SFA III RFI March 30-Final.pdf

DATE OF ISSUE: MARCH 30, 2021

CLOSING DATE TO

SUBMIT COMMENTS: APRIL 15, 2021, 1:00 PM EST

ACTIVITY TITLE: SCHOOL FEEDING ACTIVITY III ACTIVITY III (SFA III)

RFI NUMBER: USAID-RFI-669-03.30.2021

POINT OF CONTACTS: SUBMIT COMMENTS TO THE FOLLOWING ADDRESSES:

SUPERVISORY CONTRACTING/

AGREEMENT OFFICER: ANDREA M. PLUCKNETT– aplucknett@usaid.gov

CONTRACTING SPECIALIST: EDWARD LAMIN, – elamin@usaid.gov

SPECIAL NOTICES

REQUEST FOR INFORMATION (RFI)

The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID)’s Mission in Liberia is in the process of designing a new School Feeding Activity III. This $7 million activity will improve nutrition, school enrollment and attendance for children and youth within target communities. The Office of

Acquisition and Assistance (OAA) at USAID/Liberia has developed a draft concept, development hypothesis and accompanying Results Framework, and now aims to provide a community of stakeholders the opportunity to review, comment, and make suggestions to enhance the School

Feeding Activity III design.

The draft concept and Results Framework is anticipated to result in finalizing either a Statement of

Work or a Program Description that may lead to a formal solicitation or Notice of Funding

Opportunity. The place of performance is Liberia, specifically in Bong, Grand Bassa, Lofa, Nimba, Montserrado, Margibi counties. The draft concept is provided in the following pages. Your comments will be used to develop a design document that is clear, innovative, maximizes development learning, adaptation, and impact, and facilitates coordination and collaboration with existing and planned

USAID and other programs.

DISCLAIMER

Please note: This is NOT a solicitation. This Request for Information (RFI) is issued solely for information and planning purposes—it does not constitute a Request for Proposal (RFP) /Notice of

Funding Opportunity (NOFO) or a promise to issue an RFP/NOFO in the future. USAID may release a full solicitation at a later date through the U.S. Government portal at beta.sam.gov or www.grants.gov . The RFI is an attempt to reach out to stakeholders in an effort to receive feedback on our draft concept. Interest will be treated as information only. Responses to this RFI are not official proposals and in no way will be deemed to form any binding agreement with the U.S. Government and will not be construed as a commitment by the U.S. Government to issue a solicitation or pay for any information submitted as a result of this request. Organizations responding to this request are solely responsible for bearing all expenses associated with the preparation and submission of the responses to the RFI. It is the respondent’s responsibility to monitor beta.sam.gov or www.grants.gov for the release of any further information. Note that responding to this RFI will not give any advantage to any organization in any subsequent procurement. No telephone calls will be accepted and neither will responses to questions be provided with regard to this notice.

INSTRUCTIONS

Responses to this RFI must be in Microsoft Word or PDF format and submitted by April 15, 2021, 1:00 PM EST Comments on the concept, Development Hypothesis, and accompanying Results

Framework should be submitted to USAID/Liberia via email to Edward S. Lamin at elamin@usaid.gov. with copy to Andrea M. Plucknett at aplucknett@usaid.gov. To assist in the efficiency of this process, please ensure that your comments are concise and specific to the information included within the Concept, Development Hypothesis, and Results Framework.

Sincerely, Andrea M. Plucknett

Supervisory Contracting/Agreement Officer

ANDREA MARIA

PLUCKNETT (affiliate)

Digitally signed by ANDREA MARIA PLUCKNETT (affiliate) Date: 2021.03.30 14:06:48 Z

Section 1. ACTIVITY TITLE

The name of the anticipated Activity is School Feeding Activity III (abbreviated as SFA III).

Section 2. PROGRAM DURATION/TARGET BENEFICIARIES

The anticipated program duration will be for three years.

This Activity will improve nutrition, and school enrollment and attendance for children and youth of different ages living within target communities, especially the most vulnerable and marginalized. This includes children and youth who are currently enrolled in formal or non-formal, pre-primary, primary, and secondary schools, as well as children and youth who are not currently enrolled in formal or non-formal education.

Section 3. CONTEXT

Background

There is evidence that childhood hunger can impair attention, motivation, cognitive abilities and school performance.1 In response, school feeding programs are “targeted social safety nets that provide both educational and health benefits to the most vulnerable children, thereby increasing enrollment rates, reducing absenteeism, and improving food security at the household level,”2 Liberia has one of the world's highest levels of out-of-school children, with an estimated 15 to 20 percent of 6-14 year-olds not enrolled in education, and of those enrolled, only 54 percent complete primary education.3 Through a timely provision of meals, school feeding activities can reduce short-term hunger and improve abilities to concentrate.4 The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Liberia will procure services to implement a sustainable School

Feeding Activity III (SFA III) that creates the opportunity to partner with the Government of Liberia (GOL), communities, the private sector, and smallholder farmers, to increase educational opportunities through improved school enrollment and attendance, and childhood nutrition.

Given the financial barriers to education faced by many Liberian families, SFA III will also implement a conditional cash transfer (CCT) program to serve as an additional incentive to low-income households to meet their children’s educational needs and to contribute toward ensuring an increase of school enrollment and attendance within target communities. Available evidence shows that CCTs can reduce the direct costs of education, including school fees, textbooks and/or uniforms, and offset indirect costs such as lost income if schooling replaces work for a child and his/her family.5 USAID will be looking for creative, innovative and affordable ways to make frequent direct payments to families of the benefiting students. Beneficiaries of the cash transfers will be the most marginalized and vulnerable students, especially girls, children and youth with disabilities, and children in remote hard-to-reach rural areas.

Studies show that well-nourished children are better able to participate and learn in school, and school feeding programs can alleviate short-term hunger and address micronutrient deficiencies when the meals are rich in energy, protein, and vitamins.6 SFA III builds on lessons learned from other USAID/Liberia education portfolio activities [i.e. School Feeding Program II, Read Liberia, and Accelerated Quality Education (AQE)], and the

Nutrients for cognitive development in school-aged children, National Library of Medicine (2004)

Scaling up School Feeding, World Bank (2013)

Basic Education in Liberia Report, UNICEF (2000)

UNICEF. Covid-19: Missing More than the Classroom The impact of school closures on children’s nutrition (2021)

Snilstveit, B., Stevenson, J., Menon, R., Phillips, D., Gallagher, E., Geleen, M., Jobse, H., Schmidt, T., Emmanuel Jimenez, E., International

Initiative for Impact Evaluation. “The impact of education programs on learning and school participation in low- and middle-income countries” 6 Snilstveit, B., et al.

current school feeding activity funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) McGovern-Dole

Program. USAID SFP II currently provides meals to over 11,451 pre-primary, primary, and secondary school students in 28 schools (2019-2021). Lessons learned from these activities indicate that hunger and poor nutrition are not the only barriers to basic education. Other key barriers to education include the cost of school fees, uniforms and supplies, and the lack of functional water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) facilities within schools which are critical for a safe learning and school feeding environment.

3.1 Gender Consideration. The USAID/Liberia 2018 gender assessment report indicates that “women continue to lag behind their male counterparts in educational attainment and number of years of school completed, particularly at the secondary level.” This clearly demonstrates that there is a need to help increase the number of female learners in the classroom and help increase the retention and completion rate for females.

SFA III will help both boys and girls to remain enrolled in schools, remain in schools, and complete schools.

3.2 Disability and Inclusive Education. The MOE’s current Education Sector Plan 2017-2021 (also known as

“Getting to Best”) acknowledges that few children and young people with disabilities attend school, and that those who are enrolled face significant challenges such as poor infrastructure, lack of toilets, distance from school, and teachers who lack the skills and knowledge to teach effectively. The country Education Sector Plan also acknowledged that the Education Management Information System (EMIS) severely undercounts the number of children with special needs in Liberian schools, and that teacher training institutions were offering little training for teachers on addressing inclusive education needs7. SFA III will be inclusive and ensure that both abled and disabled children and youth benefit from the feeding program and other associated activities.

Section 4. KEY LEVERAGE POINTS

Disability inclusive education:

USAID has expertise in disability inclusive education and has developed guidance and tools for putting it into practice. SFA III will promote disability inclusive education.

Section 5. ANTICIPATED OUTCOMES

Development Hypothesis

The following visual Development Hypothesis outlines the three anticipated outcomes, and how implementation of the two overarching technical interventions feed into these outcomes.

Op.cit. World Bank/GPE/MOE, 2016, pg. 76.

There are three anticipated outcomes under SFA III:

(1) Increased school enrollment rates at pre-primary, primary, schools in targeted community;

(2) Increased school attendance rates in pre-primary, and primary schools in targeted communities; and

(3) Decreased malnutrition among children and youth in targeted communities.

Section 6. MAJOR ASSUMPTIONS:

Given the COVID-19 pandemic, it is likely that schools will cycle through closures and reopenings for the foreseeable future. Such unpredictability only underscores the need for innovative flexible contingency planning and quality distance learning to maintain continuity of education.

Section 7. INTERVENTIONS

The School Feeding Activity III will implement interventions under two Technical Approaches:

1. Technical Approach 1: Home Grown School Feeding Approach

Besides addressing the nutritional, enrolment and attendance needs of benefitting children and youth, the SFA

III Activity will include a home grown school feeding (HGSF) component which will contribute towards

Liberia’s efforts to address food insecurity and malnutrition. SFA III will also support the domestic production of safe, diverse, and nutritious food. Studies show that well-nourished children are better able to participate and learn in school, and school feeding programs can alleviate short-term hunger and address micronutrient deficiencies when the meals are rich in energy, protein, and vitamins.8 The HGSF approach will enhance the opportunity to provide each student in attendance at target pre-primary and primary schools with a nutritious meal during the school day in a locally sustainable and affordable way. If schools are closed due to COVID-19 or other similar shocks, the activity will transition into a take-home ration alternative whereby students who participate in distance learning will be eligible to pick up a regular allowance of food to be prepared at home.

If necessary, any learning materials will be distributed alongside rations. To ensure a wide reach within target communities and long-term sustainability, community engagement will be a vital component of the SFA III

Activity, including the HGSF component. In this context, USAID is looking for innovative ways of engaging the communities, the private sector, and small scale farmers for best sustainable and scalable best practices.

It is also expected that the HGSF approach within the SFA III Activity will enhance domestic production of safe, diverse, and nutritious food to meet demand to provide regular meals to the children in school by working with local farmers to secure locally produced food for school means and/or take home rations. Illustrative interventions include helping small-scale farmers increase productivity, produce better-quality (diversified) crops, manage natural resources and mitigate risks in a sustainable way. Additional interventions include strategic planning with community members, local farmers, and school officials to ensure the sustainability of school feeding activities beyond SFA III’s period of performance (systems strengthening). This approach will ensure a sustainable supply of quality and safe food, and provide reliable markets for smallholder farmers to sell their produce Through the HGSF approach, the SFA III Activity will be expected to develop a sustainable school feeding model which ensures the continuation of the program beyond the Activity’s three years.

2. Technical Approach 2: Conditional Cash Transfers

To improve school enrollment and school attendance within target communities, key underlying barriers to education must be addressed, including financial limitations in the form of school fees, uniforms, and supplies.

Finance is one of the barriers to school enrollment and attendance. This is clearly indicated in a research that was focused on barriers to education https://educateachild.org/explore/barriers-to-education. The Liberia

8 Snilstveit, B., et al.

education Sector Analysis which was conducted in November 2016 also establishes that school fees and other associated costs with schooling are significant barriers to accessing education and retaining students in schools.

Additionally, this publication provides some evidence that school fees and it’s related cost create formidable barriers to children rights to enroll in schools and remain in schools:

https://www.hrw.org/reports/2005/education0905/4.htm. Research suggests that conditional cash transfers

(CCTs) can incentivize enrollment in school and improve regular attendance9. To maximize USAID's contribution to Liberia’s education sector, schools and communities currently benefiting from ongoing USAID support will be prioritized. This is to ensure that the targeted children and youth also benefit from the instructional interventions provided at each school, focused on measurably improving learning and other educational outcomes. Community engagement will once again play a key role in ensuring the CCT program’s effectiveness. Illustrative interventions include organizing parent information sessions on the importance of school enrollment, and the availability and conditionality of CCTs. A 2013 Liberian parent engagement study10 found that parents are willing to attend and participate in such meetings and that parenting interventions are feasible and can be delivered in resource-constrained, culturally diverse and post-conflict settings. Additionally, SFA III will seek synergies and avenues to collaborate with the private sector, the Civil Society, and Media activities to encourage communities to keep children and youth in school.

USAID is especially interested in respondents’ feedback regarding the following SFA III priorities, along with any suggestions of other ideas in support of the HGSF and CCT approaches, and improved WASH facilities for pre-primary, primary and secondary learners enrolled and those not enrolled in school:

● Increasing access to daily nutrition, including through the home grown school feeding approach

● Reducing financial barriers to education, such as through conditional cash transfers

● Increasing private sector, community and parent/PTA participation and support

● Increasing smallholder farmers’ participation and support

● Improving school WASH facilities

Section 8. CONTRACTING OFFICE ADDRESS

United States Embassy

502 Benson Street

United States Agency for International Development

Section 9. CAPABILITY STATEMENT

USAID requests all interested parties to include a capability statement with the response to this RFI.

9 Snilstveit, B., Stevenson, J., Menon, R., Phillips, D., Gallagher, E., Geleen, M., Jobse, H., Schmidt, T., Emmanuel Jimenez, E., International

Initiative for Impact Evaluation. “The impact of education programs on learning and school participation in low- and middle-income countries”

Parents Make the Difference: Findings from a randomized impact evaluation of a parenting program in rural Liberia, November 2014