Terms of Reference (TOR) for Consulting Service for facilitating Local Agriculture Development Plan and Strategy of selected Palikas

Terms of Reference (TOR) for Consulting Service for facilitating 

Local Agriculture Development Plan and Strategy of selected Palikas

1.     Background

Heifer International has been working in Nepal in 1957 with the gift of high-yielding improved livestock and equipment upon request from the Government of Nepal. In September 1997, Heifer International signed the first General Agreement with the Social Welfare Council and continually implementing different projects and programs aimed for ending hunger and poverty. Heifer is currently working in 50 districts in close coordination and partnership Governments, Non-government organizations, academia, private sectors, value chain actors, academia at National and sub-national level. Heifer applies the market system development approach in livestock, dairy, vegetable, and local poultry to facilitate market linkages, achieve lasting changes, and increase economic opportunities for smallholder farmers. Heifer’s pro-active engagement with governments bodies help to promote sustainable agriculture practices, livestock development and improve the livelihoods of smallholder farmers. As of now, Heifer in Nepal has benefited over 400,000 families on agricultural and livestock value chains, organized in more than 15,000 self-help groups and 293 Social Entrepreneur Women Cooperatives (SEWC). 

With promulgation of the constitution of Nepal in 2015, Nepal entered new federal governance structure in 2017 having three tiers of governments namely local, provincial and federal. The federalism is aimed to share the power and authority among three governments and contribute to economic growth and prosperity of the country. The constitution of Nepal 2015 and the Local Government Operation Act 2017 has clearly outlined the exclusive rights and responsibility of local governments (also known as Palikas) for local agriculture production, extension and marketing through making needful acts, policies and procedures. Accordingly, the Palikas are providing agriculture extension and support services but their access, coverage, effectiveness does not match to the needs of the farmers and the allied local value chain actors. Majority of farmers still fell back from benefiting themselves through these services and Palikas are not able to fulfill need of farmers due to lack of well functional system in agriculture sectors.

Heifer International Nepal through its affiliate, locally separate entity Heifer Project Nepal has been providing technical support to Palika on planning and implementing the agriculture and livestock sector development initiatives through its different projects namely Value Chains for Inclusive Transformation of Agriculture (VITA), Nepal Government Partnership (NGP) and Innovation in Agriculture and Livestock Value Chain Project (IALVC) projects. The VITA project is being implemented in 19 districts under the three provinces (Bagmati-8, Madhesh-8, and Lumbin-12) for the period of six year (2021-2027). This project funded by IFAD and led by Agriculture Development Bank of Nepal (ADBN) where Heifer has been implementing the Inclusive Supply Chain Development component aiming for improved livelihood, climate resilience and nutrition of poor and vulnerable people of 120,000 through strengthening farm enterprises of poor and vulnerable rural poor into more resilient to climate change, increasingly profitable and sustainable, strengthen their market linkages and use appropriate financial services. This project will primarily focus on the meat goat, dairy, vegetable, banana, fish, cereal seeds, and potato seed value chains and back yard poultry, citrus fruit, bee farming, and medicinal plants as secondary value chains. Heifer has established partnership with selected Palikas for technical assistance to extend extension services to the needy farm families for increased production, productivity and market linkage of selected value chains as most profitable in local context. This project also intends to strengthen the farmers’ cooperative to provision business development services (access to finance, input supply, market, insurance, technical service, etc.) to its members and to enhance their capacities to aggregate their agri-products, link with appropriate market/buyer and ensure a fair price. 

Though, must of the Palika have put agriculture sector as top priority, but their efforts and activities are not consistent to achieve their vision. This might be lack of sectoral plan and sufficient competent human resources and expertise for formulating sectoral strategy and related policies in agriculture. In this context, with the request from Palikas, Heifer has planned to provide technical support through mobilizing experts to selected Palikas in formulating local agriculture development plan and strategy of 7 Palikas namely, Thakurbaba Municipality (Bardiya), Barabardiya Municipality (Bardiya) Gadawa Rural Municipality (Dang), Rajpur Rural Municipality (Dang), Dangisaran Rural Municipality (Dang), Shantinagar Rural Municipality (Dang), Malarani Rural Municipality (Arghakanchi) under VITA project. So, this TOR is prepared to hire a competent consulting firm to develop Local Agriculture Development Plan and Strategy (LADPS) of selected Palikas in Heifer’s working area. 

2.     Objectives

The overall objective of this assignment is to provide technical assistance to Palikas in developing and endorsing five-year local agriculture development plan and strategy (LADPS)   

• Develop Agriculture Livestock Strategic Planning at Palika level.
• Set mission, vision, goal, objectives and activities with estimated budget of agriculture and livestock at the Palika level.
• Collect data/information regarding agriculture and livestock current practices, challenges, opportunity, and scope including production and productivity.
• Conduct consultative workshop and validation workshop on the Agriculture Strategic Planning process.

3.     Scope of Work

The specific scope of work includes:

1. Consultation with Heifer to finalize the detailed methodologies, process and framework of the LADPS to ensure the full ownership of the Palikas. 
2. Facilitate the inception workshop organized at Palika under leadership of Mayor/Chair to build consensus about the strategy formulation process, roles of each concerned stakeholders and develop concrete action plan, 
3. Develop required checklists and questionnaire for FGD and Key Informant Interview (KII)
4. Facilitate half-day orientation session for mobilizers, facilitators, project staffs as well as technical staffs of agriculture and livestock sections of Palikas in collecting required information, 
5. Facilitate consultative visioning workshop at Palika level to set vision, mission and goal of the Palika to drive the agriculture sector development. The main participants shall be elected representative of the Palika, concerned administrative and technical departmental staffs, representatives of lead farmers, cooperatives and value chain actors, and other relevant stakeholders at Palika level.
6. Collect/compile required primary and secondary information about agriculture and livestock value chains, analyze and use in strategy documentation 
7. Assist in drafting strategy document with clear vision, mission, goal with expected outcome, outputs and major activities with required financial, human and institutional resources, 
8. Share draft strategy with Palika and concerned stakeholders including Heifer for inputs, and feedback for improvement, if any. Revisit the draft LADPS   incorporating inputs and suggestions  
9. Facilitate a half day validation workshop on produced draft LADPS at Palika level for wider inputs and ownership,
   1. Support to finalize the draft and facilitate the endorsement process by Palikas, 
10. Prepare a brief report including key process adapted for LADPS formulation and submit to Heifer within the stipulated time frame. 

4.     Methodology

The consultant(s) shall follow the extensive consultation with Palika and allied stakeholders in formulating the LADPS. The Palika leadership (Mayor/Chair, Deputy Mayor/ Vice Chair), ward chairs, Members of plan formulation committee, Chief Administrative Officer, sectoral staff, sectoral committee coordinators and members should be on board and well acquainted throughout the process. Furthermore, the consultant(s) should facilitate Palikas to reflect the voice and inspirations of farmers, agro-entrepreneurs, public/private agricultural service providers, cooperatives and other relevant institutions. Such wider consultation has been expected to create wider ownership of the strategy where each concerned stakeholder can contribute for its effective implementation and achieve the planned results. 

As outlined in scope of this assignment, the consultant(s) shall follow following, not limited to, steps and actions. 

• Consultation meetings with Heifer, project partner and respective Palikas,  
• Review of existing literature, materials and reports of Agriculture-Livestock Value Chains.
• Develop questionnaire and checklists for collection required data (primary and secondary) through FGD, KII and observations. 
• Conduct KII with Palikas elected representatives and their concerned officials.
• Conduct very FGD in the ward level.
• Prepare framework of LADPS at Palika level.
• Organize consultative workshop at different stages and purpose for LADPS formulation.
• Conduct half day validation workshop on produced draft plan.
• Prepare and submit draft and final copies of LADPs incorporating inputs from Palika and Heifer. 
• Discuss with Heifer staff, project partner staff and project stakeholders including Palika.

5.     Outputs/Deliverables

The consultant(s) shall submit the following outputs and deliverables.

• An inception report outlining detailed methodology, LADPS framework, tools, checklists and 
• Draft copy of Local Agriculture Development Plan and Strategy (Electronic and Hard copies)
• Final copy of Local Agriculture Development Plan and Strategy (Electronic and Hard copies)
• Milestone reports
• Assignment completion report. 

6.     Required professional competences and qualification of the consultants and firm

The firm or the technical support team should have composition of agriculture economist, agriculture expert, livestock expert and GESI expert with respective roles and technical inputs to the Palika’s. However, the lead consultant should have following competencies:

• At least master’s degree in agricultural economics, agricultural sciences, livestock sciences or master’s degree economics, development studies, rural development or related fields with basic degree (B.Sc.) in agricultural sciences and 15 years of relevant experience,
• Sound knowledge on federalization of the agriculture sector in Nepal including existing institutions and policies related to agriculture at three tiers of the government, 
• Extensive working experiences with Palikas in agricultural sector planning, formulating sectoral policies, developing institutional mechanism, capacity development of sectoral staff and agricultural service delivery under federal system,
• Have experience in different approaches of agricultural service delivery, agricultural value chain development and knowledge and experience on pluralistic agricultural service provisions,
• Have excellent analytical, facilitation and writing skill in Nepali language,
• The consultant must have training and workshop facilitation skills and adequate knowledge on strategic planning and plans development. 
• The consultant(s) should be PAN/VAT registered. If the quote budget exceeds NPR 500,000, application should be submitted from VAT registered firms having tax clearance of recent year. 

7.     Timeline

The duration of the assignment is spread over three months from October 2024 to December 2024. The final report of this assignment shall be submitted no later than 28 February 2025. Considering the time limitation, Heifer may select more than one team, or the consulting firm may propose more than one team to accomplish the task. Key activities to be accomplished and estimated person/days has been given as below:

8.    Institutional arrangements and reporting

The consultant(s) shall work closely with Heifer’s regional team and project partners however shall report to the Heifer’s designated personnel (point person) for day-to-day activities and every deadline via email on the progress of the work, any challenges being encountered, or risks foreseen, proposed, or taken mitigation measures, and where project support may be required. The firm/consultant will hand over all primary data and the report provided to project at the end of the service.

9.     Budget and payment schedule

The consultant should propose all costs covering consultants’ fees including food and accommodation and transportation expenses during field work, and other recurrent expenses occur during the assignment. Project will organize inception/visioning workshop and validation workshop on its own expense. All applicable taxes will be deducted at source. It will be the Firm’s/consultant’s responsibility to ensure consultant’ insurance coverage during the assignment period. Upon submission of inception report and approved work plan, 30% of the agreed budget will be paid and remaining will be paid based as per milestone outlined below and acceptance by the project.

Required Documents for Submission: 

• Cover Letter
• Brief profile of the firm
• Updated CV (relevant competency and experience) of the proposed team
• Technical proposal with timeline.
• Financial proposal
• Company/Firm registration certificate
• VAT certificate
• Tax clearance certificate (FY 079/80)

Please submit the application along with above mentioned documents to Procurement-NP@heifer.org by 8 October, 2024, 5 : 00 PM. Please mention email subject line “Application for facilitating Local Agriculture Development Plan and Strategy of selected Palikas”

Heifer Project Nepal

Lalitpur Metropolitan City, Ward No:15, Hattiban, Lalitpur

Ph.no.: 977-1-5913554, 5913120

Email: Procurement-NP@heifer.org