TERMS OF REFERENCE

DEVELOPMENT OF A MONITORING AND EVALUATION FRAMEWORK

FOR THE HEMPEL PROJECT IN MBAM DJEREM NATIONAL PARK

IN CAMEROON

Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) is seeking offers from a qualified Consultant or Consulting Firm to develop a monitoring and evaluation (M&E) framework for the project “The securing of biodiversity, ecosystem services and ecological processes of the Mbam & Djérem National Park (MDNP) through strengthened protected area management and enhanced social well-being of its peripheral communities”.

1.    Wildlife Conservation Society Overview:

WCS is a US-based non-governmental organization founded in 1895 that protects wildlife and wilderness by understanding critical issues, creating science-based solutions, and promoting conservation actions that benefit nature and the humanity. With more than a century of experience, long-term commitments in dozens of landscapes, presence in more than 60 countries and experience in helping to establish more than 150 protected areas worldwide, WCS has accumulated biological knowledge, cultural understanding, and partnerships to ensure that vibrant places, with flora and fauna, thrive together with local communities. Working with local communities and organizations, this knowledge is applied to address issues of management of species, habitats and critical ecosystems to improve the quality of life of rural poor people, whose livelihoods depend on the direct use of natural resources.            

WCS has been working in Cameroon since 1988 and today supports the Ministry of Wildlife and Forests in the management of three large and high biodiversity protected area landscapes across the country, including MDNP.

   2.   Context and justification:

Created in 2000, MDNP covers about 4,200 sq km of the transition zone between the dense humid forest of the south and the drier savannas of the north. Since 2003, WCS has been working alongside the Government of Cameroon through the Ministry of Forestry and Wildlife (MINFOF) providing technical and financial assistance for Park management and wildlife protection. We have been successful in establishing the Park, building the capacity of park personnel, developing basic protected area infrastructure, implementing law enforcement operations, raising awareness and conservation cooperation with local stakeholders, and promoting environmentally sound income generating activities.

Despite significant achievements, the area is currently facing increasing and expanding threats both to its wildlife and the physical park integrity. Habitats are under pressure from logging (both legal and illegal), unsustainable agricultural practices, and unregulated pastoralism including both local, national, and international transhumant pastoralists, uncontrolled burning of forests and savannahs for agriculture or grazing purposes. Moreover, major infrastructure development in the landscape is expanding and increasing pressures.

In 2021, WCS has benefited of significant financial support from Hempel Foundation to consolidate and expand MDNP management activities over a period of 5 years commencing June 2022.

The project’s objective is to secure the biodiversity and ecological integrity of the Mbam & Djérem landscape, ensuring the livelihoods of communities who live around MDNP, and implementing a long-term financing strategy in which carbon, livelihood, and conservation benefits are measured by our success protecting the MDNP landscape. This project has four strategic outcomes:

1. Protection & Law Enforcement: Security in the MDNP and periphery is improved, and criminality reduced through enhanced law enforcement capacity.

The protection and law enforcement-objective aims to significantly strengthen the surveillance system of the park and its periphery where the Rangers have their territorial competency with a view to securing the area's biodiversity and reduce poaching and wildlife trafficking.  

2. Management Capacity & Efficiency: MDNP management capacity to address core threats is strengthened through negotiation and implementation of a site-specific Public-Private-Partnership mandate; and MDNP is upheld as an international centre of research.

The current partnership agreement sees WCS in a technical assistance role to MINFOF, as there is currently no site-specific partnership agreement in place between WCS and the Government of Cameroon. One of the biggest priorities in the coming years therefore is the negotiation of a site-specific management mandate between WCS and the Government of Cameroon.

3. Sustainable development & Community partnerships: The well-being of the local populations, and access to and use of natural resources are improved within the environmental framework of the MDNP.

Local communities are more likely to support protected areas as well as wildlife species protection if they are aware of their potential values, understand and appreciate the benefits that the protected areas and wildlife can provide to their wellbeing. It is therefore one of the greatest priorities to create a constituency for conservation in the park’s surrounding communities and wider landscape to ensure conservation success, because security and law enforcement cannot succeed without a strong local constituency in place.

4. Green growth & Sustainable financing: Sustainable economic development is accelerated through green growth and sustainable financing strategies (including climate financing and eco-tourism).

Long-term funding appears as one of the major constraints to ensure a sustainable management of MDNP. The potential for climate financing as part of a REDD+ initiative as well as potential development of ecotourism will be researched, and feasibility studies will be conducted.

As part of this project, a monitoring and evaluation framework is to be developed for the five-year project period to fulfil both learning and accountability purposes.

3. Objective of the assignment:

A consultant will be contracted to develop a comprehensive M&E framework and implementation plan to be used for assessing and understanding the progress of the project outputs and outcomes as well as establishing baselines and targets related to main activities, outputs, outcomes, and global impact including risk and mitigations. In addition to the M&E framework, the consultant should also provide a roadmap to guide the mid-term and final evaluation.

4. Expected Activities and Outcomes:

The Consultant or Consulting Firm will be expected to carry out and deliver the following tasks:

4.1 Prepare a workplan detailing how the assignment will be accomplished with realistic timelines.

During this preparation phase, the Consultant or Consulting Firm will review project documents including log frame, annual targets and indicators, theory of change and existing monitoring tools.

4.2 Develop a comprehensive M&E framework to assess the project.

The Consultant or Consulting Firm will develop an M&E framework with appropriate performance indicators (outputs and outcomes) with clear definitions, milestones, data collection strategies, and frequency of collection. It should include methodologies for measuring these and responsible parties for collection. It should also demonstrate how the outlined impacts will be measured and outline sources of verification for each outcome/indicator.

The framework should consider any existing site-specific M&E tools.

4.3 Set and measure the baseline.

For each output and outcome, provide an appropriate measurable baseline from which the progress will be evaluated during the project period.

4.4 Develop the evaluation strategy relevant to effectiveness, efficiency, impact, and sustainability of the project’s theory of change. Evaluation methods to test and explore impacts should be specified. The evaluation should gather robust evidence about how, where, and why (or why not) the programme was effective and achieved results.

The evaluation strategy should reflect the project’s operational context and needs and comply with donor requirements. It should also specify how evaluative data will be captured.

4.5 Develop terms of reference for the external mid-term and final evaluation.

5. Deliverables:

The Consultant will provide a final report including:

5.1. A final workplan detailing how the assignment will be accomplished with realistic timelines.

5.2. A baseline assessment and plan to address any information gaps through surveys or other relevant data collection tools.

5.3. Findings gathered during the framework development and review of existing M&E tools with recommendations.

5.4. A comprehensive M&E framework for the 5-year project including a detailed implementation plan for monitoring activities, and terms of reference or roadmap to guide the mid-term and final evaluation of the project including the evaluation strategy.

6. Skills and experience required:

- Minimum 5 years of experience in natural resources management, conservation development and/or management, or related field.

- Experience in conducting technical evaluation of programs related to the management of natural resources and conservation; experience in projects related to biodiversity, climate change adaptation and/or carbon emission reduction would be an asset.

- Expertise in designing and applying robust, relevant, and timely evaluation strategies for international projects using qualitative and quantitative methods.

- Knowledge of interventions in the sector of biodiversity conservation (the fight against poaching), natural resources governance and experience with projects working with communities bordering protected areas.

- A good knowledge of forest and savanna ecosystems in Africa, and Cameroon in particular, will be considered an asset.

- Gender balance in the proposed team, at all levels, is highly recommended.

- Good communication skills, both orally and writing, in English and French.

- Proficiency in additional language(s) spoken in the Mbam & Djérem landscape is an asset, but not required.

7. Application process:

Interested applicants, should submit a technical and financial offer.

7.1 The technical offer will include:

• A short introductory chapter detailing the applicant's understanding of the mission and its main issues.

• A chapter detailing the draft methodology for conducting the assessment. The proposed methodology will detail how the objectives will be addressed.

• A brief analysis of the mission's main risks and corrective measures.

• A chapter detailing the relevance of the composition and skills of the team for this assignment and a workplan.

• Annex I: the CVs of the proposed team members (maximum length of each CV: 5 pages). Evaluators are requested to provide references (name and contact of a person who can provide a reference) for three to five similar projects. References can be contacted directly by WCS.

• Annex II: a synoptic table outlining the workplan by each proposed team member and their role, based on the proposed methodology.

• Annex III: the proposed timetable.

The maximum length of the technical offer should not exceed 10 pages, excluding annexes.

7.2 The financial offer will be presented in $ or FCFA, including daily rates, perdiems and international transport. WCS will cover local transportation and accommodation costs.

The costs of the proposed Consultant or Consulting Firm must cover:

- The remuneration paid to the Consultant(s) per day of work.

- Administrative costs related to the employment of the Consultant(s), including holidays, insurance and other social benefits.

- Overheads.

- Any reimbursement of per diems or travel expenses related to international travel.

8. Selection and Application Process:

8.1  Selection Process

- Applicants must be clear and concise and must address in detail and with appropriate documentation each of the points listed below (see evaluation criteria). Applicants failing to do so may be disqualified.

- WCS may request clarification of any offer during the evaluation process.

- Applicants should not assume they will have another opportunity to clarify their offers after the due date.

- This selection process may include a request by WCS to interview applicants and visit their office/website for purposes of clarifying their proposal.

- WCS may reject any or all proposals if, in its sole opinion, one or no proposal satisfies their criteria.

8.2 Evaluation Criteria

The contract will be awarded based on the following criteria:

A technical score will be assigned to each compliant application. An application will be rejected at this stage if it fails to address important aspects of the assignment or fails to meet the minimum technical score of 60 points out of 80.

8.3 Application Process

Applicants should submit their offer in Word format as an attachment to the following address: wcscameroon@wcs.org

Please include “MDNP M&E Framework Development Offer” in the subject line of your email.

9. Payment:

The Consultant or Consulting Firm will be paid for the amount agreed between the two parties (WCS and the Consultant or Consulting Firm) with payments made directly to the Consultant or Consulting Firm as follows:

·       10% on completion and submission of the workplan, detailing how the assignment will be accomplished with realistic timelines.

·       40% on completion of baseline plan with survey and relevant data collection tools.

·       50% on completion and acceptance of comprehensive M&E framework, the implementation plan and submission of final report with recommendations.

Deliverables will be reviewed and certified as satisfactory by the WCS Mbam & Djérem Project Director and WCS Cameroon Program Manager.

10. Timeframe:

It is anticipated that the assignment will be completed within a total of four weeks from the date of the signature of the contract between WCS and the Consultant or Consulting Firm.

10.1. Deadline by which requests for clarifications must be submitted: latest Wednesday 20^th of June 2023.

10.2. Interviews (if applicable) will be conducted between : To be determined

10.3. Deadline for submission of offers: 30/06/2023.

10.4. Notification of the award: To be determined

10.5 Expected start date: To be determined

10.6 End of the consultqncy: To be determined