Tanzania WASH SOW-DRAFT.pdf

STATEMENT OF WORK

C.1 INTRODUCTION

Access to basic water and sanitation services and improved management of water resources is a foundational prerequisite to achieving and sustaining Tanzania’s long-term development goals, including enabling economic prosperity and social well-being. The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) activity entitled Tanzania Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene (WASH) Market Systems is a key part of the U.S. government’s water portfolio in Tanzania.

USAID/Tanzania has invested for many years in the water sector, and this activity will increase focus on partnering with the Government of Tanzania (GoT) and private sector to expand the provision and governance of WASH services and management of the water resources.

C.2 BACKGROUND

C.2.1 Tanzania Country Context Tanzania has experienced steady economic growth since transitioning to a market-oriented economy. Over the last five years, Tanzania’s annual GDP has stayed consistently above the Sub- Saharan Africa average, and continued growth is forecasted for the next five years. Achieving the country’s ambitious goals for economic growth will require improved water and sanitation services. However, Tanzania’s high rate of population growth and increasing rural-urban migration present significant challenges in providing adequate access to these basic services. Tanzania’s Development Vision 2025 (TDV 2025), adopted in 2000, provides the long-term vision for the country’s economic and social development. Underpinned by the goal of becoming a middle-income country by 2025, the TDV 2025 outlined three principal objectives:

1. Achieving high quality livelihoods for all Tanzanians.

2. Strengthening good governance and the rule of law.

3. Building a strong and competitive economy.

Water is recognized as a cross-cutting enabler in this vision. The Water Sector Development Program (WSDP), Tanzania’s overall water sector guiding strategy, is aligned with the TDV 2025.

The objective of the WSDP is to achieve universal access to water and sanitation by 2025. The first phase of the WSDP (WSDP-1) was implemented from 2006 to 2015, with a total investment of US $1.4 billion. In 2016, the GoT launched the second phase of the program (WSDP-2) with an ambitious target of achieving 80 percent access to improved water supply and 75 percent access to improved sanitation in rural areas by 2019. However, Tanzania did not meet these goals, with the WHO/UNICEF Joint Monitoring Programme reporting 57% access to basic drinking water services and 30% access to basic or safely managed sanitation services.

The National Water Policy of 2002 guides the realization of the objectives of the water supply and sanitation sector. Two acts, the Water Resources Management Act of 2009 and the newly enacted Water and Sanitation Act of 2019, legislate the policy and strategy for the water and sanitation sector. The new Water and Sanitation Act introduced significant structural reforms that present an opportunity to accelerate the realization of WASH targets. The establishment of a new rural water services regulatory agency, the Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Agency (RUWASA), aims to centralize and improve accountability for rural service delivery.

The National Sanitation Campaign - a component of the WSDP, under the Ministry of Health, Community Development, Gender, Elderly, and Children - guides the improvement of sanitation and public health conditions in Tanzania. The GoT has undertaken steps to apply a combination of Community-Led Total Sanitation, social marketing for sanitation products like sato toilet pans and pit emptying in urban areas, social behavior change communication, and training masons to build improved latrines and provide schools and health facilities with adequate WASH facilities.

C.2.2 Relationship to USG Strategies

Journey to Self-Reliance In the WASH sector, self-reliance is the ability of the government, civil society, and private sector to plan, finance, and implement sustainable solutions to ensure water resources management and to deliver water and sanitation services to all. Fostering self-reliance requires an unwavering focus on sector governance and finance. The GoT has shown commitment in the sector through its water and sanitation sector policies and strategies; however, additional work is needed to improve cross-sectorial coordination and implementation and mobilize the human and financial resources to implement those strategies and plans. This activity will focus on addressing the underlying causes of poor water service functionality by working with RUWASA and urban utilities to improve overall operations, maintenance, and management of water services. It will apply a market-based approach to support water and sanitation service providers to operate on commercial principles. It will also work to build the capacity of local actors for improved stewardship of water resources.

This emphasis on improving sector governance, facilitating access to finance, and strengthening capacity is designed to achieve self-reliance.

U.S. Government Global Water Strategy (GWS) and USAID’s Water and Development Plan These strategies, as required by the Water for the World Act of 2014, guide the Agency’s WASH programming. The goal of USAID’s Plan is to “increase the availability and sustainable management of safe water and sanitation for the underserved and most vulnerable, in alignment with U.S. national security and foreign policy objectives.” Tanzania was designated as a priority country under the GWS in 2019 due to the high needs for WASH services and high opportunity for impact in the sector. This activity will support the achievement of all development results of the Water and Development Plan.

C.2.3 Challenges and Opportunities Over the past decade, access to safe water sources in Tanzania has improved, albeit slowly. Non-functionality of existing water points remains the most critical challenge for water services in Tanzania, with over 30 percent of rural water schemes non-functional and another 10 percent in need of significant rehabilitation. Many of these water points fail within only a few years, largely due to an absence of a clear strategy for ensuring professionalized management and maintenance of existing water points. Tanzania also remains off-track on reaching its goals for access to sanitation. While open defecation rates are low in Tanzania (11% as of 2019), most latrines in rural areas are of low quality and do not meet the standard for basic access (improved facilities that are not shared between households)1.

Tanzania’s water resources are abundant but are unevenly distributed across the country, rapidly declining, and in need of better management. While Tanzania currently has a much higher per capita renewable water resources endowment compared to neighboring countries, projections indicate that this may not continue due to the growing economy, increasing urbanization, and high population growth. Growing threats to water resources availability and quality are compounded by several additional factors including: catchment mismanagement and unsustainable agricultural practices, pollution of water sources from the mining sector, increasing sedimentation of lakes, and climate change impacts. All of these growing water resource challenges present risks to the country’s economic growth trajectory.

The GoT estimates that it will require about US $1.2 billion annually to realize the sector target of achieving universal access to water in the year 2030. However, water sector spending in Tanzania falls far short of this, amounting only to an estimated 2.4 percent of total government spending, or about 0.3 percent of GDP, which represents a decline of allocation to the water sector budget as a share of the total budget over the past 10 years. Furthermore, WASH sector budget allocation in Tanzania is highly biased in favor of water supply investment over investments in sanitation and management of water resources.

Despite these challenges, there are opportunities to accelerate progress towards water and sanitation goals in Tanzania:

● Sector reforms: The establishment of a new rural water supply and sanitation agency (RUWASA) offers an opportunity to shape the future of rural WASH services and their sustainability in Tanzania. The Ministry of Water formed a new Sewerage and Sanitation unit under the Directorate of Water Supply to focus on the challenge of sanitation, 1 Improved sanitation facilities are those designed to hygienically separate excreta from human contact, and include:

flush/pour flush to piped sewer system, septic tanks or pit latrines; ventilated improved pit latrines, composting toilets or pit latrines with slabs presenting an opportunity to better coordinate, increase financing, and accelerate progress in this area.

● Private sector engagement: The GoT created enabling legislation, policies, and action plans for private sector participation in the water sector. Local government authorities are showing a growing interest in partnering with the private sector to extend sanitation services to off-grid areas. There is a growing interest among domestic private sector players to venture into new roles in the provision of water services, such as through public private partnerships for maintenance services. And banks are becoming increasingly interested in commercial finance for water utilities.

● Youth: There is a significant opportunity to engage youth by supporting them to establish organizations or private companies that can be delegated by RUWASA as water and sanitation service providers. Youth are also key agents of social change on sanitation and hygiene behaviour, including changing behaviour and advocacy roles that may lead to improved practices in WASH services access and use.

C.3 SCOPE OF WORK

C.3.1 Purpose and Theory of Change The purpose of this activity is to expand and sustain the provision and governance of WASH services. The theory of change of this activity is:

IF the capacity of government institutions and private sector are improved at all levels;

AND planning and resource allocation for WASH service delivery is improved;

AND IF the youth and other WASH services users are fully engaged THEN the provision and governance of WASH services will be sustained, leading to improvements in human health, livelihood, opportunities for youth, and environmental sustainability.

C.3.2 Geographic coverage The contractor must work at the national and regional levels to support policy, planning, capacity, and system building and coordination, while specifically focusing on ten districts. The Contractor must work across all sub-objectives in both rural areas and towns within all of the focus districts, but it is expected that there will be varying levels of effort based on need, the type of interventions appropriate to each district, and on-going investments from the GoT and development partners.

The contractor must work in five (05) districts where USAID/Tanzania previously invested heavily in the WASH sector. These districts are Kilombero, Kilosa, Iringa, Kilolo, and Mufindi, where interventions must primarily focus on strengthening systems to sustain outcomes for the following USAID standard indicators:

● 8.1-1: Number of people gaining access to basic drinking water services as a result of USG assistance:

Under this indicator, the contractor must provide technical and administrative assistance to RUWASA, community based water supply organizations and private sector to reduce and/or avoid scheme down in order to sustain water supply service for the following number of people that gained access as a result of previous USAID interventions as follows:

Kilosa District: At least 85,000 people Kilombero District: At least 115,000 people Iringa District: At least 73,000 people Kilolo District: at least 48,500 people Mufindi District: at least 18,500 people

● 8.2-1: Number of communities verified as open defecation free (ODF) as result of USG assistance.

Under this indicator, the contractor must provide technical and administrative assistance to RUWASA, District council, community based water supply organizations and private sector to maintain and/or advance the ODF status achieve as a result of previous USAID interventions for the following number of communities:

Kilosa District: 05 communities Kilombero District: 05 communities Iringa District: 05 communities Kilolo District: 05 communities

● 8.2-2 Number of people gaining access to basic sanitation services as a result of USG assistance

Under this indicator, the contractor must provide technical and administrative assistance to RUWASA, District council, community based water supply organizations and private sector to maintain and/or advance the access to basic sanitation status achieve as a result of previous USAID interventions for the following number of beneficiaries:

Kilosa District: at least 116,000 people Kilombero District: at least 173,500 people Iringa District: at least 176,500 people Kilolo District: at least 153,200 people

Also, the contractor must implement the activity in five new districts of Kalambo, Nkasi, and Sumbawanga in Rukwa region and Ludewa and Makete in Njombe region, where there is greater need for initial infrastructure investments. The contractor must work in collaboration with the GoT and USAID on planning the WASH investment in each mentioned district.

For the purpose of this statement of work, where the term small town is used it is defined as is written below:

Small towns refer to a district headquarter or a town within a district with no sewerage network, a population of not less than 10,000 and not exceeding 100,000 people, and a water supply utility classified in class B or lower by GOT. Other requirements include availability of social services such as hospitals, secondary schools, police offices, and at least 50 licenced retail shops. Lastly, the town council must be able to cover 50% of its budget from its own sources without depending from the central government.

C.3.3 Sub-Objectives and Expected Results

The four results areas in this activity are integrated. It is expected that there will be interrelated activities and that results in each area will contribute to results in other areas.

Sub-Objective 1: Increase access to sustainable water services managed by the Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Agency and urban water utilities.

The structural reforms instituted by the new Water and Sanitation Act, especially the creation of the new RUWASA, provides an opportunity for USAID to support improvements in the government’s capacity to plan, finance and oversee water services. Under this Act, there are opportunities to move away from a volunteer community management model for rural water to a system that allows the private sector to provide operations and maintenance services. Lastly, the act allows for clustering of community water schemes under one management umbrella to increase efficiency through economies of scale.

Tasks

● The Contractor must assess the status of implementation of the National Water Policy, identify gaps in implementation, and provide technical and administrative assistance to the Ministry of Water to finalize, disseminate and operationalize the National Water Policy.

● The Contractor must provide support to national level coordination platforms, including providing logistical support for meetings of the Development Partners Group, data analysis and hosting the DPG secretariat to facilitate coordination among WASH development partners and the Government of Tanzania

● The Contractor must provide both technical and financial support to the Ministry of Water and RUWASA on national scale data collection and implementation of a monitoring information system to track national level WASH services and enable better decision making and targeting of resources.

● The Contractor must assess and provide technical and administrative assistance to the Tanzania Water and Sanitation Network to improve their ability to advocate for equitable allocation of resources and the accountability of the government for delivering water and sanitation services, including promoting the voice of youth in these advocacy efforts.

● The Contractor must provide technical support to RUWASA to build their capacity in financial management, infrastructure planning, engineering, and management of private sector contracts.

● The Contractor must work in partnership with RUWASA in the target regions and districts to develop and test new operations and maintenance models that progressively professionalize management of services, utilize the private sector, and create economies of scale in rural water service delivery.

● The Contractor must provide technical, administrative, and/or material assistance to selected small town urban water utilities to improve financial viability and the provision of water services.

● The Contractor must implement targeted water infrastructure construction activities, based on a commercial approach that identifies areas for infrastructure investment designed to best address key needs and enable water service providers to become financially viable and attract future funds from other sources .

Expected results:

● 10% increase in the number of people in target districts with new or improved access to water services

● RUWASA has increased institutional capacity to plan, monitor, and manage rural water services

● Reduced water scheme downtime in supported districts

● New operations and maintenance structures for rural water services institutionalized within all target districts

● Improved cost recovery of water service providers in targeted areas

● Increased performance of all supported urban utilities (the equivalent progress of moving from the Urban Water and Sanitation Authorities Category Class C to Class B or Class B to Class A)

● Improved monitoring of water services at district, regional and national level

● Strengthened evidence-based dialogue based on up to date WASH data and analysis between GoT and Tanzanian WASH civil societies

Sub-Objective 2: Increase access to finance for water, sanitation, and hygiene.

Expanding access to sustainable services will require new sources of finance, including increased public expenditures, greater cost recovery from users, increased efficiency in service provision, better targeting of subsidies, and better mobilization of financing. As these utilities become more financially viable, the Contractor must work to support them to access funding from the National Water Fund and/or other financial institutions.

Tasks

● The Contractor must provide technical and administrative support to RUWASA and the small town utilities targeted under Sub-Objective 1 to secure both public and private funding for WASH services.

● The Contractor must provide technical assistance and capacity building support to small and medium enterprises, including those owned by women and youth, to improve their ability to access finance from financial institutions for their household sanitation and hygiene products business, fecal sludge management services, water scheme maintenance services, or other SMEs providing WASH goods and services.

● The Contractor must support the development of financial products and services designed to meet the needs and opportunities for entrepreneurs, including women and youth, to provide water and sanitation related services.

● The Contractor must provide technical assistance to the Ministry of Water and Basin Water Boards to improve financial management and sustainably increase revenue generation.

● The Contractor must support TAWASANET to produce the annual water sector equity report.

● The Contractor must support TAWASANET to advocate to the GOT for equitable allocation of WASH resources and to increase the percentage of funds allocated for basins daily operations and improved catchment/water resources protection.

Expected results:

● At least 10 utilities accessing finance from the National Water Fund, and/or financial institutions, to expand services.

● At least 15 small and medium enterprises accessing finance from financial institutions, including banks, microfinance institutions, and/or other sources, of which at least 8 must be women or youth-led enterprises.

● 30% Increase in the financial resources allocated for Basin Water Boards to implement expanded stewardship of water resources.

Sub-Objective 3: Strengthen the market for sanitation and hygiene products and services.

Under this sub-objective, the Contractor must work to expand access to higher quality sanitation products and services to address the critical need to move beyond unimproved sanitation facilities in the target districts, through a market facilitation approach where the Contractor does not act directly to sell products.

Market-based solutions are critical for improving the quality of sanitation and hygiene products and services, beyond what is generally achieved through Community Led Total Sanitation activities, where a “Do-It-Yourself” model to toilet construction and tippy taps are promoted. In addition to the need for expanded household sanitation, many cities and small towns in Tanzania lack safe fecal sludge management services. Engagement with private sector actors is critical to stimulate innovation and investment to meet demand, while considering affordability, sustainability, and local market conditions.

Tasks

● The Contractor must perform a market research analysis to provide market-based solutions to sanitation service provision.

● The Contractor must assess different market segments, including the role of women and youth as consumers of sanitation and hygiene products and services.

● The Contractor must partner with private sector entities to develop and pilot solutions for enabling the poorest to adopt sanitation and hygiene products and services.

● The Contractor must design behaviour change and marketing interventions to reach consumers' preferences that go beyond health benefits to trigger change.

● The Contractor must provide technical assistance on business development, marketing and management to sanitation and hygiene market actors, including product manufacturers, salespeople and installers.

● In small towns within the target districts, the Contractor must provide both technical and financial support to RUWASA and/or water utilities to establish and expand access to pit emptying services and small-scale, decentralized waste treatment facilities.

Expected results:

● 50% increase in the population using improved sanitation facilities in the household

● High quality sanitation products and services are available in all target districts

● At least 25 supported sanitation enterprises increase revenue and profitability

● Ten Small towns in target districts have decentralized waste treatment and pit emptying services available

● Greater participation of women and youth as professionals in the sanitation market

Sub-Objective 4: Strengthen basin water boards and water user associations to enhance stewardship of water resources.

Increasing water stress and declining water quality threaten the sustainability of the water resource base necessary to provide universal access to safe drinking water services. The Contractor must work with the Ministry of Water to strengthen the basin water boards (BWBs) and water user associations (WUAs) responsible for the overall stewardship of water resources in targeted districts. The Contractor must work with these institutions to help prevent or reverse catchment degradation and the overexploitation or pollution of critical surface and groundwater resources.

These interventions will help ensure that changing climate conditions (including increasing frequency and magnitude of floods and droughts) do not negatively affect water quality or quantity.

Tasks

● The Contractor must provide technical assistance to the BWBs to improve their institutional capacity and operational efficiency, including the ability to collect revenue, use data to inform decisions, engage with water users in participatory processes, and support the needs of water service providers.

● The Contractor must complement capacity building efforts with targeted investments designed to protect and restore catchments that serve as important sources for drinking water systems, including but not limited to small town or urban systems targeted for intervention under Sub-objective 1. These interventions must aim to enhance water supply or quality.

● The Contractor must raise awareness of the effects of high population growth and health and environment issues within the BWBs, including pollution and other economic activities that threaten Tanzania’s water resource base.

Expected results:

● Improved capacity of BWBs to manage water resources, including under changing climate conditions

● BWBs and WUAs have increased revenue from water user fees

● BWB and WUAs have increased budgets for operating costs and the implementation of management plans

● Number of people benefiting from the adoption and implementation of measures to improve water resources management, including under changing climate conditions increased by 30%

● Improved reliability and quality of bulk water supply to supported small towns

C.3.4 Guiding Principles

1. Youth Engagement The average Tanzanian is 17.5 years old, and 44 percent of the population is under the age of 15.

These demographic trends represent a potential source of energy, innovation, and promise for the future of the WASH sector. Engaging with youth within all result areas is an important part of this activity. There are opportunities to increase youth engagement in three main areas:

● Youth as the next generation of water professionals: Local universities or technical institutions provide an opportunity to create a pipeline of youth who can gain formal employment in the WASH sector. The contractor must work with the engineers registration board of Tanzania to provide internships for 70 graduate engineers aged between 18 to 28 years of age, with high priority being given to graduate female engineers and technicians

● Young entrepreneurs and laborers: Youth may be less likely to have business skills and capital, and may need added support to engage in opportunities in the private sector.

● Youth as advocates and decision makers: Youth can be an important voice for policy and decision making at all levels.

● Youth as beneficiaries of the WASH services: Community water and sanitation interventions play an important role in the health, safety and education of young people, so specific benefits to youth should be a consideration.

2. Gender Empowerment

Gender parity has increased across sectors, from income-earning opportunities, access to key resources and, to some extent, decision-making power. Still, efforts to fully understand and address gender issues remain insufficient across sectors. Efforts to improve data and learning are essential to create the public demand and support for more inclusive leadership of political, business, and civil society entities. Increased gender parity is essential to generate market-driven practices that mobilize the full potential of the economically under-engaged. Use of water and sanitation services differ between males and females. Gender is a fundamental dimension of this new activity, particularly regarding the inclusion of women’s voices in decision-making processes. Beyond considering women as beneficiaries of WASH services, it is important to proactively engage women as leaders and decision makers in the WASH sector by:

● Advocating for policy change that breaks down structural barriers preventing women from accessing WASH services.

● Seeking to build skills around positive communication and shared decision-making among genders within couples and families, in all activities.

● Seeking to transform harmful gender relations and norms, through constructive engagement with boys and men as partners and agents of change for gender equality.

Ensuring boys’ and young men’s access to mentors who endorse equitable gender norms and model healthy behavior.

● Increase support for women’s participation in water-related decision-making from key community leaders as well as LGAs.

3. Self-Reliance

As self-reliance is a key part of the updated USAID Policy (https://www.usaid.gov/sites/default/files/documents/1870/WEB_PF_Full_Report_FINAL_10Ap r2019.pdf), the Contractor must be guided by a strategic approach that emphasizes catalyzing GoT and civil society commitment and capacity to maximize their ability to plan, finance, and implement its own development solutions. As such, the Contractor must ensure that self-reliance is a key component of their technical approach and implementation of the activity is in line with the GoT water sector development program and RUWASA’s and urban water utilities’ long and short- term plans.

C.4 GRANTS UNDER CONTRACT

This activity includes a small grants under contract (GUC) program that may be used to implement activities under all result areas. The Contractor must use the GUC mechanism to engage local WASH civil society organizations, including NGOs and small WASH enterprises.

These grants may be used for a variety of purposes, including, but not limited to, grants and/or revolving loan to youth and/or women led private WASH enterprises, support to civil society organizations that build demand and advocate for products and services and increased GoT funding to WASH and water resources management, and support to community groups to implement water resource management and catchment protection activities.

Grants must be accompanied by capacity building support for the local organizations in areas such as technical skills, financial management, reporting, and planning. The Contractor must seek to ensure that grants enable private enterprises to operate on commercial principles, build creditworthiness and leverage other funds. Grants to the GoT, including parastatal entities, will be in-kind only. The annual implementation activities of the GUCs program will be described in the Annual Work Plan.

C.5 COORDINATION

Partnerships and synergies with other relevant USAID and donor activities in the target districts will be critical. The Contractor must coordinate activities with other implementing partners and development partners working in the target geographies across various sectors. The Contractor must participate in coordination platforms, participate in joint work planning exercises, joint quarterly reviews, joint field visits, and share monitoring data with other relevant partners. The contractor must coordinate with other USAID funded activities in the ten (10) districts to identify possible areas of collaboration in the areas of nutrition, family planning, HIV/AIDS, education, horticulture, and efforts towards eliminating tropical neglected diseases, as appropriate. The contractor must include the identified areas of collaboration in the annual work plan.

https://www.usaid.gov/sites/default/files/documents/1870/WEB_PF_Full_Report_FINAL_10Apr2019.pdf https://www.usaid.gov/sites/default/files/documents/1870/WEB_PF_Full_Report_FINAL_10Apr2019.pdf

Many development partners, including the World Bank, UNICEF, and DFID, intend to support the new RUWASA over the next few years. The Contractor, in consultation with the COR, must coordinate their support to complement that being implemented by other USAID activities and other development partners and fill critical gaps.

C.6 MONITORING, EVALUATION, AND LEARNING

C.6.1 Required Standard and Custom Indicators

The Contractor must track progress against the following standard indicators.

● HL.8.1-1: Number of people gaining access to basic drinking water service as a result of

USG assistance

● HL.8.1-3: Number of people receiving improved service quality from an existing basic or safely managed drinking water service as a result of USG assistance

● HL.8.2-2: Number of people gaining access to basic sanitation as a result of USG assistance

● HL.8.2-3:Number of people gaining access to safely managed sanitation services as a result of USG assistance.

● HL.8.3-3: Number of water and sanitation sector institutions strengthened to manage water resources or improve water supply and sanitation services as a result of USG assistance

● HL.8.4-1: Value of new funding mobilized to the water and sanitation sectors as a result of USG assistance

● HL.8.5-1: Number of people benefiting from the adoption and implementation of measures to improve water resources management as a result of USG assistance

● EG.11-2 Number of institutions with improved capacity to assess or address climate change risks supported by USG assistance

This list is not exhaustive; final indicator selection will depend on the monitoring, evaluation, and learning (MEL) plan. The Contractor must also report on other USAID F indicators where applicable. Targets for each indicator will be determined upon completion of the baseline and work plan by the contractor.

All person-level indicators must be disaggregated by sex and age.

Custom indicators must also be used to track results along the theory of change and to capture results beyond those that can be tracked using standard indicators.

C.6.2 Collaborating, Learning, and Adapting (CLA) The Contractor must undertake iterative learning and adaptation, including the use of real-time information and analysis to continuously assess progress and adjust interventions or approaches as necessary. Given the breadth of the needs to be addressed under this activity and the new approaches being tested, the contractor must regularly assess which approaches are effective in a given region or district. Through networking and collaboration, the Contractor must work to build sustained knowledge capture and sharing, across sites, partners, GoT, other donor-funded activities, and with USAID staff.

USAID will work in collaboration with the Contractor to review the available evidence, assess selected approaches to achieve the activity and project purpose, analyze assumptions, and adjust planning and implementation of the activity. USAID and the Contractor will function as an integrated, operational team with shared program vision and equal commitment to the success of the program. The CLA strategy is envisioned to help facilitate this collaborative process between USAID and the implementing partner and relevant stakeholders.

As part of adapting to changing context, the Contractor may be directed by the CO to respond quickly to within-scope tasks, following a natural or manmade disaster. The contractor will be expected to adjust its work plan (both tasks and allocation of funding) to accommodate these changes on short notice from the CO (e.g., within 10 days) in response to urgent needs that arise in the sector. Changes will be in technical areas covered by the contract and that contribute to the higher level objective.

C.7 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.

This mandate is codified in Federal Regulations (22 CFR 216) and in USAID’s Automated Directives System (ADS) Parts 201.5.10g and 204 (http://www.usaid.gov/policy/ads/200/), which, 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. Offeror environmental compliance obligations under these regulations and procedures are specified in the following paragraphs

In addition, the eventual Contractor 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 will govern.

No activity may be implemented unless an environmental threshold determination, as defined by 22 CFR 216, has been reached for that activity, as documented in a Request for Categorical Exclusion (RCE), Initial Environmental Examination (IEE), or Environmental Assessment (EA) duly signed by the Bureau Environmental Officer (BEO). (Hereinafter, such documents are described as “approved Regulation 216 environmental documentation.”)

An Initial Environmental Examination (IEE), has been approved which encompasses USAID’s Tanzania Water Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) Market Systems Activity. USAID has determined that a Categorical Exclusion applies for the project’s activities involving technical assistance and training, analyses, studies, academic workshops, seminars, and meetings that do not entail laboratory work, field studies or involve actions that directly affect the natural or physical environment. A Negative Determination with Conditions is applied for the project’s activities which may entail small-scale water and sanitation construction activities.

The Contractor is responsible for implementing all IEE conditions and climate change screening requirements pertaining to activities to be funded under this Contract. As part of its initial Work Plan, and all Annual Work Plans thereafter, the Contractor, in collaboration with the USAID Contracting Officer’s Representative and Mission Environmental Officer or Bureau Environmental Officer, as appropriate, must review all ongoing and planned activities under this contract to determine if they are within the scope of the approved Regulation 216 environmental documentation.

If the Contractor plans any new activities outside the scope of the approved Regulation 216 environmental documentation, the Contractor must prepare an amendment to the documentation for USAID review and approval. The Contractor must not undertake any new activities prior to receiving written USAID approval of environmental documentation amendments.

Any ongoing activities found to be outside the scope of the approved Regulation 216 environmental documentation must be halted until an amendment to the documentation is submitted and written approval is received from USAID.

The Contractor must prepare an environmental mitigation and monitoring plan (EMMP) or a project mitigation and monitoring (M&M) plan, describing how the Contractor will, in specific terms, implement all IEE conditions that apply to proposed project activities within the scope of the award. The EMMP or M&M Plan must include monitoring the implementation of the conditions and their effectiveness. The Contractor must integrate the EMMP or M&M Plan into the initial work plan and subsequent Annual Work Plans, with any necessary adjustments to activity implementation in order to minimize adverse impacts to the environment.

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