Climate Change Evaluation Expert

THE MDG-F ENVIRONMENT JOINT PROGRAMME IN ETHIOPIA:

The MDG-F Environment Joint Programme (UNDP, FAO and UNEP) in Ethiopia, entitled Enabling Pastoral Communities to Adapt to Climate Change and Restoring Rangeland Environments Programme, aims at supporting the Ethiopian government in its endeavor to address climate change challenges in the country.

Pastoralists constitute almost 14% percent of the total Ethiopian population (close to 10 million people). They occupy a total area of 625,000 km² in Ethiopia, which is over 60% of the country’s land mass. The pastoral areas of Ethiopia have among the highest rates of poverty and the lowest human development indices. Pastoralists raise from 50 to70% of their livelihood from livestock rearing. Considerable proportions of pastoralists rely on food aid for survival as it suffers from chronic food insecurity.

Climate change, resulting in drought and extreme weather patterns has reduced pastoralists’ basic resource including communal rangeland, constrained mobility and significantly reduced the number and productivity of livestock. Changes in the traditional land use systems and limited alternative livelihoods have exacerbated this situation.

The Ethiopian Government has committed to address these challenges through policy reform and targeted programmes: improving pastoral livelihoods and assets base; management of rangelands and encouraging livelihood diversification. The MDGs Achievement Fund Environment Joint Programme contributes to strengthening capacities to implement these strategies and programmes both at national and community level.

The programme implementation began in July 2010 and focuses on the achievement of three outcomes:

• Outcome 1: Climate change mitigation and adaptation options for pastoralists mainstreamed into national, sub-national and district development frameworks
• Output 1.1 Improved national/regional/local development plans, key sector policies, strategies and partnership to mainstream climate change mitigation and adaptation options into policy frameworks
• Output 1.2 Instruments/.guidelines for mainstreaming federal, regional and district CC adaptation and mitigation in pastoral areas developed
• Outcome 2: Enhanced capacity of government agencies and respective pastoralist community institutions to effectively respond to the climate change risks and challenges at all levels
• Output 2.1 Federal/Regional/district and pastoral community institutions capacity and service delivery to respond to pastoralist needs in the face of changing climate
• Outcome 3: Pastoral community coping mechanisms/sustainable livelihood enhanced
• Output 3.1 Target community climate change sensitive needs identified, assessed and priority interventions agreed
• Output 3.2 Integrated Rangeland Management Implemented in the targeted districts for better livelihoods and coping with adverse climatic effects
• Output 3.3 Communities in 17 villages of the six districts participate in livelihood diversification activities so as to cope with climate change related livelihood risks

The environment joint programme underwent a thorough Mid-Term Evaluation in January and February 2012. The recommendations from the MTE were taken to the Programme Management Committee which then developed a Programme Improvement Plan, including a participative reprogramming of the activities for the remaining duration of the project, as well as the formulation of a no-cost extension. The programme is now in its last months of implementation and will be officially closed on 31^st March 2013. The final evaluation must be carried out no later than between December 2012 and February 2013.

Opportunities and challenges of the environment joint programme: 

High vulnerability of the pastoralists to climate change

The joint programme focuses on a particularly vulnerable portion of the Ethiopian population. Pastoralists, especially women, are particularly vulnerable to climate change due to their dependency on rangeland for animal husbandry. The productivity of rangelands in Ethiopia is primarily dependant on climate (rainfall). Drought is increasingly becoming a characteristic of the pastoral areas. In recent decades, due to the increased intensity of climate variability and climate change, environmental degradation coupled with the increasing human and livestock populations and the recurrent drought has brought about significant effects resulting in the decline of rangeland resources. Representing 46.9% of the population of the pastoralist community in Ethiopia, women have a significant contribution to pastoralist economy and are first line victim of environmental degradation. Women own and sell small ruminants and increasingly poultry and eggs. Therefore, women development is the best entry point to trigger market oriented growth in the whole pastoral sector.

Disintegration of traditional resource management practices

Due to the climatic and socioeconomic dynamics in many parts of the pastoralist areas, the traditional system of environmental resources management is degrading. Moreover, due to the increased environmental resources scarcity, inter and intra clan conflicts over resources are compounding the difficulties faced by pastoral communities.

Inadequate institutional capacity

Despite vigorous effort by the government to improve capacity at various levels, poor institutional capacity is still recognized as an important constraint in Ethiopia. The inefficiency and ineffectiveness of livestock marketing in the pastoral regions have been contributing to the pastoral food insecurity. Until recently, the pastoral areas have been side-lined in the development processes. The federal and regional governments are trying to rectify the pastoralists decades of historical socio-political exclusion.

The joint programme has targeted some of the most vulnerable Regions to implement its activities. The following table gives an overview of the targeted direct beneficiaries: Afar (two weredas), Somali (two wereda), Oromia (one wereda) and SNNPR (one wereda)

The programme targets a total of 32,160 pastoral community members (14,658 women and 17,502 men) as direct beneficiaries.

The joint programme is implemented by the following implementing partners:

• Lead Government IP: Ministry of Agriculture (MoA)
• Partner Governmental Organizations: Ministry of Finance and Economic Development (MoFED), Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) and 4 Regional IPs

• Lead UN agency: United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)
• Partner UN agencies: Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP)

The participating UN agencies bring to bear the normative (policy/strategy, research), programmatic interventions at the beneficiary level and capacity development (human/institutional capacities) in Ethiopia. The comparative advantage of these participating agencies is the experience, knowledge and best practice generated as a result of the implementation of projects in the pastoralist areas to be shared with the Joint Programme. They support the government partners, pastoral communities and other relevant stakeholders on major area.

• Measure to what extent the environment joint programme has fully implemented its activities, delivered outputs and attained outcomes, specifically measuring development results.
• Generate substantive evidence based knowledge, by identifying best practices and lessons learned that could be useful to other development interventions at national (scale up) and international level (replicability).

As a result, the findings, conclusions and recommendations generated by these evaluations will be part of the thematic window Meta evaluation, which the Secretariat is undertaking to synthesize the overall impact of the Fund at national and international level.

This final evaluation will use methodologies and techniques as determined by the specific needs for information, the questions provided to the evaluation team and the availability of resources and the priorities of stakeholders. In all cases, consultants are expected to analyze all relevant information sources, such as reports, programme documents, internal review reports, programme files, strategic country development documents, the mid-term evaluation and any other documents that may provide evidence on which to form judgments. Consultants are also expected to use interviews, surveys or any other relevant quantitative and/or qualitative tool as a means to collect relevant data for the final evaluation. The evaluation team will make sure that the voices, opinions and information of targeted citizens/participants of the joint programme are taken into account.

The methodology and techniques to be used in the evaluation should be described in detail in the desk study report and the final evaluation report, and should contain, at minimum, information on the instruments used for data collection and analysis, whether these be documents, interviews, field visits, questionnaires or participatory techniques.

The consultant is responsible for submitting the following deliverables to the evaluation reference group:

• Inception Report (to be submitted within 10 days of the submission of all programme documentation to the evaluation team). This report will be 10 to 15 pages in length and will propose the methods, sources and procedures to be used for data collection. It will also include a proposed timeline of activities and submission of deliverables. The desk study report will propose initial lines of inquiry about the joint programme. This report will be used as an initial point of agreement and understanding between the consultant and the evaluation managers. The report will follow an outline which will be provided in due time. More details on the evaluation report will also be provided.
• Draft Final Report (to be submitted within 15 days after the completion of the field visit, please send also to MDG-F Secretariat). The draft final report will contain the same sections as the final report (described in the next paragraph) and will be 20 to 30 pages in length. This report will be shared among the evaluation reference group. It will also contain an executive report of no more than 2 pages that includes a brief description of the joint programme, its context and current situation, the purpose of the evaluation, its methodology and its main findings, conclusions and recommendations. The draft final report will be shared with the evaluation reference group to seek their comments and suggestions. This report will contain the same sections as the final report, described below.
• Final Evaluation Report (to be submitted within 7 days after reception of the draft final report with comments, please send also to MDG-F Secretariat). The final report will be 20 to 30 pages in length. It will also contain an executive summary of no more than 2 pages that includes a brief description of the joint programme, its context and current situation, the purpose of the evaluation, its methodology and its major findings, conclusions and recommendations. The final report will be sent to the evaluation reference group.

The evaluation team will be made up of an international consultant and a national consultant.

• Have a leading role in the evaluation process
• Be in charge of the inception report and final evaluation report writing
• Be responsible in fulfilling the contractual arrangements in line with the TOR, United Nations Evaluation Group (UNEG)/Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) norms and standards and ethical guidelines; this includes developing an evaluation matrix as part of the inception report, drafting reports, and briefing the commissioner and stakeholders on the progress and key findings and recommendations, as needed.

• Provide assistance to the international consultant and provide information about local institutions, protocol, social etiquette and traditions as necessary
• Accompany the international consultant to meetings and field visits
• Facilitate the evaluation mission and provide administrative support and coordinate logistical arrangements
• Provide translation to the international consultant (Amharic and English proficiency will be required)

The evaluation will be carried out from December 2012 to March 2013 for the delivery of the final report.

• Strong analytical skills. Knowledge on environment and climate change will be an asset.  
• Ability to work with a diverse range of stakeholders and work as part of a team.
• Ability to work independently, flexibly and under pressure, utilizing initiative and sound judgment.
• Good interpersonal and communications skills.
• Cultural Sensitivity/Valuing diversity.

Education:

• Post-graduate degree in social sciences, economics, agricultural sciences, development studies or a related field

Experience:

• Minimum 7 years experience in conducting or managing evaluations, research or review of development programmes, results based monitoring and evaluation, experience with variety of research methodologies, including qualitative and participatory approaches, as well as experience as main writer of an evaluation report.
  
• Experience in sub-Saharan Africa will be an asset.

• Fluency in English.