TOR - Steering and Coordination Committees

USAID Public Financial Management (PFM)

Terms of Reference for Short-Term Technical Consultant

1. Background

Deloitte Consulting and WSP, together with Georgia State University and the Niti Foundation are implementing a five-year USAID funded Public Financial Management Program (USAID PFM) whose purpose is to provide technical assistance and strengthen Public Financial Management (PFM) functions, performance, and accountability of targeted agencies at the federal, provincial, and local levels of government, and to provide targeted assistance to the Government of Nepal (GON) aimed at strengthening national PFM institutions and systems to sustainably advance PFM.

The project commenced in October 2022 and will run for a five-year period to October 2027. The major stakeholders of the project are selected Federal Agencies including Ministry of Finance (MOF), Ministry of Federal Affairs and General Administration (MOFAGA), Financial Comptroller General’s Office (FCGO), PEFA Secretariat, National Natural Resources and Fiscal Commission (NNRFC), National Planning Commission (NPC), Office of the Prime Minister and Council of Minsters (OPMCM), Public Procurement Monitoring Office (PPMO), Provincial Governments of Madhesh and Lumbini Province, and Local Governments located in these two provinces.

The objectives of the Project are to provide technical assistance and strengthen PFM functions, performance, and transparency and accountability of targeted agencies at the federal, provincial, and local levels of government, and to provide targeted assistance to the GON aimed at strengthening national PFM institutions and systems to sustainably advance PFM. The Project’s two objectives and key activities are:

In general, the expected outcomes of the Project are to enhance transparency and accountability by accomplishing:

• Selected PFM related laws or policies or regulations or standards or norms or guidelines or tools or manuals developed.
• Selected local governments have increased their own resource revenue.
• Elected and Government officials trained on public financial management system.
• Selected PFM institutions, governments and agencies adopted improved public financial management system.
• Selected local governments have improved gender-responsive budgeting. 
• Coordination mechanisms for coordination are established.
• Standardized training modules in the PFM disciplines are developed.

2. Purpose

The purpose of this assignment is to engage a consultant to work with NPFMSC, PLGPFMCC, and ILGPFMCC and the USAID PFM Project to develop a well ordered and structured Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) including Terms of Reference (ToR) and Scope of Works (SoW) for the said Committees in order to strengthen those committees in functioning effectively with an aim to establishing better coordination and communication between the Provincial and Local Governments.

(Please note that the ToR is subject to change slightly per the Government Counterpart’s requirements which will be informed to the applicants prior to selection)

3. Rationale

As stated above, the USAID PFM Activity aims at strengthening PFM systems and functions of all three tiers of governments. In addition to selected federal entities, the Project supports provincial governments of Madhesh and Lumbini provinces and local governments situated in these two provinces. One of the key concerns of the Activity is establishing functional coordination and communication between all concerned government entities. In this regard, a National PFM Steering Committee has been established in the leadership of federal Ministry of Finance comprising number of representatives from pertinent federal and provincial entities to coordinate with all stakeholders/implementers, provincial and local coordination committees and other government entities, manage institutional arrangements and provide strategic oversight to the project activities in order for attaining the Project objectives. For the methodical and functional operation of this Steering Committee, a SOP should be there so that the Committee works as per its purposes and contributes to achieving the objectives of the Project. Besides the Steering Committees in the center, two PLGPFMCCs have been established in two provinces for better coordination and collaboration between provincial and local governments. Likewise, two ILGPFMCCs have also been established in these two provinces to strengthen coordination and collaboration between the LGs situated in the province. In this context, two different SOP are also required to enhance coordination, collaboration, and communication in terms of carrying out the Project activities in order to  achieve the Project objectives. These SOP will mainly describe roles and responsibilities of the committees, their chairpersons, members, and member-secretaries, meeting operational arrangements, how to propose and finalize agenda, procedures of recording and endorsement of meeting minutes among others. In view of this, development of the SOP of these committees is considered a perquisite task for the  implementation of the Project activities.

4. Methodology

The methodology to be undertaken for this assignment shall be as follows:

• Consultation meetings with concerned officials of OPMCM, federal Ministry of Finance, MoFAGA, OCMCM, provincial Ministry of Finance, Financial Comptroller General Office (FCGO), NPFMSC, PLGPFMCC, ILGPFMCC, and others.
• Collect relevant data, information, and views from concerned agencies through primary sources such as questionnaires, interview and secondary sources i.e. published documents through appropriate sources. The consultant should prepare the minutes of meeting / interview and include the photographs of consultation meetings.
• Triangulate the collected data, information, views, feedbacks with the consultation meetings and published materials collected from the concerned sources as well as validation workshops with concerned officials or representatives of provincial government, professional institutions, and development partners.

5. Tasks

This work assignment is to develop Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) for NPFMSC, PLGPFMCC, and ILGPFMCC. The assignment has the following scope of works and tasks that need to be carried out in order to achieve the said objective:

• Review the project documents specially the scope of the work of the project, coordination approach and mechanism;
• Review the legal framework related to coordination and collaboration between the governments including Constitution of Nepal, Inter-Governmental Fiscal Arrangement Act, Federal, Province, and Local Level (Coordination and Inter-relation) Act Local Government Operation Act among others;
• Consider the established coordination mechanisms and their rationale; 
• Conduct study on similar types of arrangements and practices regarding coordination mechanisms established for coordination and collaboration; 
• Conduct consultative meetings and discussions with the officials of concerned government entities, committees, and others;
• Describe the detail working and decision procedures to capture overall executions of the committees including roles and responsibilities of the committees, their chairpersons, members, and member-secretaries, meeting operational arrangements, agenda proposing and finalizing process, recording and endorsement process of meeting, additional and alternate committee's members, frequency of the meetings, tasks need to be carried by the committees required to contribute achieving the project's objectives among others;  
• Prepare a draft report for comments and suggestions from the concerned Government Counterpart and USAID PFM Project;
• Manage and conduct workshops in order to validate, qualify, and finalize the developed SOP; and 
• Develop and submit the concluding SOP for the committees in the form of Final Report incorporating the comments from the concerned Government Counterparts and USAID PFM Project and/or as stated in the deliverables.

6. Deliverables

• Submit the Inception Report with detailed work plan in English language within 5 days of the agreement.
• Submit the First Draft Report in Nepali within 40 days of the agreement.
• Conduct Validation workshops / meetings within 5 days of the submission of the First Draft Report, utilizing presentations and/or other methods to facilitate discussion. Nepali materials shall be used to facilitate clear discussions.
• Submit the Final Report in Nepali within 60 days of the agreement incorporating the comments / suggestions received from the workshops/meetings.
• Summary Consultant's Work Completion Report describing actions taken to fulfill the above deliverables and provide observations/recommendations for any additional next steps in the process of rolling out of the Guidelines/manuals in English.

All deliverables shall be submitted in editable Microsoft documents, in electronic format. The final report shall also be provided in at least two hard copies and PDF format.

7. Period of Performance: 

The duration of this assignment will be 60 days. The anticipated start date will be on or about the second week of June 2023, and the completion date will be August 15, 2023.

8. Technical Directions/Supervision:

• The Consultant will work under the direction and supervision of the Chairperson of National PFM Steering Committee, Provincial and Local Government PFM Coordination Committees, and Inter-Local Government PFM Coordination Committees and Objective 1 Lead (Lead PFM Expert). 
• The Project COP and DCOP will also monitor the Consultant’s work as and when required.
• The Consultant shall carry out her/his tasks in close collaboration and coordination with the officials of Steering and Coordination Committees and the Project team.

All deliverables required hereunder will be reviewed and approved by the above-said Committees.

9. Required Qualifications and Experience of the Consultant:

The Consultant should at a minimum have the following qualifications:

• Master’ Degree in Business Administration or Management or Economics or relevant subject;
• At least 15 years' experience in public finance sector;
• Good communication skills (oral and written) in Nepali and English languages;
• Good report writing skills;
• Proficiency in Microsoft Office software (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, etc.); and
• Ability to work in a multi-cultural environment and exhibit good inter-personal skills.

10. Facilities/Utilities and Logistics to be provided:

The Consultant shall be expected to spend time at the selected government entities, Project Office and from home.  As deemed necessary, the Project will provide working space, internet connection, printing and photocopy facilities as required to complete the assignment. The consultant must provide her/his own computer, including Microsoft Office software to produce compatible documents for review.

All the required field visits, consultative meetings and workshops shall be arranged in coordination with the concerned Government, whereas logistics and allowances shall be managed by the Project.

11. Contractual Amount and Payment Terms:

This will be a fixed price assignment awarded in Nepali Rupees. Payments shall be made in Nepali Rupees in the following manner.

• 25 percent payment upon submission and acceptance of the inception report, including a detailed work plan for the assignment; (Deliverable 1)
• 40 percent payment upon submission of first draft Guidelines/Manuals which is ready to be presented at validation workshop; (Deliverable 2), and
• 35 percent payment after completion of the validation workshop, submission and acceptance of final report (Guidelines/Manuals for Audit Irregularities Settlement for Local Governments) and the Consultants’ Work Completion Report (Deliverables 3, 4 and 5).

Travel costs, including the number of trips and length of trips should be estimated. Travel will be arranged and approved in advance by the Project, and actual costs will be reimbursed based on the Project’s standard practices and rates for hotel, per diem, and other billable costs (e.g. meeting costs).

Workshop costs shall be borne directly by the Project. Necessary arrangements for workshop costs (To Be Decided/Determined) if necessary, will be arranged by the project.

12. Application Instructions:

Only individual consultants will be considered for this opportunity. 

Interested and qualified individuals should email the following documents to recruitment@pfm-nepal.com with subject line “TOR-OBJ1-2023-08 Development of Standard Operating Procedures of Interagency Coordination Committee.”

(a) Cover letter

(b) Recent CV 

(c) Dates of availability 

(d) Contact information of three professional reference, and

(e) Daily rate.  A biodata form may be asked of the successful candidate in order to verify the daily rate.

(f) VAT registration certificate

Application deadline: May 31, 2023

Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted. The organization reserves the right to reject any/all applications without assigning any reason.