact innovations.

III. Evaluation Purpose:

The KCIE activity aimed to harness innovation for cutting-edge results through private sector strategies with the potential to general significant measurable increases in household income and/or nutrition in selected agricultural value chains: maize, dairy, horticulture, and staple foods such as sorghum and millet. The evaluation will be used to assess the project’s design, in order to inform relevant future designs for innovation activities. It will also be used by management to determine whether the approach successfully met its goals of scaling new innovations for market-based solutions, and how it can be improved to bring new innovation to market. The performance evaluation will provide lessons learned to shape future programming, including current procurements as well as future work plan design.

The key audience for this evaluation is USAID’s Office of Economic Growth (OEG), innovation champions, KCIE staff, and smallholder farmers from various counties. The report will also be shared with other stakeholders, such as county governments and development partners, in summarized formats that suit the needs of such stakeholders. Findings will be disseminated through a report through farmers working groups’ team leaders and challenges faced in implementing a multi-faceted employment program.

IV. Evaluation Questions:

The contractor must answer the following evaluation questions:

1. To what extent did KCIE achieve its goals and objectives?

a. What factors (internal and external) contributed to the program’s successes/failures in meeting these objectives and how? (Please also consider impact investors and access to finance)

b. What lessons and recommendations can be shared with all stakeholders

i. What is the feedback from industry stakeholders on KCIE?

2. Freedonia had overall coordination of the program, managing 17 innovators. What challenges did Freedonia face in achieving results through the innovators?

3. How did the program adapt and change over time to meet the varying needs of smallholder farmers in order to achieve program objectives as they evolved over time?

4. To what extent did KCIE collaborate with other OEG programs? What were the successes? What were the challenges/barriers and how can these be addressed?

5. How appropriate is the model of providing Business Advisory Services (BAS) to innovating firms to meet USAID’s goals? Does Kenya have sufficient capacity in providers of BAS to merit substantial USAID support?

6. How sustainable are KCIE’s impacts beyond the program?

a. To what extent will the demonstration effects inducing private investment extend past program completion?

b. To what extent are incubated projects likely to grow without USAID and KCIE support? Have they aroused the interest of impact investors?

c. To what extent can other OEG projects play the incubation role of KCIE?

d. How can lessons learned be utilized in future USAID innovations?

e. Is there a risk that USAID is turning profitable firms into NGOs by forcing impact expectations such as FTF indicators onto a pre-existing business model?

f. Should USAID continue to work with market-based investment models such as KCIE?

V. Audience and Intended Users:

The key audience for this evaluation is USAID’s Office of Economic Growth (OEG), innovation champions, KCIE staff, and smallholder farmers from various counties. The report will also be shared with other stakeholders, such as county governments and development partners, in summarized formats that suit the needs of such stakeholders. The report will be disseminated through farmers working groups’ team leaders.

· To assess the success of the project

· To determine how innovation activities can be incorporated in the OEG’s other activities and programs.

· Draft report will be shared with OEG staff.

· A presentation shall be made to OEG staff prior to a presentation to Mission management.

· A mission out brief presentation shall be made by the evaluation team.

· The Final Evaluation report shall be shared with the mission.

· A findings validation workshop will be held between the IP/USAID and contractor at the IP’s office.

· The draft final report shall be shared with the KCIE COP for comment and the final report shared as well.

Stakeholders Farmers County government

Innovators

· Encourage them to adopt the innovations.

· Help them understand and address county government related constraints.

· To enable innovators understand how to improve and scale up their innovations.

· Copies of the report will be shared by Email/hard copies delivery by KCIE.

VI. Evaluation Design and Methodology:

USAID seeks the most robust evaluation design and methodological approach that is appropriate for the scope of the project, resources, and audience. A non-experimental evaluation design must be used. USAID is open to suggestions to modify the methodological approach to be agreed upon with the evaluation team prior to implementation of the final workplan.

A meeting will be held with the contractor at least two days after issuance of the RFTOP to answer any questions that may arise from the Statement of Work, clarify the evaluation questions, and address any concerns, including methodology, and implementation timetable.

Evidence collected and analyzed in this evaluation must be both qualitative and quantitative data. Where applicable, data should be disaggregated by gender and document whether activities are reducing gender gaps. Methodological triangulation is encouraged in this study. At a minimum, the following methods must be used:

a) Secondary Data A desk review of key relevant documents listed below and provided by USAID/KEA is required. Content analysis of all available secondary data relevant to the evaluation must also be undertaken. Key documents to be reviewed must include but are not limited to:

· KCIE Program report on Lessons Learned, 2014 – 2019.

· Activity Description from Agreement with Partner and ALL Modifications to the description

· Program documents such as, work plans, Activity M&E Plan with Results Framework

· Activity Quarterly Performance Reports

b) Primary Data The contractor must work in consultation with USAID’s SPA, OEGI and KCIE Office in Nairobi. In addition, the evaluation team must visit the following KCIE counties: Meru, Uasin Gishu, Makueni, and Isiolo. The contractor must, at a minimum, meet with USAID staff, Freedonia Nairobi and field staff as well as staff from the grantees/Innovation Champions, smallholder farmers. Innovators to be met include: iProcure, Arid Lands Information Network (ALIN), Kenya Network for Dissemination of Agricultural Technologies (KENDAT), Wanda Organics, Kenya Biologics, Amtech, Takaful Insurance, and Indicus.

In addition, the contractor must meet with County Government officials where necessary including the Director of Agriculture Meru County Dionisia, as well as hold interviews with community members related to the various innovation activities and impact investors. The table below illustrates key stakeholder to be met and in which county. The contractor may choose to use key informant or group interviews or to meet with farmers benefiting from each of the technologies presented.

Nairobi

OEG staff

Other donors

Ministry officials

Investment Advisory Committee Evelyn Mulama (private sector)

Investment Advisory Committee Amalgamated business

USAID Programs

KAVES, AVCD

Impact Investors

Meru

Wanda Stores

Uasin Gishu

Inseminators

Makueni

The contractor must provide suggestions on additional data collection methods and analysis approaches that, in their opinion, best accommodate the objectives of the evaluation. The final evaluation approach must be negotiated with the Mission and will be part of the inception report.

Data Analysis Methods The contractor must have a clear plan for analyzing and triangulating data from various methods and sources to generate high quality and credible evidence to answer the evaluation questions. The analysis method(s) must be relevant to the data collection tools proposed. Potential limitations of the methodologies must be thoroughly considered along with ways to mitigate the limitations and presented in the Inception Report.

All conclusions made by the evaluation team must be supported by clear, verified evidence. Anecdotal evidence will not be considered sufficient for drawing conclusions.

VII. Evaluation Team Composition:

The contractor must propose the most effective team composition based on the proposed methodology. The contractor must articulate the type of qualifications and experience that will be required for each proposed key personnel position and the approach of identifying and recruiting this team. An overall organizational chart must be provided as well. Additionally, highlight operational approaches to ensuring adequate Task Order management, and risk and change management, demonstrating ability to do rapid course correction in cases where evaluation team personnel are not adequately performing or where they leave mid-course.

VIII. Evaluation Deliverables:

· Inception Report: The contractor must submit a detailed inception report to USAID 5 days after the initial meeting between USAID and evaluation team. The report shall detail the evaluation methodology, limitations and ways to mitigate these, and an operational work plan, which must include the proposed data collection and analysis methods to address the key evaluation questions. The inception report must also include questionnaires and interview protocols and should not exceed 15 pages.

· Presentation/Debriefing: Within 2 days after the Validation Workshop between the IP, USAID and Evaluation Team the team must present the major findings of the evaluation to USAID/KEA in Nairobi through a PowerPoint presentation. The debriefings must include discussions of methodology, limitations, sample, findings, conclusions, and recommendations.

· Preliminary Draft Evaluation Report: Within 7 days of the presentation to USAID/KEA, the contractor must submit a draft evaluation report incorporating comments given during the presentations.

· Final Report: Within 3 calendar days after receiving USAID and the IP’s comments on the draft Evaluation Report, and based on the provisions of the USAID evaluation policy, a formal and final evaluation report must be presented to USAID/KEA. The final report must incorporate the team responses, comments and suggestions. The format must include an executive summary (highlighting key lessons learned), table of contents, list of acronyms, evaluation design and methodology, limitations, findings, conclusions, and recommendations and lessons learned. The report must be submitted in English, in both electronic and three bound hard copies. The Final Report should have a maximum of 45 pages, excluding annexes.

· A brief summary, the Executive Summary, of this report (the popular version), not exceeding 15 pages, excluding any potentially procurement-sensitive information must be submitted (also electronically, in English) for dissemination among implementing partners and stakeholders. The report must meet standards outlined in the evaluation policy (see evaluation report checklist on page 9 of 26)1.

· Two Page Summary: Must be submitted two days after USAID’s approval of the final report, back and front; for easy reading and distribution.

· All primary source data, both quantitative and qualitative, generated during the course of evaluation must be provided to USAID in an electronic file in an easily readable format; organized and fully documented for use by those not fully familiar with the activity or the evaluation. In addition, all background documents collected for this evaluation must be provided to USAID on CDs, organized by implementing mechanism, along with the final report.

Deliverables and Timeline:

Note: All days are calendar days Due Dates

i. First to OEG

ii. Then to USAID/KEA and possibly key stakeholders

A two page summary of the methodology, limitations, sample, findings, conclusions, and recommendations and the powerpoint slides must be provided two days before the presentation day.

Approximately 2 days after # 5 and as scheduled by USAID

Reporting Guidelines

· The evaluation report should represent a thoughtful, well-researched and well-organized effort to objectively evaluate what worked in the project, what did not and why.

· Evaluation reports shall address all evaluation questions included in the scope of work.

· The evaluation report should include the scope of work as an Annex. All modifications to the scope of work, whether in technical requirements, evaluation questions, evaluation team composition, methodology or timeline need to be agreed upon in writing by USAID.

· Evaluation methodology shall be explained in detail and all tools used in conducting the evaluation such as questionnaires, checklists and discussion guides will be included in an Annex in the final report.

· Evaluation findings will assess outcomes and impact on males and females.

· Limitations to the evaluation shall be disclosed in the report, with particular attention to the limitations associated with the evaluation methodology (selection bias, recall bias, unobservable differences between comparator groups, etc.).

· Evaluation findings should be presented as analyzed facts, evidence and data and not based on anecdotes, hearsay or the compilation of people’s opinions. Findings should be specific, concise and supported by strong quantitative or qualitative evidence.

· Sources (including people and organizations contacted) of information need to be properly identified and listed in an annex.

· Recommendations need to be supported by a specific set of findings.

· Recommendations should be action-oriented, practical and specific, with defined responsibility for the action.

USAID Evaluation Policy standards must be met by the contractor throughout the contract.

IX. Evaluation Management:

a) Logistical Support: USAID/KEA will provide other relevant documents and information for this assignment. USAID/KEA Strategic Planning and Analysis Office will manage this contract and coordinate with the technical office, Office of Economic Growth (OEG). The contractor is fully responsible for all logistical and secretarial support including local and regional travel.

b) Scheduling: USAID/KEA expects this evaluation to take place beginning on/about end December 2018 until May 2019.

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