RFI-367-23-00001-USAID Localization Support.pdf

ISSUANCE DATE: November, 16, 2022

RFI CLOSING DATE: December 14, 2022, 17:00 Nepal Time

SUBJECT: Request for Information (RFI) – USAID Localization Support

REFERENCE: RFI No. RFI-367-23-00001

Dear Prospective Respondents and Interested Parties, The United States Government, represented by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) in Nepal, is in the process of designing an activity to support its localization efforts. USAID is publishing this Request for Information (RFI) pursuant to FAR 52.215-3 to conduct market research, gauge interest from qualified organizations, and seek public comments, clarifications, and suggestions on the DRAFT Statement of Work (SOW). This announcement is an RFI issued solely for information and planning purposes and does not constitute a Request for Proposals (RFP). Responses to this request for information are not binding on the U.S. Government and do not obligate USAID to issue a solicitation, nor do they commit USAID to pay any cost incurred in the preparation and submission of comments and responses.

Brief Activity Description

USAID is committed to shifting more leadership, ownership, decision making, and implementation to the local people and institutions who possess the capability, connectedness, and credibility to drive change in their own countries and communities. The localization approach will require a different way of doing business internally to USAID and for our partners including Nepali organizations and government institutions.

Localization is the process and actions that USAID will undertake to ensure our work puts local actors in the lead, strengthens local systems, and is responsive to local communities. Over the past decade, we have contributed thought leadership, invested in innovative processes, and adopted acquisition and assistance reforms to elevate local leadership and strengthen local systems. We have partnered with local organizations, provided project-based assistance to governments, and sought to shift power from foreign

U.S. Agency for International Development G.P.O. Box 295 U.S. Embassy, Maharajgunj Kathmandu, Nepal usaidnepal@usaid.gov l +977 1 423 4000 USAID.gov/nepal mailto:usaidnepal@usaid.gov intermediaries to local implementers. But we must further expand and enhance these efforts, embracing localization throughout our development and humanitarian assistance work and centering our organizational culture around localization objectives. Localization is more than directing awards to local organizations. Instead, it requires us to shift how we perceive local actors and the roles they play. We must value their knowledge, respect their commitment and integrity, and engage them as partners rather than as our agents and beneficiaries. This kind of partnership will require us to emphasize trust-building, mutuality, and long-term commitments to a shared vision.

Vision: USAID envisions expanding the share of its programs that are locally led, in which local actors define priorities, design projects, drive implementation, measure results, and more fully own and sustain efforts to save lives, reduce poverty, strengthen democratic governance, reduce corruption, address climate change, work to prevent conflicts, respond to global pandemics, and emerge from humanitarian crises. Localization involves a set of programs and policies and a cross-cutting approach to address these top Agency priorities.

Activity Purpose: The purpose of the proposed USAID Localization Support activity is to provide services to USAID, partner Nepali organizations, and Government of Nepal entities to provide surge support, build capacity, and establish systems and processes to effectively design, implement, and monitor activities that advance our shared development objectives. The full draft SOW is provided in Attachment A of this RFI.

Requested Information

Statement of Work Comments: In order to inform the design of the planned USAID Localization Support activity and ensure the most essential services are in place for all stakeholders, USAID invites constructive feedback on the draft SOW (Attachment A). These comments will be taken into consideration in the design of a final activity. In addition to general feedback, USAID would like to receive comments related, but not limited, to the questions listed below:

1. Are the three overarching areas described in the Section C.2 sufficient for USAID/Nepal to support its localization objectives? If not, what changes would you recommend?

2. Is the menu of services described in Section C.4 sufficient for USAID/Nepal to support its localization objectives? Are there any services that you would recommend adding or deleting?

3. Since unforeseen needs may arise during implementation within the three overarching areas, how do recommend USAID incorporates flexibility in the potential services so that USAID and the contractor are not tied to the list of services listed during implementation?

4. USAID is interested in industry suggestions on the type of mechanism that should be utilized, including any suggestions on applicable indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity (IDIQ) contracts you are aware of that USAID/Nepal could use to issue a task order for this mechanism. Please provide suggestions on the potential contract type that you recommend along with your rationale.

5. Is there any other feedback you would like to provide?

Sources Sought Information: USAID/Nepal further seeks to determine the capabilities and interest of qualified organizations. Interested parties who consider themselves qualified to implement the activity are invited to submit information supporting their experience, expertise, and capabilities in undertaking similar work as follows:

1. Organization Information: Name, email address, address, small business status (if applicable), GSA OASIS Pool holder details (if applicable), or any other IDIQ holder details as applicable.

2. Maximum three-page capability statement describing your organization’s ability to execute the services in the draft Statement of Work attached.

3. One-page table that contains a list of up to five past or current projects/activities that details your organization’s experience of performing efforts of similar size, scope, and complexity as the requirements detailed in the attached draft SOW (Attachment A). Sample format below:

Name of Activity Country Years (To - From) Brief Description

Instructions: Comments in response to this RFI must be submitted via email to the Contracting Officer, Maria Televantos at mtelevantos@usaid.gov with a copy to the Acquisition and Assistance Specialist, Lesley DeRosa at lderosa@usaid.gov with the subject entitled:“Request for Information (RFI): USAID Localization Support activity” no later than the date and time stated above.

Thank you for your interest in the subject request for information.

Sincerely, Maria Televantos Contracting Officer mailto:mtelevantos@usaid.gov mailto:lderosa@usaid.gov

ATTACHMENT A: DRAFT STATEMENT OF WORK

C.1 TITLE OF ACTIVITY

USAID Localization Support

C.2 PURPOSE

The purpose of the Contract is to support USAID/Nepal efforts to strengthen the Mission’s ability to ensure that local actors are in the lead role for Nepal’s development. Support must be provided in three overarching areas:

● Capacity Strengthening for Local Actors to apply, receive and manage USAID awards: The Contractor must provide a range of support services to local organizations to ensure that they can be effective partners for Nepal’s development. These services will cover the pre-award phase, design phase, award implementation phase, and help to strengthen the long-term sustainability of these organizations.

● Strengthen the Mission’s Government to Government (G2G) Programming: To support USAID/Nepal’s increasing emphasis on G2G programming, the Contractor must provide services to strengthen the Mission’s design, pre-award, and implementation of G2G awards.

● Support for the Mission to Improve Localization Programming: The Contractor must provide a range of services to support USAID/Nepal to improve localization programming and ensure the Mission is prepared for the increased demands related to these efforts. These services will cover support and logistics for USAID’s satellite presence in areas outside of Kathmandu, the pre-award phase, the design phase, the implementation phase, and provide for the Mission’s operational needs under localization.

C.3 BACKGROUND

USAID/Nepal has outlined a plan for achieving and measuring results in its 2020-2025 Country Development Cooperation Strategy (CDCS) and the Performance Management Plan for 2020-2025.

USAID/Nepal expects to program an estimated $659 million in foreign assistance in the areas of effective, participatory, and equitable democratic ecosystem, broad-based and inclusive economic growth, inclusive health and education systems and equitable and improved natural resources and disaster risk management over the five-year period of the CDCS beginning in 2021.

USAID/Nepal places a strong emphasis on the use of robust evidence and analysis, generated by non-biased qualitative and quantitative research to make strategic programmatic decisions. The Agency’s emphasis on CLA approaches also incentivizes the Mission to use quality and timely data for programmatic decision-making. As USAID focuses on achieving a more self-reliant, prosperous and inclusive Nepal, the need for high quality data and evidence becomes ever more critical to measure progress towards that development journey, address challenges, and adapt accordingly.

The recently approved USAID/Nepal’s CDCS is being implemented in the context of a federal Nepal, where government structures and power dynamics at different levels of government are still evolving. The CDCS also highlights issues of gender equality and social inclusion (GESI) and resilience as critical areas to address for sustainable development outcomes.

https://www.usaid.gov/nepal/cdcs https://www.usaid.gov/nepal/cdcs

Figure 1: USAID/Nepal CDCS Results Framework (2020-2025)

USAID/Nepal’s Performance Management Plan (PMP) outlines the high-level learning agenda and performance and context indicators that will be used to measure progress toward the CDCS Objectives.

The Learning4Development contract will be USAID/Nepal’s primary support vehicle for implementing the PMP and feeding the lessons into programming decisions.

USAID’s Localization Vision and Approach The Vision. USAID/Nepal’s approach to localization envisions an expanding portfolio of USAID programs in which local actors define priorities and lead their communities’ and countries’ development agendas, and are enabled through effective and inclusive local systems, sufficient resources, and strong local organizations and institutions to sustain outcomes over time. This will create an environment in which local actors and systems more fully own and sustain efforts to save lives, reduce poverty, strengthen democratic governance and reduce corruption, address climate change, work to prevent conflicts, respond to global pandemics, and emerge from humanitarian crises.

To deepen and accelerate localization at USAID, the Mission is establishing a Localization Agenda and whole-of-Mission effort to: galvanize and harmonize our various efforts to engage locally into a robust and consistent localization practice; address programmatic and operational impediments and blindspots to equitable localization; outline clear measures of success; and build greater support for localization among our key stakeholders, collaborators, and partners.

USAID’s Approach to Localization. USAID will deepen its commitment to being transparent, inclusive, and responsive to local actors and supportive of their development aspirations, while catalyzing a shift towards localization across the wider development community. To achieve this, USAID’s approach to the Localization Agenda will advance four lines of effort:

1. Adapt our policies and program practices to foster locally-sustained change that is tied to each country’s unique political, social, cultural, economic, and environmental conditions, while targeting the drivers and barriers to change. Progress will depend on effective application in our processes and programs of three mutually reinforcing practices:

● Locally led development – The process by which local actors set their own development agendas, develop and implement solutions, bring the capacity, leadership, and resources to promote equitable change and ensure that positive outcomes can be sustained by local people, for local people.1

● Local systems practice – The lens we use to understand development results and suggest interventions to achieve sustainability. Improving development and humanitarian results requires strengthening system performance by developing local capacities, deepening interrelationships between local actors, improving equity, and aligning the incentives that shape the system.2

● Local capacity development – A set of approaches that support local actors to achieve their own mission, take action to design and implement equitable responses to local challenges, learn and adapt, and innovate and transform over time.3

2. Change power dynamics among local actors, intermediaries, USAID staff, and other bilateral and multilateral donors to ensure a meaningful seat at the table for local actors, with a focus on underrepresented populations, under the principle, “Nothing About Us Without Us.” USAID will embrace and incentivize behavior to devolve more leadership and ownership to local actors, and to reposition USAID as a supporter and catalyst of a more inclusive and locally-led approach to development. Localization practice will elevate the voices of underrepresented communities – LGBTQI+ people, women and girls, persons with disabilities, indigenous peoples, marginalized ethnic and religious populations, internally displaced persons, youth and elderly, and other socially marginalized individuals – across development and humanitarian assistance programs.

3. Channel a higher portion of assistance directly to credible and accountable local partners while ensuring accountability. At the same time, our localization practice must reconcile the Agency’s tendency to emphasize local awards as the primary means to advance localization with a more comprehensive set of approaches that meaningfully and equitably empower local actors.

4. Serve as a global public advocate and thought-leader, using our convening authority, partnerships, voice, and the power of example to catalyze the shift to localized development at the global and country level. Making this shift will require rethinking roles and reforming policies and practices across the entire global development community, from donor agencies to international philanthropies to national governments, the private sector, and local organizations. Closer to home, we need to link up localization efforts across the interagency – including with our colleagues in the Development Finance Corporation (DFC), the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), and the State Department – to ensure that our programming is aligned and reinforcing and that our legislative and budgetary requests reflect our localization vision.

USAID/Nepal Localization Vision The Mission is committed to being more responsive to the needs and priorities of local actors and communities, by unleashing local knowledge to foster lasting change in the communities in which we work. We will facilitate local ownership of development and humanitarian assistance as it is the route to greater equity, effectiveness, and sustainability.

3 Local Capacity Development Policy Resource Page - ProgramNet (2021).

2 Local Systems: A Framework for Supporting Sustained Development (2014).

1 What is locally led development? (2020).

https://programnet.usaid.gov/development-policy-and-practice/local-capacity-development https://www.usaid.gov/policy/local-systems-framework https://docs.google.com/document/d/1SGx12NGgPBR4x3GpxaEPfrxL5MQJAFgruyvLCdS-w8U/edit

USAID/Nepal has taken a Mission wide approach to Localization, which includes all technical and strategic advisory offices (Program Office, Office of Acquisition and Assistance, Executive Office, Financial Management Office, Resident Legal Officer). We will foster a culture of learning and adaptation by revising our approaches, discussing what is and is not working, and harnessing failures as a learning tool to drive our progress towards Localization. USAID/Nepal aims to serve as a Localization Thought Leader and Model to assist other Missions wishing to design and implement their localization agendas.

We will share our best practices, innovations, and lessons learned throughout the Agency.

With ambitious targets to obligate 40 percent of its annual resources to localization by FY 2025, which includes direct awards to local organizations and G2G support, USAID/Nepal is an early Agency leader for localization. This goal exceeds the Agency global target of programming at least a quarter of its funds directly to local partners. In addition, by FY 2025, USAID/Nepal will strive to ensure that 100 percent of all new activities are co-designed with local communities in the lead to define the development challenge, set priorities, drive implementation, and/or measure and evaluate the impact of our programs. The Mission will employ best practices for prioritizing local leadership at various stages in the procurement and program lifecycle to include a greater number of designs using co-creation.

Localization at its core is about shifting relationships and power dynamics so that local actors are at the center of our work. Mission staff realize that it is essential to change our attitudes, behaviors, practices, and procedures. Although the Mission has experience with localization, a transition of this magnitude will require additional staff capacity, resources (time, staff, support mechanisms), and a shift in how the Mission designs, implements, and monitors localization activities.

THEORY OF CHANGE If local actors are empowered and take the initiative to lead responses to the development challenges they face, and have the necessary resources, decision-making power, autonomy, and support, then local actors will develop and implement solutions that are more appropriate to their needs. Further, these development solutions will be more effective and sustained, and USAID will have access to and support more effective approaches which will strengthen development programs. Together, these will result in better strategic outcomes, more sustainability, and greater development impact.

USAID/Nepal’s Localization Vision is based on comprehensive consultations internally and externally.

This was developed through a collaborative, iterative process, and based on evidence and lessons learned from previous and ongoing strategies and programs, including Agency-wide analysis of local capacity building and methods to engage more broadly with more diverse partners.

C.4 SCOPE OF WORK

The primary purpose of the Localization Support contract is to provide USAID/Nepal with technical, logistical, and advisory services to support the Mission’s increasing localization programming. The Contractor must provide USAID/Nepal with flexible and demand-driven services. Primary services under this Contract will cover the three overarching areas of local organization capacity support, strengthening G2G programming, and support for the Mission to improve localization programming. These services will assist the Mission in contributing to the Agency’s new development policy and metrics Include link once officially approved.

It is instrumental that the Contractor use flexible and adaptable systems to accommodate Mission’s immediate priorities and remain ready to adapt plans. The Contractor must provide the level of expertise specified by the Mission to complete the required tasks within the development sectors of democracy and governance, health, education, food security and agriculture, economic growth, natural resource management, disaster risk reduction and, the Mission’s priority cross cutting themes of federalism, inclusion and resilience. The Contractor must efficiently and effectively manage performance under this contract to ensure all the necessary technical and business planning, organizing, managing, coordinating and tracking (e.g., cost, schedule, and deliverables), performance management, resource management, data management, and subcontract management required to perform all activities are accomplished, as required by this SOW. Accordingly, the Contractor must provide personnel during normal operations and during surge or special situations to accomplish the requirements specified in this SOW.

The following sections outline a menu of services for each overarching area of the Contract.

C.4.1 LOCAL ORGANIZATIONS

C.4.1(a) Purpose

The Contractor must provide a range of support services to local organizations to ensure that they can be effective partners for Nepal’s development. Local organizations for the purposes of this Contract will include NGOs, CSOs, national and regional federations, the private sector, non-government education institutions, and others as identified by USAID during the course of the Contract. These services will cover the pre-award phase, design phase, award implementation phase, and help to strengthen the long-term sustainability of these organizations.

Local organizations will play a key role in the Mission’s localization efforts, but tend to have lower capacity than government entities. NGOs, in particular, have not been seen as equal partners by the GON in Nepal’s development. As such, they often have weak financial and managerial sustainability, and lack a core team of professionals that stay with the organization beyond a single award.

The purpose of this overarching area is to ensure that local organizations are prepared to work with USAID, are capable of meeting USAID requirements, and develop the long-term capacity to contribute to Nepal’s development beyond a single USAID award.

C.4.1(b) Overview of USAID/Nepal Expectations

The Contractor must adhere to the following:

● Provide staff with the language skills and geographic proximity necessary to perform the contracted activity.

● Provide qualified staff in all regions of the country for the services under this area.

● Tailor capacity development tools and mentoring specifically for the local organization and its development sector.

● Employ participatory, systems-based approaches to capacity building whenever possible. Such approaches will include using facilitative, learner-centered processes to help client organizations develop the vision, institutional and employee competencies, and networks they need to upgrade and monitor fiduciary performance, and sustain progress on risk mitigation or financial management improvement plans.

o Competency-building will include system strengthening and a range of skills and knowledge-building interventions, including traditional and electronic training, coaching, peer-to-peer mentoring, leadership development, etc. Whenever possible, skills and knowledge-building will be interactive and/or experiential. Competency-building interventions may also include systems assessments, operational and other research, the development of tools and templates, exchange programs, study tours, etc. to inform improvements to organizational capacity and processes, as well as technical assistance in improving fiduciary systems and processes. Competency-building efforts will employ gender-sensitive approaches and reflect the broader inclusionary aspirations of USAID/Nepal’s CDCS and DEIA objectives. Illustratively, leadership courses could be developed specific to women’s needs, learning materials could be made available in the relevant local language, etc.

● Whenever possible, provide systematic capacity-building that is guided by evidence-based performance plans developed in partnership and tailored to the needs of the client organization being supported. At USAID, organizational capacity development is counted if an organization has undergone an intentional and demand-driven performance improvement process detailed in points (a) and (b) below.

(a) The activity theory of change, award documents, work plan, or other relevant documentation reflects that resources (human, financial, and/or other) were allocated for organizational capacity development.

(b) An organization demonstrates that it has undergone and documented a process of performance improvement, including the following four steps:

(i.) Obtaining input from the supported organization and/or any other relevant stakeholders to define desired performance improvement priorities, (ii.) Analyzing and assessing performance gaps (the difference between desired performance and actual performance), (iii.) Selecting and implementing performance improvement solutions (or the development interventions), and

(iv.) Using a performance improvement metric for which the organization will monitor and measure changes in performance.

In addition to meeting conditions (a) and (b) above, organizations must meet the following condition:

(c) An organization demonstrates that its performance on a key performance metric has improved.

● Develop relationships and collaborate with local organizations to improve the quality and contextual relevance of its work and to increase USAID/Nepal’s access to capable, cost-effective local expertise in the future.

● Maintain the human, hardware and software capacity for electronic data collection in order to better ensure the transparency of data collection; to create the ability to collect new types of data (GIS, media, including photographs, video, and audio); and to increase the quality and efficiency of: (i) transferring collected data back to a central manager for data analysis; (ii) identifying data anomalies; and (iii) aggregating and sorting data from multiple partners and projects.

● Continuously reflect USAID/Nepal’s commitment to collaboration, learning and adapting.

o Further to collaboration, the Contractor will establish cooperative relationships with other donors, as requested by USAID/Nepal.

o “Learning and adapting” will be deliberate and ensure that USAID/Nepal and the

Contractor itself are continuously learning from ongoing work in Nepal as well as from elsewhere in the world and applying learning to improving practices and methodologies.

Monitoring and evaluation plans will reflect that USAID/Nepal is not supporting capacity building for capacity building’s sake but rather with the objective of improved institutional performance in exercising fiduciary responsibilities. Thus, beyond numbers of individuals trained, the Contractor must develop monitoring and evaluation systems that can also track improvements in institutional performance. The best systems will be those that the client organizations themselves find of value in sustaining institutional improvements beyond the life of any one Task Order. The use of performance scorecards and other performance-tracking graphics is encouraged to help client organizations “see” their progress or lack thereof.

C.4.1(c) Services to be provided

The Contractor must be able to provide the following services, which will be further defined and streamlined during the co-creation/work planning phases throughout the implementation of the activity, and may suggest others that will support the completion of this area of work.

● Design Phase

○ Preparing potential new partners to work with USAID by creating webinars/resources in Nepali

■ An introduction to USAID processes, including the documentation, registration, compliance, and steps to become an eligible partner of USAID

■ Instructions on how to apply under USAID/Nepal’s Annual Program Statements

(APS)

○ Organize and convene events in the provinces to raise awareness on working with

USAID

○ Updating database and listserve of local organizations to inform of Requests for

Information and funding opportunities

○ Proposal Development Training (not individual support, but potentially recorded webinars that are publicly accessible)

● Pre-award Phase

○ Support local organizations to apply localization tactics and techniques - putting the community in a lead role in their own development

○ Developing Work Plans and Monitoring, Evaluation, Learning, and Research Plans

○ Capacity strengthening support through group training events or more individual sessions as needed

○ Developing Organizational Performance Monitoring & Management Systems

● Implementation Phase

○ Improving award management for existing local partners

■ Comprehensively reviewing award provisions

■ Preparing Vouchers

Assisting with preparing Regular Reports (i.e., Financial Report, Accrual Report, Host Government tax Report etc )

■ Vat Reimbursement

■ Preparing for Audits

■ Subaward and Grants management, etc.

■ Develop & implement performance solutions to address local partner difficulties implementing an award)

■ Financial management and budgeting capacity strengthening

■ Capacity building on USAID environmental procedures

■ Branding and Marking needs

○ Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning Surge Support

■ Create a Local organization learning platform

■ Surge support for Learning for Development to tailor assistance to support

MEL plan development (if Learning for Development’s ceiling is reached)

■ Surge support for Learning for Development for Collaborating, Learning, and Adapting (CLA) capacity strengthening (if Learning for Development’s ceiling is reached)

○ Logistical, planning, and facilitation support for:

■ implementing partner coordination in the field

■ Training events to benefit local organizations

■ Convening consultations with local government actors

■ Communications support

● Social media

● Photography

● Marking and branding

● Behavior Change Communications

● Communications and outreach

● Strengthen long term sustainability

■ Business development

■ Financial sustainability

■ Resource mobilization (connect, consult, and collaborate with others in the system--can generate valuable complementary and supplementary resources that lead to innovations, market-based solutions, and partnerships--all aimed at optimizing results. CSO/PSE and PPP models as examples)

■ Marketing and Advocacy

■ Politically unbiased/impartiality - build internal capacity and help monitor local issues and political interference

■ Conflict Sensitivity/ Do No Harm/GESI related safeguards

C.4.2 GOVERNMENT ENTITIES

C.4.2(a) Purpose

The Contractor must assist USAID/Nepal to provide services to strengthen the Mission’s design, pre-award, and implementation of G2G awards. The Contractor must support USAID in conducting financial reviews, risk assessments, audits, cost share contribution calculations, and other analyses of existing G2G awards, potential G2G partners, and Host Country partners’ fiduciary systems.

C.4.2(b) Overview of USAID/Nepal Expectations

High quality, upright public financial management (PFM) is essential to ensuring the integrity of government budgeting and budget execution processes and has the added benefit of fostering democracy by fortifying accountability and transparency. As USAID/Nepal increases the delivery of its assistance through GON entities, it has an obligation to U.S. taxpayers to understand the strengths and weaknesses of counterpart financial management mechanisms so that risks can be addressed. The Contractor must assist USAID/Nepal in:

● Conducting internal control, financial management and risk assessments to identify and develop plans for addressing the risks associated with channeling USAID resources through Nepali counterpart systems.

● Conducting financial, close out, and/or forensic audits.

● Building capacity of USAID/Nepal IP, potential local IPs, host country government and internal

USAID/Nepal staff to strengthen financial management competencies necessary to identify and address risks.

The Contractor must meet the following requirements:

○ Adhere to guidance provided in the ADS chapters that reference G2G programming.

○ Provide staff that are certified and adhere to accounting and auditing standards that are generally accepted in the United States of America.

○ Undertake risk assessments, pre-award assessments, and other examinations of host country partner systems in partnership with the organization being examined. The intent will be to better understand issues, capacity and commitment to reform from the partner organization’s perspective, and in this way, strengthen prospects that any mitigation measures will be meaningfully implemented, both because of better fit to the partner organization’s situation and increased buy-in from the organization for the mitigation measures agreed upon.

○ Collaborate, learn, and adapt.

▪ The Contractor’s commitment to collaboration will be demonstrated by: (i) its ability to collegially solicit input and participation from USAID IPs and potential IPs, when such input and/or participation is required; and (ii) its performance in ensuring that USAID/Nepal risk management interventions are effectively coordinated with (and when requested by USAID/Nepal, harmonized with) interventions conducted by other donors that share USAID/Nepal’s objectives.

▪ “Learning and adapting” will be demonstrated in its deliberate and reported efforts to ensure that USAID/Nepal and the Contractor itself is continuously learning from ongoing work in Nepal as well as elsewhere in the world and applying learning to improving practices and methodologies.

C.4.2(c) Services to be provided

The Contractor must provide a minimum of the following services which will be further defined and streamlined during the co-creation/work planning phases throughout the implementation of the activity, and may suggest others that will support the completion of this area of work.

● Design Phase

○ Develop processes for G2G negotiations and designs

○ Prioritizing government plans linking with the CDCS

○ G2G Risk Assessments

○ Support to mitigate risk

○ Individual and system capacity assessments

● Pre-award Phase

○ Tailored assistance to support G2G MEL plan development

○ Other pre-award surveys and assessments, including host country contracting capability

● Implementation Phase

○ Capacity strengthening for government MEL systems and data collection

○ On demand financial management system strengthening

○ Assist on reporting (financial reporting, cost share contribution reporting etc.)

○ Orientation on USAID audit requirements

○ Assistance with milestone verification

○ Imbed research and planning to reform the required system

○ Policy support

○ On-demand support to GON entities for audits

○ Other Support for USAID’s Office of Financial Management (OFM): The Contractor will be expected to provide other services in support of USAID’s OFM.

Other support could include, but will not be limited to: conducting assessments of internal financial management control systems, preparing tools and templates to support improved financial management, conducting analyses to better understand conditions for improved performance in curbing fraud and providing other OFM-related support to USAID/Nepal staff, IPs, potential IPs or host country governmental entities.

C.4.3 USAID/NEPAL

C.4.3(a) Purpose

The Contractor must provide a range of services to support USAID/Nepal to improve localization programming and ensure the Mission is prepared for the increased demands related to these efforts.

These services will cover support and logistics for USAID’s satellite presence in areas outside of Kathmandu, the pre-award phase, the design phase, the implementation phase, and provide for the Mission’s operational needs under localization.

The Contractor must assist USAID/Nepal to further develop its capacity to plan, manage, and learn and adapt from localization efforts. In addition, a high level of logistical support will be needed both in Kathmandu and in remote areas of Nepal.

The Contractor may, in coordination with USAID’s Learning4Development contract, conduct performance third-party monitoring, such as site visits to verify activities and reported data where USAID/Nepal is implementing activities with local organizations.

C.4.3(b) Overview of USAID Expectations

The Contractor must meet the following requirements:

● Provide staff with the language skills and geographic proximity necessary to perform the contracted activity.

● Be positioned to provide qualified staff in all regions of the country for the services under this area.

● Whenever possible, capacity-building will be systematic and guided by performance plans developed in partnership and tailored to the needs of the Mission.

● Collaboration, learning and adapting.

o “Learning and adapting” will be deliberate and ensure that USAID/Nepal and the Contractor itself are continuously learning from ongoing work in Nepal as well as from elsewhere in the world and applying learning to improving practices and methodologies.

Monitoring and evaluation plans will reflect that USAID/Nepal is not supporting capacity building for capacity building’s sake but rather with the objective of improved institutional performance to manage localization. The use of performance scorecards and other performance-tracking graphics is encouraged to help the Mission “see” its progress or lack thereof.

C.4.3(c) Services to be provided

The Contractor must provide a minimum of the following services, and may suggest others that will support the completion of this area of work.

● Satellite Presence

○ Logistical and/or operational support to set up satellite offices

○ Staffing Support including hiring and training

○ Transportation for site visits

● Pre-award Phase

○ Drafting and analyzing Initial Environmental Examinations and Environmental

Monitoring and Mitigation Plans

○ Develop guidelines to engage and partner with women and marginalized communities

○ Support milestone development for fixed amount awards

○ Logistical, planning, and facilitation support for co-creation workshops, industry days, and conferences, etc.

○ NICRA development and support

○ Organizational Capacity Assessments, including the FAA Entity Eligibility Checklist and

NUPAS exercises

○ Support due diligence vetting of applicants

○ Support developing simplified application requirements for partners new to USAID and/or with limited capacity

○ Centralized support for SAM registration

○ Advising on advertisement of procurements best practices to reach new partners

○ Organizing pre (bidders) conferences with local organizations

● Design Phase

○ Logistical, planning, and facilitation support for design consultations

○ Vet pass/fail of proposals received under the APS

○ Partner Landscape Analyses (PLA) - support Missions in identifying new and underutilized partners within thematic areas, geographic boundaries, or other parameters as determined by Mission needs (e.g., those mapping to the Mission CDCS).

○ Independent Government Cost Estimate development support

○ Support on drafting Branding and Marking Plans, or other outreach planning

○ Developing milestones- FAA Entities

● Implementation Phase

○ Logistical, planning, and facilitation support for:

■ implementing partner coordination in the field

■ Training events for local organizations

■ Internal learning events to promote behavior change for localization

○ Develop reporting templates (which may include quarterly reports, site visit reports, work plan templates, etc.)

○ Third Party Monitoring- will need to connect to Learning for Development for aggregating and convening meetings to share recommendations for action

● Operational Needs

○ Staffing and Surge support

○ Translation, Editing, & Interpretation Services

○ Training AOR/CORs, GATRs, and A&A Specialists on topics identified by the Mission

○ Build grant management and capacity development skills

○ Webinar Development & Delivery

○ Provide office/team-level DOC support through new embedded staff that focus just on their sector.

○ Support USAID staff and partners understanding, application, and measurement of DEIA.

○ Provide additional meeting and event space: the contractor offices must be positioned within a one kilometer radius of the U.S. Embassy in Kathmandu, and have sufficient flexible meetings space to convene USAID staff, partners, and stakeholders. Each meeting space should be well ventilated and equipped with minimum conferencing needs, including chairs, tables, flipchart stands, video conferencing capabilities, and projector.

At a minimum, there should be at least two distinct meeting spaces with the following specifications:

Room Capacity with no social distancing Capacity with COVID-19 compliant social distancing

Room #1 50 25

Room #2 15 8