Evaluation of Agroforestry for Livelihood Empowerment (ALIVE) Programme (Readvertised) At Vi Agroforestry

Introduction

The Agroforestry for Livelihood Empowerment (ALIVE) Programme (2018-2022) was developed on the background of Vi Agroforestry Strategy (2017-2021). The vision and the overarching goal of the strategy and the programme was a sustainable environment that enables women and men living in poverty to improve their lives. The programme objective was to create societal changes enabling economic empowerment of small-holder farmer families through market-led, sustainable agriculture based on agroforestry.

The programme supported 42 grassroots farmer organisations and local NGOs in Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania, and Uganda through a mutually beneficial partnership approach to strengthen their capacities to engage duty bearers as well as support their members in accessing essential services. The programme was implemented through working long-term with local partners focusing on fighting poverty and climate change.

The framework/method/theory of the Human Rights Based Approach (HRBA) is fundamental for ALIVE. The programme has been working towards a constructive engagement of duty bearers by rights holders and their governing structures. This programme has a prioritised focus on women, children and youth while at the same time ensuring that a gender lens is applied in all interventions to ensuring inclusion of women and youth in decision making, leaderships roles and value chain development.

Sustainable agriculture, adaptation and mitigation of climate change, i.e., climate-smart agriculture, are some of the focus areas of the programme. Agroforestry and climate-smart agriculture as approaches have been used to realise food security and poverty reduction while enhancing agro-ecosystems’ sustainable functioning.

The programme is funded by the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida) with approximately two million US dollar per year through We Effect. This is approximately 20% of the total budget of Vi Agroforestry. This term of reference is prepared specifically for the evaluation of ALIVE programme which includes the ALIVE Partnership and which is covered by Vi Agroforestry’s Strategy.

Vi-skogen (Vi Agroforestry) is a Swedish non-profit foundation established in 1986. We work with local partner organisations in East Africa, mainly in Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda to empower smallholder farmers and their organisations to improving their living conditions.

Vi Agroforestry has 38 years of experience in promoting agroforestry, sustainable agriculture, human rights-based approaches, gender equality and empowerment of women, men, youth and children. Vi Agroforestry works in partnership with farmer organisations, government agencies and other civil society organisations to promote sustainable food production, safe environment and applies a human rights-based approaches in all its work, thereby addressing the root causes of poverty.

Objective of the evaluation

This is a performance evaluation aiming to evaluate and assess results, outcomes and achievements of the ALIVE programme on the background of Vi Agroforestry’s Strategy 2017-2021. The outcome and lessons learned from the evaluation is expected to enrich the process of strategy development and future programmes’ design and planning. The evaluation must provide a clear and evidenced assessment of achieved, expected or unexpected outcomes and how this have been guided by the strategy of the organisation.

The objectives of this evaluation are to:

1. Evaluate the performance of the ALIVE programme, guided by Vi Agroforestry’s strategy 2017-2021.
2. Evaluate and assess to which degree the desired outcomes of the ALIVE programme have been achieved, and what unanticipated but important outcomes it has brought.
3. Evaluate the extent to which the ALIVE programme has contributed to the realisation of Vi Agroforestry’s strategy 2017-2021 and formulate recommendations as an input to the upcoming strategic discussions concerning the preparations of a new phase of the programme.
4. Evaluate the relevance of Vi Agroforestry’s and its partners approaches, policy engagement and capacity development.

Criteria and questions of the evaluation

The evaluation should be conducted according to the widely used and agreed-upon OECD/DAC Criteria, with focus on relevance, effectiveness, efficiency, sustainability and participation in relation to its overall objectives and expected results as defined in the ALIVE programme document.

Methodology of the Evaluation

1. We request a detailed methodology with a clear elaboration on the method to be used in the tender submitted to conduct this evaluation. It is expected that the evaluator describes and justifies an appropriate evaluation approach/methodology and methods for data collection in the tender. The evaluation design, methodology and methods for data collection and analysis are expected to be fully developed and presented in the inception report.
2. Due to the Covid-19 pandemic and with full respect to health guidelines and restrictions in countries of the evaluation, interviews with target groups, partner organisation and staff should be held through a combination of physical field visits and online. Online interviews should be conducted using suitable platforms, preferably Microsoft Teams.
3. a. The partner organisations that implement ALIVE programme are distributed in Kenya – 8, Rwanda – 8, Uganda -15 and Tanzania – 15. Each partner organisation handle between 1000 to 6000 beneficiaries. The partner organisations in each country are more or less similar and therefore sampling can be used to select a representative sample
4. The interviewees shall include our country managers and their deputies, regional advisors, representatives from partners, M & E advisors in the programme countries, financial Advisor and staff, staff at head office, and management of Vi Agroforestry.
5. Review and analysis of programme documents (application & reports), strategies and polices.
6. An inception report will be prepared by the evaluation team based on – and in line with – this term of reference. It will be reviewed and agreed upon by Vi Agroforestry.
7. The inception report must include a work plan for the review, detailing methodological aspects and timeframe for conducting the interviews and the workshop. It’s the responsibility of the evaluation team to book meetings for the interviews through direct communication with the interviewees. A list will be provided by Vi Agroforestry.
8. Before writing the final report, the consultant will organize a workshop with the interviewees to gain feedback and validation of the conclusions and recommendations. This feedback will serve to validate the information, the analysis and the feasibility/utility of the recommendations made. Validation workshop will be done online and Vi Agroforestry will handle the workshop logistics. The workshop is expected to provide inputs to the ongoing strategic discussions and to the final report of the evaluation.
9. The final report shall be written in English and be professionally proofread. The final report should have a clear structure. The executive summary should be maximum 3 pages. The evaluation approach/methodology and methods for data collection used shall be clearly described and explained in detail, and a clear distinction between the two shall be made. All limitations to the methodology and methods shall be made explicit, and the consequences of these limitations discussed. Findings shall flow logically from the data, showing a clear line of evidence to support the conclusions. Conclusions should be substantiated by findings and analyses. Evaluation findings, conclusions and recommendations should reflect a gender analysis and an analysis of identified and relevant cross-cutting issues. Recommendations and lessons learned should flow logically from conclusions. Recommendations should be specific, directed to relevant stakeholders and categorized as short-term, medium-term and long-term. The report should be no more than a maximum of 35 pages, excluding annexes (including Terms of Reference and Inception Report). The evaluator shall adhere to the Sida OECD/DAC Glossary of Key Terms in Evaluation.

Expected products/deliverables

1. Work plan, in which proposed methodologies, tools and timeline are incorporated, which has to be validated by Vi Agroforestry.
2. Presentation of the results in a workshop.
3. Final evaluation report, submitted within a maximum of six weeks from the date of signing the contract.

Profile of the Reviewer/team

1. The evaluation team should have a minimum of five years in conducting evaluations of programmes and knowledge of issues related to sustainable land use management, climate change and gender equality.
2. Documented experience of reviews, assessments, results-based management (RBM), monitoring and evaluations.
3. The evaluation team is expected to have excellent knowledge of the East Africa context and have good knowledge about international development cooperation, farmers’ organisations, and central thematic issues and conditions for Sida-funded programmes.
4. The evaluation team should have sufficient experience and knowledge about organisational development, results-based management, HRBA, gender equality, climate change, advocacy and policy dialogue.
5. The team should have experience of leading performance evaluations and formulation of useful recommendations. The evaluation team needs to have excellent communication skills in English.
6. Curriculum vitae (CV) of the evaluation team should be provided. The CV should include details on engagements carried out by the member of the consultancy team, including ongoing assignments indicating responsibilities assumed, qualifications and experience in undertaking similar assessments or studies. If you will be working with consultants in in our countries of operations, you are required to include their CVs too.

Terms of validity of the consultancy and method of payment

The consultancy is expected to have a maximum duration of 25 working days and shall start immediately after signing the contract. The assignment is to be carried out during 19th July – 6th September 2021. Three payments will be made. 25% when signing the contract, 25% after submission of the first draft report and 50% after submission of the final report.

Ownership and confidentiality

Vi Agroforestry is the sole owner of the results of the evaluation and all other information produced as a result of the assignment. The result of the evaluation can be used after previous authorization from Vi Agroforestry.