Background
The Pakistan Agriculture Development project, funded by USDA’s Food for Progress program, aims to increase production and reduce post-harvest losses for date, tomato, chili, and banana smallholder farmers in Sindh and Punjab provinces. By encouraging collectives, connecting growers to markets, and introducing cold chains and other new technologies, this project improves the lives of individual farmers while boosting the agricultural economy.
Effective with the release of this consultant announcement, Winrock International will be recruiting qualified consultants to provide a post-harvest market analysis for horticulture in Punjab and Sindh provinces in Pakistan. The responsibilities, level of effort, duties and qualifications for this assignment are described below.
PAD will be focused on contributing to the following two United States Department of Agriculture’s Food for Progress Strategic Objectives:
- Increased agricultural productivity by building the capacity of producers in improved productivity and profitability; training producers in improved production techniques; post-harvest handling, marketing, sanitary and phytosanitary practices; and providing grants and loans for equipment and agriculture inputs.
- Expanded trade of agricultural products by developing both domestic and export market linkages; facilitating trade relationships, researching export opportunities; promoting a coordinated and strategic approach to building market share by associations and promoting food safety issues and requirements.
Purpose and Objectives of Assignment:
Sustainable food systems development is a key goal of PAD’s work. With increasing demand for a range of foods, value-adding activities are essential to prolong shelf life and provide nutritious food products. Our work focuses on improving the participation of smallholders in existing agriculture value chains through increased storage and preservation of food, value addition, food processing, packaging and marketing for increased incomes, job creation and employment generation.
This consultancy will support in the execution of the project’s interventions and related activities, including but not limited to value chain analyses and documentation of information on production, post-harvest and marketing of banana, dates, chilis, and tomatoes; capacity building of the value chain partners and coordination with the relevant projects, programs and organizations.
Other key objectives include:
- Provide insight on the commodity market potential, forecast, and growth in the 4 target value chains.
- Accurately measure market size to understand potential growth opportunities.
- We require that different channels of market size be assessed. For example, the total market for tomatoes might be 50,000 MT/year but we also need numbers for tomatoes sold informally at local markets versus to middlemen and onwards to large urban markets versus the formal sourcing model of supermarkets
- We are interested in what is most replicable and scalable. Focus should be on channels where 70-80% of the product is moving
- Evaluation of current business models in the commodity value chain.
- Specify the terms of trade: Typically, what is the volume of the average transaction? Type of transaction (i.e. spot or previously negotiated), terms of payment (i.e. immediate with the exchange of goods)
- Identify industry best practices to stimulate innovation and growth sponsored by the project.
- Map the food supply chains and identify steps in the chains where food losses are likely to be high or have the highest impact.
- Identify indicators to assess or measure the volume, value and impact of food losses and waste on the (local) economy, on the environment, and on local communities.
- Assess the role of gender in post-harvest along the chosen food supply chains, in terms of transactions and operations performed.
Anticipated Tasks and Activities:
- Make logistical arrangements and the required contacts (with stakeholders, chain actors, authorities, government agencies) to undertake the assessment.
- Visit the value chain activities and actors to make observations and have consultations and participatory field surveys and data collections.
- Determine the technical aspects of the various supply chain operations, assess the level of quantitative and qualitative post-harvest optimization along the chains, the frequency of losses and identify their causes.
- Under the direction of the PAD Communications and Media Officer, collect video footage, photos and record interviews with respondents, demonstrating the scale and scope of FL&W across the food supply chains.
- It is expected that each of the project’s value chains specialists will be consulted and heavily involved in assisting with the assignment. The consultancy should be used as an opportunity for program staff to build their capacity.
Skills and qualifications:
- Sound knowledge and understanding of the horticulture sector of Pakistan, and domestic and international marketing systems.
- Knowledge of commodity markets.
- Ability to develop market knowledge.
- Ability to communicate complex situations, and interpret graphs and charts
- Strong oral and written communication skills required
- Detail-oriented
- Strong working knowledge in statistical analysis
Work environment:
- Work is accomplished mostly in office setting. Travel is required to visit with producers, vendors, private sector entities and other value chain actors and could be remote.
Education and training:
- MSc or MBA in Agriculture, Economics, Mathematics or related degree is required.
- Minimum of 4 years of relevant experience in the following:
- Market research or analysis
- Agricultural risk management
- Agricultural market decision making
Estimated Level of Effort: up to 6 weeks
Estimated Dates of Performance: September – October 2018
Reporting Relationship: Program Officer and Chief of Party
Deliverables:
- Develop a work plan of activities to be approved by the COP and Program Officer within 1 week of starting the assignment
- Submit a screening, survey and sampling protocol and methodology, together with a schedule to collect data and information, for approval by PAD
- Complete a report encompassing findings from the assignment
- Provide concrete recommendations for the project on suitable entry points for our investment in the value chains (i.e. investment opportunities) with a timeline of duration to accomplish the recommendations, i.e. short-term recommendations (3-6 months); medium term (6-12 months); long term (12+ months).
- Provide a synopsis of the report in PowerPoint format for project use as needed
- Weekly progress updates to Program Officer and COP
APPLICATIONS:
Interested applicants should submit their cover letter and resume to [email protected]. Winrock International is an equal opportunity and affirmative action employer.