Call for consultancy Mid-term evaluation of the project to set up the conflict sensitivity center (CSH) in the Democratic Republic of Congo At International Alert

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Experience 5-10

We are looking for an external consultant or consulting firm who meets the following criteria:

Good command of the conflict sensitivity approach
Proven experience in conducting evaluations in peacebuilding projects and/or learning studies, including quantitative and qualitative methodologies.
High capacity in analyzing the strategy proposed by a project and appreciating the possibility for this strategy to achieve the relevant results
Good command of the humanitarian, development and peacebuilding sectors in the DRC (HDP actors)
Fluency in French and English

Ideally, he or she will also be:

Experienced and well-informed on the context of conflicts in the East of the DRC
Fluent in Kiswahili
Masters the project intervention area: North Kivu, South Kivu, Ituri and Tanganyika

The overall objective of this project is to contribute to improving aid delivery and effectiveness in the DRC through increasingly conflict- and gender-sensitive HDP programming. It pursues two main specific objectives as follows.

Specific Objective 1: Provide continued, conflict- and gender-sensitive access to resources, capacity building, technical assistance and learning for humanitarian, development and peacebuilding (HDP) actors.

Specific objective 2: Increase the credibility, capacities and sustainability of the CSH.

The DRC Conflict Sensitivity Expertise Center (CSH) is structured around four main areas:

Research and analysis . The CSH conducts research and analysis on conflicts and contexts, and makes recommendations to help its partners better guide their interventions. It also assists them in developing their research and analysis skills.
Technical capacity building . CSH supports its partners in creating and sharing tools to monitor contexts and the impact of interventions, in order to ensure that conflict sensitivity is taken into account at both the programmatic and institutional levels.
Technical support . The CSH offers three types of training: conflict analysis, conflict-sensitive and gender-sensitive programming and management. Thematic training is also offered for specific areas (humanitarian aid, education, cash transfers, etc.).
Learning . The CSH facilitates and encourages peer learning, sharing of experiences and lessons learned between local organisations, national and international NGOs and donors, within a community of practice.

In order to establish the level of achievements since the beginning of the second phase of the project, International Alert intends to conduct, in accordance with the terms of the contracts and/or contribution agreements signed with the various donors, a mid-term evaluation.

This evaluation is part of the perspective of capturing the changes achieved and the practices adopted by HDP actors and other stakeholders. It is also part of highlighting the areas in which the project has had the greatest impact, exploring why and how this impact has been achieved so far. The evaluation will also clearly indicate other areas of the project that need to be strengthened or from which good practices can be extracted.

This evaluation will therefore be carried out externally by an independent consultant or consultancy firm, who will work under the leadership of the CSH team and the International Alert monitoring, evaluation, accountability and learning team.

Objectives of the assessment

The objective of this evaluation is to determine quantitatively and qualitatively the current situation of the project after just over two years of implementation, to understand how the CSH has supported HDP actors in making their interventions more conflict-sensitive. The evaluation will also measure the performance of key project indicators, by comparing current data to baseline data. The key project indicators that will be the subject of quantitative data collection as part of this evaluation include, among others:

Number of HDP actors who have improved their support delivery through the integration of conflict sensitivity
Number of HDP actors technically assisted on the integration of conflict sensitivity in their organization who have implemented the conflict sensitivity action plan in their organization
Number of HDP actors trained on conflict and gender sensitivity who have implemented the training acquired to be conflict and gender sensitive
Conflict Sensitivity Center Sustainability Indicators and Potential

In addition, it will assess the quality of the work already accomplished and the different approaches and methodologies used, in order to formulate recommendations to improve the implementation of the project during its last two years.

Finally, the mid-term evaluation will explore and propose possible scenarios for the privatization of CSH services, in relation to the sustainability of the center and local ownership.

The following topics will be covered:

Accountability : The evaluation will analyze and report on the performance and results achieved at the current stage of the project.

Participation : The evaluation will seek to analyze how HDP actors, sectoral coordinations and other project stakeholders are involved in the implementation of the project; and how this involvement facilitates the achievement or not of results.

Learning : The evaluation will determine why certain outcomes have or have not occurred, in order to draw lessons, best practices and indications for learning. It will provide conclusions that are based on solid evidence that can inform operational decision-making. Observations will be actively disseminated and lessons will be incorporated into appropriate lesson-sharing systems as the project continues.

Sustainability : The evaluation will measure the progress made by the CSH so far in sustainability including its capacity to engage stakeholders in the CSH in a strategic partnership. It will also explore different scenarios in which the hub could become financially autonomous, among other things through privatization of services.

Scope

Period : This mid-term evaluation covers the period from March 1, 2023 to September 30, 2024

Geographic coverage : the evaluation will be carried out in all areas of project implementation, namely the provinces of North and South Kivu, Ituri and Tanganyika in the DRC.

Direct beneficiaries of the project: The direct beneficiaries for this project are humanitarian, development and peace (HDP) actors working in the eastern Congo. A list of 250 national and international NGOs and United Nations agencies was developed at the beginning of the project and constitutes the cohort of direct beneficiaries for this project.

In addition, the project also targets various coordinations and working groups bringing together HDP actors in the Eastern zone as direct beneficiaries.

Indirect beneficiaries: The indirect beneficiaries of this project are made up of communities affected by conflicts who are in the intervention areas targeted by the HDP actors who are direct beneficiaries of the project, as well as HDP actors who are not in the cohort of direct beneficiaries.

Evaluation results

Main results

The following results are expected from this evaluation:

Progress made two years after the start of the project is examined both quantitatively and qualitatively.
Performance of the project’s key indicators is measured: current data on the four key project indicators (mentioned above) will have to be collected on the cohort of direct beneficiaries, analyzed and interpreted by the consultant or the firm in order to provide precise information allowing Alert to achieve the overall targets of the project.
The participation of HDP actors, sectoral coordinations and other stakeholders involved in the implementation of the project is analyzed in order to understand how this involvement facilitates or not the integration of conflict sensitivity within HDP actors. It will be, among other things, to assess the capacities of the supported organizations to i) replicate training (training of trainers) internally and ii) be able to anticipate and iii) be able to manage the indices of latent conflicts.
The analysis of the sustainability of the CSH is carried out including the possibilities of privatization of the CSH services
The relevance of the strategies, approaches and constraints to be overcome by the CSH is determined;
The major challenges, strengths and weaknesses of the project are reviewed and a risk analysis is conducted;
The consistency of the links between the products and the corresponding results, between the progress in achieving the expected results compared to the baseline situation is determined;
Lessons learned and recommendations for improving project implementation are identified and documented: this evaluation will focus much more on learning.

In addition to the above results, this evaluation must also answer the questions initiated for each evaluation criterion chosen and included in the point below.

Evaluation methodology

The detailed methodology will be proposed by the firm/consultant, and validated by International Alert and the project steering committee. It will have to use qualitative and quantitative methods in order to cross-reference and triangulate the information. It will also have to take into account the way in which the collection of quantitative data on the results indicators will be carried out.

This study will include the following steps:

Preparation: The main project documentation will be provided to the firm/consultant and will include the project proposal, the logical framework, the various project reports, etc. A half-day kick-off workshop will be organized to enable the consultant to effectively understand what Alert expects from this evaluation. Then, the consultant will prepare a methodology note, a work plan and the data collection tools, which will be reviewed and approved by the Alert team.
Field work: collect data from project stakeholders.
Analysis of results: The consultant will carry out the analysis of the data in order to answer the different questions of the study. Once he has information from these analyses, he will formulate relevant recommendations to guide the implementation.
A first draft of the report fully meeting these terms of reference.
A final report taking into account Alert’s observations and comments.

Deliverables

The consultant must produce, at a minimum , the following deliverables:

Planning of the assessment work
Report of the kick-off workshop
The inception report , including the methodological note including the data collection and analysis tools (questionnaire, etc.), necessary for approval by d’Alert
The draft of the evaluation report
Final report with all annexes integrating Alert inputs, databases and various survey forms duly completed during data collection and processing). It will be produced in French and English.

The submission date for each deliverable listed above will be agreed in advance and will be the subject of a detailed evaluation schedule.

All deliverables must be submitted to Alert in draft form before being finalized and approved by Alert. Alert will own all deliverables and study data, which may be used for internal and external reporting and communications.

The main body of the report, in Word format, should be between 20 and 30 pages (excluding annexes/attachments) and should include, at a minimum, the following elements:

Table of Contents
Summary note
Introduction
List of acronyms
Background (project description)
Objectives and criteria of the evaluation
Methodology and limitations
Main results and analysis, clearly answering the key questions of the ToR
Conclusions and recommendations, focusing on results-based project implementation.
Annexes: terms of reference of the evaluation, timetable, tools used (guides concerning the questions), list of documents consulted, list of key informants contacted, the sustainability index sheet of the SC center, databases, etc.

Evaluation results and teaching dissemination plan

After approval of the final evaluation report, a capitalization workshop of this study will be organized with the project team and the management of the Alert RDC program. The consultant will lead this workshop. He will prepare in advance a Power Point presentation to lead the session.