Notification of Intent to Sole Source Additional Requirements

The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Mission to Zambia intends to make a sole source award to Education Development Center (EDC) for the purpose of expanding the geographical coverage/scope of the current contract number 72061119C00001(expand existing interventions to an additional five provinces: Copperbelt, Central, Luapula, Lusaka, and Northern). The statutory authority permitting this award without providing full and open competition is AIDAR 706.302-70(a)(2), Citation; 40 U.S.C. 113, Impairment of Foreign Aid Programs, which states: “full and open competition need not be obtained when it would impair or otherwise have an adverse effect on programs conducted for the purposes of foreign aid, relief, and rehabilitation.” This authority pursuant to AIDAR 706.302-70(b)(5) may be used for: “awards for the continued provision of highly specialized services when award to another resource would result in substantial additional costs to the Government or would result in unacceptable delays."

EDC was awarded contract number 2052719C00001 in January 2019 and has provided highly specialized services to GRZ under the existing contract, which is expected to end in January 2024. The current Total Estimated Cost (TEC) of the contract is $48,995,537. USAID/Zambia intends to increase the TEC by $5,145,654.57. The period of performance will remain unchanged. The contractor has expended a significant amount of time and effort to build and strengthen vital relationships with key GRZ stakeholders to achieve the objectives of this activity. As a result, the GRZ requested the USG expand implementation of the Let’s Read Activity/Project to five additional provinces making it a national wide to ensure consistency with national curriculum. The contract modification will allow USAID to respond to the Government of the Republic of Zambia’s (GRZ) and enable development assistance reach more underserved Zambian children and promote equity and equality in access to quality education.  Further, expanding geographic coverage will enable interventions to be fully ingrained in the MOGE system, thus strengthen host government systems. No solicitation package will be issued. This notice of intent is not a request for competitive proposals.

Please refer any questions or comments to the attention of Michael Capobianco Supervisory Contracting Officer at oaa-solicit-lusaka@usaid.gov.