Senior Consultant - Baseline
Study

Scope of Work

Senior Consultant - Baseline Study

U.S. – Pakistan Agricultural Market Development Program (AMD)

Contractor Name	CNFA-AMD
Position	Senior Consultant - Baseline Study
Project	U.S. - Pakistan Partnership for Agricultural Market Development
Place of Performance	Lahore, Pakistan
Level of Effort	180 days
Period of Performance	On or about September 15th, 2016
Reports to	Director Monitoring & Evaluation

 

 About CNFA:

CNFA, a Washington D.C.-based, international development organization dedicated to stimulating economic growth around the world by nurturing entrepreneurship, private enterprise and market linkages in the agricultural development sector was found in 1985. Since its inception, CNFA has actively promoted public-private sector partnerships as a way to jumpstart economic growth. CNFA specializes in engaging private sector investment in training, new technology and marketing as a means to increase overall competitiveness, expand exports and generate higher incomes all along the value-chain for farmers, processors and distributors. CNFA has a successful track record of performance in Africa, Eastern Europe, the Middle East, the CIS, and South and Central Asia, and has managed more than $310 million in donor-funded agriculture development programs over the past decade.

Project Description:

The U.S.-Pakistan Partnership for Agricultural Market Development (AMD) activity in Pakistan is a USAID funded project implemented by CNFA with the goal of supporting the development of Pakistan’s commercial agriculture, particularly through ‘Increased Economic Performance of Focus Enterprises’ to meet both international and domestic demand and requirements in targeted product lines in the Livestock, High Value Off Season Vegetables (HVOSV), Citrus, and Mango sectors. The objective of the AMD project is to encourage investments in the four target product lines through matching grants and to empower stakeholders by developing synergies among them to accomplish together what they cannot do alone. AMD support upgrading, streamlining supply chains, optimizing profit margins, increasing participation of women entrepreneurs, and ultimately help make Pakistani meat, high value and off season vegetables, mangoes and citrus more profitable and more competitive.

Assignment Objectives

The AMD program seeks the services of a qualified short-term senior consultant (STTA) for a period of 3 months to assist the project to undertake a baseline and benchmarking studies leading to the AMD targeted value chains in Citrus, Mango, High Value/Off Seasons Vegetables and Livestock in selected areas of Punjab and Sindh;

• Baseline study relevant to AMD interventions in Citrus, Mango, High Value/Off Seasons Vegetables and Livestock Value Chain to set benchmarks in selected value chains.
• Generate primary data on key indicators to be maintained and updated in a database during the course of the project implementation and afterwards. 
• Statistical data on key performance indicators included but not limited to; the proportion of female engaged, volume of sales, value of the sale in domestic and in international market and the number of persons and households engaged in targeted value chain.

Assignment Scope

To effectively meet the objectives of the assignment, the consultant will be required to travel to other cities/areas related to AMD value chain interventions to capture baseline data. The STTA will be based out of the AMD office in Lahore.

 

AMD’s program areas by each targeted product line are:

• Livestock: Punjab and Sindh province.
• Mango: Punjab and Sindh province.
• Citrus: Sargodha and other districts of Punjab province.
• HV/OSV: Punjab and Sindh province

 

Methodology

The consultant will, within the framework of the targeted value chain, review the existing data and reports including published documents. Consultant will work in close collaboration of M&E team in designing, planning, implementing and reporting the baseline activity. The baseline methodology will include definitive quantitative targets, means of verification and resourceful follow up.

 

Consultant, in collaboration with the AMD team, will pre-test tools that could be used to undertake baseline study in the project targeted areas. PMP indicators related to Impact, outcome and output level will be clubbed into themes to bring the consistence and continuity in the flow of questions in the questionnaires. Keeping in view the diverse nature of the product line, questionnaires will be developed separately for mango, citrus, livestock and HV/OSV. Statistical data will be collected on key performance indicators included but not limited to; the proportion of female engaged, volume of sales, value of the sale in the domestic market and international market and the number of persons and households engaged in targeted value chain. Gender disaggregated data will be collected in Citrus, Mango, High Value/Off Seasons Vegetables and Livestock value.

 

M&E and AMD technical team will provide backstopping and coaching throughout the implementation of the baseline study. M&E team will be remained involved in facilitating & technically guiding. The consultant(s) will undertake validation, verification and monitoring of the field investigations. The collected data will be analyzed in the SPSS software and in Ms. Excel using pivot table and cross tabulation option.

 

STTA Assignment Deliverables

Generate baseline data on the key PMP indicators to be maintained and updated in a database during the course of the project implementation for documenting the outputs/outcomes/impact of the program intervention;

• Submission of final survey instruments including all questionnaires (in English and Urdu Language)
• Orientation of field enumerators on data collection tools
• Gantt chart with each activity timeline breakup
• Inception report - The collected data will be analyzed to produce a report that well-matches with the baseline objective of the AMD Project impact, outcome and output indicators
• Datasets with data captured from fieldwork
• Clean and fully labeled Database in Ms. Excel
• Cleaned and fully labeled data sets in SPSS
• Desegregated data through value chain wise, gender and district wise
• Consolidated data set against PMP Indicators  
• Debriefing session about key findings from the baseline study
• Interim report
• Final report - Must at the minimum include: a clear statement of the objective of the baseline study, assessment; a description of the program; a description of the methodology used for the qualitative and quantitative components; findings, data sets against PMP Indicators & interpretation of results and conclusions.
• Workshop and presentations to share findings with AMD team and partners.

 

Desired qualifications

The consultant should have:

• Advance degree in the field of Business Management, Economics, Finance or related field with more than 5 years of professional experience in conducting value chain and baseline studies with USAID funded projects with a focus on Agribusiness & agriculture sector;
• Experience of conducting baseline & research studies in agriculture and value chain analysis and financial analysis;
• Considerable experience in directly conducting and leading baselines, and research projects in developing countries, preferably in Pakistan.
• In-depth knowledge and hands-on experience in quantitative and qualitative data collection and analysis tools and methods.
• Excellent computer skills (Word Processing, excel spreadsheet and power point);
• Excellent skills of data interpretation through SPSS
• Excellent skills of data management and analysis
• Excellent report writing skills and proven track record of generating baseline, research and other reports for donors.
• Experience working in complex environments
• Strong interpersonal, verbal and written English communication skills.