Reporting, Monitoring and Evaluation Consultant At International Organization for Migration

Projects Context and Scope:

“Enhancing Border Management Capacity in the Lao People’s Democratic Republic through Technology Improvement”

Lao PDR has located in the Greater Mekong Sub (GMS)-region is particularly susceptible to both smuggling of migrants and human trafficking. It links and shares extensive and unevenly monitored 5,274 km land boundaries with its five neighbouring countries, namely, Myanmar, Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia and China, which makes smuggling and trafficking in Lao People’s Democratic Republic as a low risk and high return business as well as national, regional and global challenges, as the country can be seen as a convenient loophole in the GMS region for opportunistic criminal groups.

There are a total of 102 border checkpoints across Lao People’s Democratic Republic, comprised of international (including international airports, bridges and ports), local and traditional checkpoints, of which, some are particularly poorly attended and equipped. For local government, managing the land borders in Lao People’s Democratic Republic is extremely difficult due to their length, limited capacity and resources, and because of the local communities who share cultural, ethnic or economic relations with people in the neighbouring countries.

The Department of Immigration (DOI) is in the process of moving ahead towards a comprehensive Border Management Information System to manage cross-border movements of both nationals and foreigners.

The current paper-based Border Pass arrangements for border residents and capacity of the provincial border guards in Lao People’s Democratic Republic are the weakest link in country’s overall border security and border management infrastructure. When using passport, travellers are required to present individually for being taken their live photo and ensure biometrics comparison where this is possible. However, this is not possible when travellers use the Border Pass due to the lack of biometric verifiers in the document and the limitations of the system that doesn’t allow biometric verifications. This undermines Lao government’s ability to maintain the integrity of its’ international borders, especially the land borders and protect nationals and foreigners from transnational crimes such as trafficking in persons, as well as ensure due level of security in the border communities. The relatively ineffective border controls and the low integrity and security of the paper-based Border Pass expose the country and the communities to potential irregular migration and transnational criminal activity that involve not only local but possibly international groups from East or Southeast Asia, who is proven to take advantages of gaps of border controls and low-security travel documents.

“Mekong Region: Responding to Cross Border Mobility Challenges – Strengthening Border Management Capabilities to Systematically Detect and Disrupt Transnational Crimes, including Trafficking in Persons and Smuggling of Migrants Phase III”

As Lao People’s Democratic Republic moves from a landlocked to a land linked country through the rapid expansion of regional and domestic infrastructure, including the newly opened Vientiane-Boten railway, well-governed migration will become increasingly crucial to the country’s socioeconomic development. The effective, efficient, and safe passage of goods and people will be critical, including swift and simple border clearance procedures to minimize delays. Furthermore, well-managed migration has the potential to contribute to the realization of the National Socio-Economic Development Plan (2021-2025) outcomes.

The country currently has 102 points of entry (PoE) with 31 of those being international border checkpoints and four international airports, 19 land border checkpoints, and 52 traditional checkpoints and will potentially need to open more as transport infrastructure is developed. Despite the increasing complexity of managing its borders, the Lao People’s Democratic Republic lacks a comprehensive training curriculum for border officials, border control procedures are not standardized, and most PoE do not have an automated Border Management Information System (BMIS) making it difficult to monitor, record, share and act on information, including collecting statistics and develop analyses on border crossing which can inform policymaking, as well as use data for risk and trends analyses to support detection of illicit movements and inform the investigation. This poses challenges in managing increased cross-border migration flows.

A lack of knowledge makes migrants, whether internal or international, more at risk of exploitation and trafficking in person (TIP). This is compounded by the fact that many migrants are young, sometimes children, from rural and border areas. The migration processing in the Lao People’s Democratic Republic remains a paper-based system, particularly at land crossings. This reliance on paper-based processing makes managing migration flows across borders even more demanding in times of sudden critical events. In terms of identity protection, identification verification and mitigating the potential for increased people smuggling and anti-trafficking.

Organizational Department / Unit to which the Consultant is contributing:

Immigration and Border Governance (IBG) at IOM mission in Lao People’s Democratic Republic, for the projects:

• “Enhancing Border Management Capacity in the Lao People’s Democratic Republic through Technology Improvement”, supported by the Government of Japan.
• “Mekong Region: Responding to Cross Border Mobility Challenges – Strengthening Border Management Capabilities to Systematically Detect and Disrupt Transnational Crimes, including Trafficking in Persons and Smuggling of Migrants Phase III”, supported by the Government of Australia.

Category A Consultants: Tasks to be performed under this contract

The consultant will carry out the following duties:

1. Develop and fill in information in the monitoring tools (including update/draft monitoring and evaluation plans etc) for current IBG projects.
2. Consolidate and analyse data on project, results, achievements, and indicators in order to facilitate the preparation of two reports (one quarterly, one final report) and activity-specific reports as required. These include but are not limited to success stories, case studies, social media monitoring, presentation, etc.
3. Make efforts to enhance donor satisfaction by ensuring quality reporting on programmatic results to donor and government including fulfilling donor requirements and expectations related to reporting for the current projects;
4. Reporting analysis of the result matrix, updating information and documentation vis-a-visa results matrix
5. Coordinate with IBG Complete and submit reports through PRIMA;
6. Coordinate with the Government and other relevant stakeholders to arrange the relevant meetings, events, TDYs and prepare relevant NFFs, reports.
7. Research/analyse, interpret and also, monitor and review information and data from regular and wide variety of sources for internal and external reporting for both projects from the beginning to this point;
8. Perform other related duties to reporting as required and;
9. Undertake field trave as required
10. Identify and disseminate good practices, lessons and knowledge, as identified through programme implementation, monitoring and evaluation activities including focus group discussion, measuring impact through interviews, surveys etc;
11. Quality and timely development and review of systems for tracking/monitoring that will feed into the final report;

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