Attachment J.1 Statement of Objectives Business Enabling Project.pdf

ATTACHMENT J.1 - STATEMENT OF OBJECTIVES (SOO)

C.1 ACTIVITY TITLE

The title is USAID Zambia Business Enabling Project.

C.2 PURPOSE

The purpose of the USAID Zambia Business Enabling Project is to catalyze greater gender equality and inclusive private sector investment and trade in rural areas by strengthening select Zambian government and civil society organizations to implement improved and streamlined policies and processes for economically viable and gender balanced rural enterprises. The project will support the creation of an enabling environment that incentivizes productive investments in trade, agriculture, energy, eco-tourism and sustainable natural resource management.

C.3 BACKGROUND

The Government of the Republic of Zambia (GRZ) is responsible for providing a supportive macro- and micro-level enabling environment for the economy. The Government has adopted an integrated approach to sectoral development as outlined in its Seventh National Development

Plan (7NDP)1 of 2017-2021. This is to ensure that sector interventions are coherent and support the attainment of prioritized national policy objectives. To this end, sectoral clusters2 have been established to promote multi-sectoral planning, implementation and monitoring impact and results. Trade, agriculture, energy, tourism and sustainable natural resource management are part of pillar 1 whose focus is on economic diversification and job creation. Therefore, interventions in these sectors are expected to be coordinated for meaningful results and impact.

Although the GRZ has made strides, in principle, toward introducing transparent policies to foster competition, complaints arise from time to time. The government continues to use the

Regulatory Impact Assessment (RIA)3 as part of its policy and legislative making process, creating a platform for public-private dialogue and healthy debate on economic development laws and policies, and ultimately, improving the quality of regulation. Under the Business Regulatory Act

No. 34 of 2014, the law requires that regulators consider alternatives to proposed regulations;

the RIA informs those discussions. Proposed laws and other statutory instruments are, however, 1 Seventh National Development Plan 2017-2021, © 2017, Ministry of National Development Planning 2 Summary Report of the National Development Coordinating Committee (NDCC) Meeting 19th to 20th December, 2018. Ministry of National Development Planning, © January 2019.

3 https://www.mcti.gov.zm/?wpfb_dl=64 4 https://www.mcti.gov.zm/?wpfb_dl=64 https://www.mcti.gov.zm/?wpfb_dl=64 https://www.mcti.gov.zm/?wpfb_dl=64 often insufficiently vetted with interest groups, or are not released in draft form for public comment and need to be improved.

Through the Zambia Development Agency (ZDA), the Government continues to undertake a number of activities to promote investment through provision of fiscal and non-fiscal incentives, establishment of Multi-Facility Economic Zones (MFEZs), the development of SMEs, as well as the promotion of skills development, productive investment, and increased trade. The Zambian

Business Regulatory Review Agency (BRRA5) has responsibility for Regulatory Services Centers

(RSCs) that serve as a one-stop shop for investors. RSCs provide for an efficient regulatory clearance system by streamlining business registration processes; providing a single licensing system; reducing the procedures and time it takes to complete the registration process; and increasing accessibility of business registration institutions by placing them under one roof. The

Government established RSCs in Lusaka, Livingstone, Kitwe, and Chipata, and will need support to establish additional RSCs so that there is at least one in each of the country’s 10 provinces.

With respect to Agriculture, the Second National Agriculture Policy (SNAP)6 provides a policy framework to ensure development of a competitive and diversified agriculture sector in the country. Policy challenges in the agricultural sector are highlighted by unbalanced agriculture policies favoring maize production thereby disadvantaging the production of other crops7; poor financing towards Research and Development (R&D), low mechanization and information communication technologies (ICTs) to increase yields; and limited food commodity storage, and insufficient irrigation and related infrastructure challenges. Although women play a critical role in sustaining a productive agricultural sector, mostly through provision of labor, they have limited access and control over productive resources for equal participation in economic activities. There is need therefore for deliberate policies that empower women with technology, access to finance and skills to bring gender equity and social inclusion.

With regards trade, a National Trade Policy8 supported by a National Export Strategy9, among other strategic documents, was adopted in 2019 as part of the national development agenda of maintaining an open trading system that supports national development efforts. However, there are a number of GRZ policies and/or procedures that still impede trade and business growth that are aggravated by onerous and challenging documentation and permitting processes. Although

Zambia is signatory to a range of international treaties that govern international investment and has signed several Bilateral Investment Treaties (BITs), it still lacks harmonized legislation for investment built on a national investment policy. While the Government has made gains in improving the business and operating environment for companies, especially for foreign investors, weaknesses in the regulatory framework remain apparent. Although Zambia is a member of several regional trading bodies, much work remains to develop implementation protocols and mechanisms across Africa.

5 The Zambian Business Regulatory Review Agency - info@brra.org.zm 6 Republic of Zambia Second National Agricultural Policy, Ministry of Agriculture and Ministry of Fisheries and Livestock. February 2016 7 http://www.iapri.org.zm/ 8 National Trade Policy 2018, Ministry of Commerce and Trade.

9 The National Export Strategy 2018, Ministry of Commerce and Trade.

Energy is another area of focus and priority for economic diversification and job creation. GRZ seems to prioritize initiatives aimed at expanding access to electricity for households and businesses and improving electricity reliability and diversification of electricity generation sources.

There are significant gender differences in access, use and effects of different energy sources. For instance, biomass accounts for 77 percent of the total primary energy use, and is typically inefficiently produced and utilized, resulting in a negative health impact on the rural women who use it. Currently, around 31.4 percent of the country’s total population has access to electricity, with rural households accounting for only 4.4 percent (National Energy Policy, 2019).10 Besides the low electricity access rate, parallel efforts need to be directed towards improving electricity reliability, including the diversification of Zambia’s electricity generation sources. Energy consumers, both individually and through representative entities (that include civil society) have increasingly voiced their concerns on energy services such as electricity particularly with regard to pricing e.g., the 113% tariff increment in 2019 and reliability of supply.

In the tourism sector, forests and wildlife areas provide a significant opportunity for rural communities to benefit economically. Through wildlife-based tourism, GRZ has an ambitious goal of creating one million jobs by 2030 and increasing the contribution of wildlife and forests to the country’s economic growth through tourism and sustainable timber harvesting. However, this goal is confronted by a number of challenges, which include limitations in policy enforcement, and illegal demands on natural resources, such as bush meat, charcoal, timber, among others. Part of the solution to these challenges rests on catalyzing greater involvement of the private sector in order to create opportunities for increased investment, trade and economic benefits from wildlife, forests and eco-tourism.

Efforts by various Zambian think-tanks including the USAID-funded Indaba Agricultural Policy

Research Institute (IAPRI) and the Policy Monitoring and Research Centre (PMRC), as well as civil-society organizations such as the Zambia National Farmers Union (ZNFU,) have made laudable efforts but have had little success in fostering GRZ policy and regulatory reforms that would lead to a more conducive private-enterprise enabling environment. This limited success is partly due to the tendency of these organizations to work in silos, as opposed to coordinating their efforts.

C.4 OBJECTIVES

In order to reach the purpose of this project, there are two mutually reinforcing objectives:

1. Streamline and improve processes and policies that catalyze gender-equitable private sector investment in agriculture, trade, energy and natural resources/eco-tourism.

2. Strengthen informed decision-making for Zambian Government policy implementation and formulation through linkages with strengthened civil society organizations and the private sector, where women’s interests are equally represented.

10 The National Energy Policy 2019, Ministry of Energy

C.5 SUCCESS

Success of the USAID Zambia Business Enabling Project will be measured by:

1. Increased value of investments in the agriculture, energy, eco-tourism and sustainable natural resource management industries, including for women-owned businesses.

2. Increase in the volume and value of domestic and internationally traded goods and services due to improved trade policies and processes.

3. Improvements in select indicators that are used to compute the World Bank’s Ease of

Doing Business Index, the World Bank’s Women, Business, and the Law (WBL) index, and the World Bank’s Enabling the Business of Agriculture (EBA). In collaboration with the private sector and other stakeholders, the key specific performance business indicators that go into these indices will be developed to reflect the priorities of each sector.

4. Improvements to business owners’ perceptions of the regulatory and investment opportunities and challenges in target sectors.

5. Increased access to modern energy, increased reliability of the existing energy supply and increased proportion of renewable energy will measure success for the energy sector.

6. Increase in the number of functioning mechanisms and increased levels of participation by stakeholders for dialogue between and within public and private sectors.

7. Reduction in barriers to women’s equal economic participation and entrepreneurship in each sector.

C.6 KEY STAKEHOLDERS

The following list provides key stakeholders and their envisioned respective roles and responsibilities within the USAID Zambia Business Enabling Project. Collaboration with these stakeholders will include coordination to avoid duplication and maximize impact, joint learning that benefits the Zambian business environment, strengthening goals and efforts to advance an effective partnership with the Government of Zambia.

STAKEHOLDER ROLES

USAID Zambia To provide oversight of the performance of the Contract.

GRZ (Ministry of Agriculture;

Ministry of Commerce, Trade and Industry; Ministry of Tourism and Arts; and Ministry of Energy.

Propose and implement laws and other statutory instruments to improve the business enabling environment.

CIVIL SOCIETY Strengthen decision-making for Zambian Government policy implementation and formulation through advocacy, providing evidence and vetting.

PRIVATE SECTOR Strengthen decision-making for Zambian Government policy implementation and formulation through advocacy/lobbying, providing evidence and vetting.

Cooperating Partners (JICA, World Bank, GIZ, WFP, European Union, DFID, FAO, UNDP)

To coordinate interventions in related activities as planned or managed by other cooperating partners.

C.7 LINKAGES TO MISSION OBJECTIVES AND OTHER USG PROGRAMS

Through co-design and partnerships with GRZ, private sector, think-tanks, non-governmental organizations (advocacy groups, etc.) and local communities, this project will contribute to

Development Objective (DO) 2 (“Rural Poverty Reduced through Enterprise-Driven Inclusive Economic

Growth”) of USAID/Zambia’s 2019-2024 Country Development Cooperation Strategy (CDCS).

USAID is working with host country governments and its partners to achieve locally-sustained results, helping countries mobilize public and private revenues, strengthening local capacities, and accelerating enterprise-driven development. An important enabler of this are citizens themselves, along with private-sector stakeholders, who have a strong interest in improving conditions so their communities and markets can thrive. The USAID Zambia Business Enabling Project seeks to unlock the enabling power of civil society and the private sector to help the Government of

Zambia advance its development goals and boost inclusive economic opportunity, especially in rural areas. Specifically, the project will address DO2’s Intermediate Result (IR)2.1 (“Rural business enabling environment improved”) and address Sub-IR 2.1.1 (“Economic and natural resource policies improved and implemented”) and Sub-IR 2.1.2 (“Markets strengthened and expanded”) - see table 1. In addition, this will also contribute to IR 2.2 (“Rural enterprises strengthened”) and IR 2.3

(“Natural resources more sustainably managed”) by addressing critical enablers of economic growth.

To address this challenge, the project will coordinate closely with the Democracy, Rights and

Governance Office (DRG), which manages DO1 (“Citizen and National Self-Reliance Advanced by

More Effective, Accountable Governance”), to strengthen citizen-responsive transparency initiatives around government revenue, budgeting, expenditure and policy implementation.

Table 1: USAID/Zambia CDCS DO2 Results Framework

DO 2: Rural Poverty Reduced through

Enterprise-Driven Inclusive Economic Growth

IR 2.1:

Rural business enabling environment improved

IR 2.2:

Rural enterprises strengthened

IR 2.3:

Natural resources more sustainably managed

Sub-IR 2.1.1

Economic and natural resource policies improved and implemented

Sub-IR 2.2.1:

Investment in rural enterprises increased, including for female-led enterprises

Sub-IR 2.3.1:

Income from sustainable livelihoods increased

Sub-IR 2.1.2:

Markets strengthened and expanded

Sub-IR 2.2.2:

Access to electricity and digital technology in rural areas increased

Sub-IR 2.3.2:

Natural resource management and governance improved

Sub-IR 2.2.3: Employment, income and entrepreneurship in rural areas increased, particularly among youth

Sub-IR 2.3.3: Conservation of natural resources improved

Numerous USG programs have invested or are currently investing in Zambia to improve food security and nutrition (PROFIT+, Mawa, COMACO, Partnering for Innovation, Enterprise

Development and Growth Enhanced [EDGE], Emerging Farmers Partnership [EFP], Scaling Up

Nutrition Technical Assistance [SUN-TA], etc), governance (Local Impact Governance project, Revenue Mobilization for Equity and Growth [ReMEG], and Integrated Land and Resource

Governance [ILRG]), natural resource management (Alternatives to Charcoal [A2C], Community

Forest Program [CFP], North Luangwa Ecosystem Project, Community Wildlife

Protection[CWP]), eco-tourism (Wildlife Crime Prevention Program), energy (the Zambia

Energy Regulatory Partnership), and trade (Southern Africa Trade and Investment Hub). The

Offeror will be expected to build upon these past programs and leverage existing programs, where appropriate, to maximize the impact of the USAID Zambia Business Enabling Project. In particular, this project is expected to collaborate strongly with the Health, Ecosystems and

Agriculture for Resilient Thriving Societies (HEARTH) project(s), which aims to scale up public-private partnerships to implement integrated solutions that increase rural incomes through improved natural resource management, intensified agricultural production and diversified farm and off-farm incomes. Where appropriate, the project will collaborate with other relevant

USAID partnership programs and other donor supported initiatives that complement the USAID

Zambia Business Enabling Project objectives and are in line with national policies or priorities to improve trade and investment opportunities within Zambia to spur more inclusive, market-driven rural economic growth.

C.8 STRATEGIC ALIGNMENT WITH GRZ GOVERNMENT PRIORITIES

This project aligns with the GRZ’s 7NDP on the development outcomes: creating a diversified and export-oriented agricultural sector through improved trade policies; improved access to domestic, regional and international markets; improved energy production and distribution for sustainable development; creating a diversified tourism sector; and enhancing job opportunities in the economy. The project will address policy and regulatory constraints and assist GRZ in achieving these development objectives.

C.9 ASSUMPTIONS

USAID/Zambia believes that through this project the results will be achieved in five years given the following assumptions:

● USAID interventions demonstrate and prove win-win outcomes that positively influence government decision makers to facilitate increased private-sector engagement in agriculture, energy, eco-tourism and sustainable natural resource management industries, including for women-owned businesses.

● Addressing Zambia’s ability to become economically independent and self-reliant remains a USG policy priority, with commensurate levels of resources available to USAID/Zambia across the sector foci in this project.

● Zambia’s fiscal environment and COVID-19 disruptions do not significantly deteriorate and continue to accommodate private sector growth and investment.

C.10 THE DEVELOPMENT HYPOTHESIS

If the Government creates an enabling environment for business which is informed regularly with input from key stakeholders, then private sector companies will be supported to grow their businesses, expand trade and attract increased investment in agriculture, energy, eco-tourism and natural resource management, resulting in broad-based gender-equitable economic growth that transforms rural areas and pulls people out of poverty.

C.11 SCOPE

The focus of this project is to improve the policy Institutional Architecture (IA) needed to stimulate the transformation of agriculture, trade, energy, and natural resources/tourism sectors.

IA refers to the entities and processes for policy formulation and implementation. Specifically, this project will strengthen/streamline agriculture, trade, energy and natural resources/tourism policies, laws, and regulations and administrative procedures that impede trade and investment.

The economic vibrancy of sectors is often limited by a small number of market or regulatory failures. High-leverage interventions will be identified, and the project will facilitate “fast-tracked” approaches to policy improvement that apply to the targeted sectors and capitalize on high-profile, high-priority initiatives in the first years of implementation. Policy and regulatory reform with these institutions will be most effective where changes are aligned with Zambia’s development priorities, particularly where there are internal and external incentives. It will be important to balance working with high-profile sector reform, which may become caught up in political economy factors, and those reforms that may be critical but not prioritized by the government. The project should therefore focus its engagement on key barriers to investment for the private sector and key enabling civil society organizations, with particular attention paid to gender nuanced barriers. In the short run, confidence building measures that increase transparency, trust and promote “citizen voice,” including smallholder farmers, small-scale traders and local business associations, including under-represented groups such as women, will be critical for the success of this project.

The following are some of the areas with policy misalignment that require interventions:

● Lack of coordination among/between sectors in identifying policy objectives and implementation strategies. Oversight roles by various bodies (e.g steering committees consisting of representatives from relevant ministries, private sector and civil society and community representatives) should be clearly defined and implemented.

● Lack of integrated approach to policy planning and implementation, e.g., does the energy policy address challenges in other sectors (i.e., energy supply capacity to respond to production constraints), does the agriculture policy address challenges in other sectors

(i.e., production to meet demand, agriculture measures not to create trade constraints).

● Uncoordinated response/interventions by cooperating partners in the design and provision of support to sectoral processes and initiatives.

● Commercialization of agriculture - has this policy translated into specific interventions and what are the challenges? The challenges of the Farmer Input Support Program (FISP) and

Food Reserve Agency (FRA) are well known, but ongoing fledgling reform efforts need to continue because these entities are important for the poverty alleviation agenda of the country.

● Availability of credible data to support policy interventions and how this affects investment decisions (in sectors) consistent with priorities, and monitoring and evaluation frameworks - how effective are these?

● Complementary support to facilitate private sector involvement e.g., finance, capacity, etc.

The project will also include activities that create incentives to unleash the private-sector resources needed to advance the country’s journey to self-reliance. For example, advocating for zero tax ratings on special capital investments for SMEs. This will also support scaling up and effectiveness of economic growth development outcomes of other USG funded activities including the Enterprise Development and Growth Enhanced (EDGE), and Healthy Ecosystems and Agriculture for Resilient, Thriving Societies (HEARTH), Revenue Mobilization for Equity and

Growth (ReMEG), and the Local Impact Governance activities. The project will be expected to collaborate with these other USAID funded activities to leverage resources and improve development outcomes. To achieve this, the USAID Zambia Business Enabling Project will facilitate and strengthen linkages between key actors in all target sectors to advance their specific policy and advocacy issues. The project will also work with GRZ line ministries at both national and sub-national levels to address policy/administrative issues, or other constraints that impede private sector investments and engagement of women and youth. Although the mid-term review

(MTR) of the 7NDP noted that structures were functional both at national and sub-national levels, much work remains to be done especially at ward level. The MTR noted that full adoption of this approach was hampered by the slow pace of actualization of the integrated budgeting system based on the outcome areas of the 7NDP. The current budgeting process is still predominantly sector based. The MTR, therefore, recommended that the Government should: (i) strengthen the cluster approach across all the dimensions of 7NDP management including resource planning, programme implementation, monitoring, evaluation and reporting; (ii) strengthen vertical linkages between national and sub-national levels and streamline reporting formats; (iii) establish effective feedback mechanisms between national and sub-national levels; (iv) allocate adequate resources to support coordination mechanisms, meetings, monitoring and reporting processes; (v) restructure the national budgeting system to entrench integrated and results-based budgeting for the clusters; and (vi) finalize legal frameworks that are supportive of the integrated approach, for instance the National Planning and Budgeting Bill.

The offeror must consider using a blended approach of capacity building activities focused on organizational strengthening and relationship-building between institutions to hold each other accountable and build common agendas. Engagement with governmental corporations like

ZESCO must be aligned with each respective organization’s mission to identify strategic opportunities for reform. The offeror must provide more of an oversight role to ensure that support to Ministries, regulatory agencies and civil society organizations is coordinated, standardized and effected with an overarching goal of improving the rural business enabling environment.

The core of this project will be strengthening the institutional architecture of GRZ and civil society to solicit and respond to private sector and community needs. The project should take advantage of known areas where the government is receptive to making changes to capitalize on their willingness. The planning of activities must also be flexible enough to respond to emerging policy issues.

● Within the GRZ, ministries should improve their feedback and learning systems to be responsive to stakeholders’ needs and identify issues affecting their ability to invest/expand their businesses.

● This project will consider the interests of various stakeholders and address them accordingly: invest resources into developing a better understanding of specific “issue networks” in order to frame who the critical actors are and whose voices are currently excluded.

● Facilitate problem solving and local solutions by bearing the transaction costs to encourage actors to come together to find more sustainable solutions to the problems they face.

● Support coalitions of interests or webs of alliances in which a range of actors work for similar types of changes through addressing issues of immediate interest to them; work with like-minded actors on the state side of the equation and opportunities to ‘work with the grain’ in order to build critical mass.

● Provide sufficient upfront support to avoid privileging organizations that are better placed to produce well written proposals but are less likely to have the most influence or represent the interests of those most affected. Stakeholder consultation processes will yield little return for regulators if private sector associations do not have adequate capacity to effectively convey the needs of the sector in a coherent, thoughtful manner.

● Amplify the voice of local organizations and constituency-based groups and reinforce it with the credibility of expert analysis, including from international partners, with a focus on mainstreaming gender considerations throughout their operations.

C.12 INCEPTION PHASE

The USAID Zambia Business Enabling Project is trying to break through blockages or bottlenecks in the economic system. The project will begin with a six-month inception phase to establish a baseline for performance measurement and refine the approach to ensure that interventions are based on the best possible understanding of the local context and evidence of what is likely to work within these conditions as well as the differential impact on men and women. Allowing the program, a six-month inception phase will ensure that all potential technical assistance programs are appropriately vetted. During this phase the offeror will engage in collaborative planning and field consultations with USAID and key stakeholders including GRZ, civil society and the private sector to understand political economy and system dynamics, organizational capacity and skill constraints, risks, the nature of the problem and where and how the project will intervene to achieve its objectives. Opportunities should be identified and pursued to achieve early successes and build momentum, such as identifying and enabling investments in women-owned businesses and implementing early regulatory reforms that private sector stakeholders have called for.

This effort will identify and assess existing institutions – public, private, informal, traditional, U.S.

Government (USG) supported and non-USG programs – that could be engaged or assisted to achieve the project’s purposes. Possible benchmarks for GRZ involvement and ownership will be explored. The assessment also will examine consequential cultural and political factors as well as the underlying social networks that shape ground-level decisions. Power discrepancies including gender and partisan divides among Zambian citizens, private business, subnational officials, and local ministerial representatives underscore the importance of broad stakeholder engagement to achieve inclusive systemic change. The applied learning component will use data and consultation to challenge assumptions, assess organization capacity, implementation risks, and systems dynamics to refine the proposed technical approach. This should be revisited annually as part of the learning agenda.

These are among the questions that USAID and the offeror will probe during the inception phase:

1. The economic vibrancy of sectors is often limited by a small number of market or regulatory failures. Which are these high-leverage interventions for each sector?

2. Which constraints are most consequential, including those for women specifically? Which catalysts deserve the most attention?

3. What are low, medium and high potential interventions for implementation? The need for enough buy-in from key stakeholders inside and outside government is important.

4. What is the best strategic approach for implementation?

5. What would incentivize the Government to advance reforms beneficial to the private sector for rural investment?

Through its inception phase work plan development, the offeror will construct an adaptive roadmap for program implementation. The roadmap may face challenges like the two big context issues of the moment: 1) the economic crisis - recession, debt and impact on rural jobs and incomes - and 2) the Covid-19 disruption. The offeror will establish specific adaptive management steps for implementation to address the above challenges.

C.13 COLLABORATING LEARNING AND ADAPTING (CLA)

Development work presents many opportunities to collaborate and engage with a broad set of stakeholders, to learn from both evidence and experience and to adapt iteratively to unexpected results or changes in context. Therefore, USAID places “Collaborating, Learning and Adapting,” or CLA, at the center of its Program Cycle, both as a connector between, and an integrated part of the components. USAID/Zambia will employ a rigorous framework for ensuring that all partners are instituting robust and meaningful CLA practices and behaviors across their activities and feeding into the greater USAID Mission and GRZ priorities. The USAID/Zambia Economic

Development office is finalizing a CLA Action Plan that the offeror will be expected to participate in and follow for their contribution to Mission objectives. One learning question this project will need to contribute to is “How can we compare the effectiveness and sustainability of the new

USAID/Zambia’s enterprise-driven approach with the previous traditional approach to rural poverty alleviation?”

COLLABORATING

Collaboration enables cross-sector integration, convergence, and effective interventions to maximize development resources and enhance development results. The offeror will collaborate with USAID-supported and other development partners (e.g., multilateral, other donors, host government) activities in common areas of operation and engage with stakeholders (defined collaboratively with USAID COR) to deliver integrated services to target populations.

LEARNING

Learning should be intentional, systematic and resourced. Sources for learning include data from monitoring, pause and reflect workshops, portfolio reviews, findings of research, evaluations, analyses conducted by USAID or third parties, knowledge gained from experience, stocktaking exercises, and other sources. Those documents produced by USAID will be shared with the offeror by the COR for consideration in the learning phase of CLA.

These sources will be used to develop and implement plans, manage adaptively, and contribute to the USAID/Zambia knowledge base in order to improve development outcomes. A collaborating, learning, and adapting focus helps to ensure that programming is coordinated, grounded in evidence, and adjusted as necessary to remain relevant and effective throughout implementation.

Knowledge generated by learning shall be applied throughout programming to implementation approaches, processes, and stakeholder engagement. Knowledge generated by learning should also be disseminated to stakeholders, partners, and collaborators in an appropriate forum and format so that it may be translated into decisions and actions that enhance the success of approaches and interventions designed to achieve common intermediate results.

The offeror will share information and knowledge generated by monitoring data, portfolio review results, research findings, evaluations, analyses, and experiences with other USAID implementing partners. The offeror will apply actionable information and knowledge gained from collaborating partners to implementation in order to improve results. USAID implementing partners and other development partners’ staff, as relevant, shall convene on a periodic basis to reflect on actions taken, exchange analysis, and propose decisions that affect implementation.

ADAPTING

The offeror will demonstrate adaptability that is informed by knowledge gained through learning and recognize behaviors and incentives necessary to create change. Knowledge gained through learning shall influence decision making, resource allocation, and adaptation to contextual shifts.

Application of new knowledge to implementation decisions shall be reflected in the Annual Work

Plan and Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning Plan (AMELP). Decisions to adapt may be based on, but not limited to the following:

● Extraneous changes in the operating environment (i.e., emergency or natural disaster;

national policy changes)

● Financial and human resource constraints

● Evidence that signals targets are unmet

● Emerging evidence that interventions are not working or could work better if adapted

Any changes to the scope of the contract must be approved by the Cognizant Contracting Officer in a modification to the contract. Changes in technical approach may be approved by the

Contracting Officer’s Representative (COR) by way of the COR’s authority to provide technical direction and approve Annual Work Plans.

C.14 ENVIRONMENTAL COMPLIANCE

The Foreign Assistance Act of 1961, as amended, Section 117 requires that the impact of USAID’s activities on the environment be considered and that USAID include environmental sustainability as a central consideration in designing and carrying out its development programs. ADS Parts

201.5 and 204 (http://www.usaid.gov/policy/ADS/200/) in part, require that the potential environmental impacts of USAID-financed activities are identified prior to a final decision to proceed and that appropriate environmental safeguards are adopted for all activities.

Additionally, the USAID Zambia Business Enabling Project must comply with host country environmental regulations unless otherwise directed in writing by USAID. In case of conflict between host country and USAID regulations, the latter or more stringent of the two shall govern. None of the activities under the USAID Zambia Business Enabling Project will be implemented unless an environmental threshold determination, as defined by 22 CFR 216, has been reached as documented in the amended FTF/WASH IEE duly signed by the Bureau

Environmental Officer on October 13, 2020.

As part of the initial Work Plan and all annual work plans thereafter, the USAID Zambia Business

Enabling Project, in collaboration with the COR and the MEO will review all ongoing and planned activities to determine if they are within the scope of the approved IEE. If any of the planned activities are outside the scope of the approved IEE, an amendment must be prepared for USAID review and approval. No such new activities shall be undertaken prior to receiving written USAID approval of environmental documentation amendments. Any ongoing activities found outside the scope of the approved Regulation 216 environmental documentation will be halted until an amendment to the documentation is submitted and written approval is received from USAID.

A negative determination with conditions has been reached for this project which means that if these activities are implemented subject to specified conditions, they are expected to have no significant adverse effect on the environment. The offeror should therefore include potential impacts that are likely to result from this and develop an approach to achieving environmental compliance and management, including developing and implementing an Environmental Mitigation and Monitoring Plan (EMMP) and an illustrative budget for implementing environmental compliance activities.

C.15 SELF RELIANCE AND SUSTAINABILITY

This project exemplifies USAID’s priority goal of advancing Zambia’s self-reliance through the strengthening of local government and civil society and the inclusion of the private sector. The decision on interventions will be primarily driven by the end goal of sustainable rural economic growth with poverty reduction through private sector investment and trade. This will build sustainability into existing government and regulatory structures that will persist beyond the project’s life. The USAID Zambia Business Enabling Project will collaborate extensively with the

Government of Zambia, private sector and associated civil society institutions by strengthening the capacity of the national and sub-national stakeholders to effectively collaborate to improve service delivery. This ecosystem of government, civil society and the private sector will sustain and expand the model that the USAID Zambia Business Enabling Project will build to widen the ownership base for development and achieve more robust and lasting development outcomes.

C.16 GENDER AND YOUTH CONSIDERATIONS

Inclusive development is smart development, as no country can realize its full potential without supporting all people to contribute to and benefit from the development of their countries.

Gender roles in the Zambian society result in a general imbalance in women’s economic participation. The USAID Zambia Business Enabling Project’s technical approach must strive to institute policies, practices and behaviors that have the potential for transformative change to reduce gender-based barriers to economic development. Moreover, the project will identify approaches making headway in Zambia that can be leveraged to promote greater citizen engagement, especially for its underutilized and underrepresented women. USAID strives to promote gender equality, in which both women and men have equal opportunity to benefit from and contribute to economic, social, and cultural development. This project’s approach will identify those areas where strategic engagement on gender issues could substantively and significantly unlock women as drivers of increased economic growth and investment. Planned activities will need to be carefully tailored to ensure that clear, realistic, and equitable strategies are implemented with the ultimate aim of reducing gender disparities in access to, control over and benefit from socioeconomic opportunities and services at the local level.

This project is rooted in a Positive Youth Development (PYD) approach, which is based on the belief that, “given guidance and support from caring adults, all youths (ages 10-29) can grow up healthy and productive, making positive contributions to their families, schools, and communities.” PYD programs encourage youth leadership and experiential learning, as well as adult approachability and champions. Services and opportunities are designed to support young people in developing a sense of competence, usefulness, belonging and empowerment. The offeror will include concrete and practical approaches that will not only address the challenges that youth face to accomplish the results but will also involve and support young people in decision-making, management, and leadership.

C.17 CLIMATE CHANGE INTEGRATION

Climate risk management (CRM) is required for all USAID-supported activities. ADS 201 stipulates that all USAID projects and activities comply with climate risk management requirements. Climate risks must be assessed, and risk management measures determined during design to ensure that results are incorporated and budgeted for. Climate risk is the potential for negative consequences on objectives and/or outcomes due to changing climatic conditions and can be manifested through potentially severe adverse consequences for development programs resulting from the interaction of climate-related hazards with the vulnerability of societies and systems. A climate risk may arise when an element, target, or beneficiary is exposed to a climate hazard such as higher temperatures, flooding or drought.

Per USAID policy, moderate and high climate risks must be addressed in the design and during implementation. The CRM process may identify potential development opportunities associated with current and expected climatic and meteorological changes, including chances to achieve additional development objectives.

The offeror must describe their approach to climate risk management and how they will inform implementation and adaptive management. In addition, given the challenges posed by climate change, the offeror will need to articulate practices and interventions that can enable climate resilient approaches to succeed and support the sustainability of the investments made under this project. The identified risks and mitigation measures will be added to the EMMP.

C.18 SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY, INNOVATION AND PARTNERSHIP (STIP)

USAID/Zambia is one of 20 Missions recognized as a “Lead Mission” in applying Science, Technology, Innovation and Partnership (STIP) to enhance its development impact. The offeror must describe their approach and use of cost-effective methods to reach many beneficiaries and accelerate the timeline for obtaining results, and/or bringing ground-breaking innovations to scale.

C.19 REFERENCES:

See Attachment J.2 for References.

[END OF SECTION C)