Republic of Moldova

Evaluation of the UN Drought Response in Moldova

Vacancy Number: 87/UN--2008

Background:

During the summer of 2007, Moldova suffered from a devastating drought that has affected most of the country.  According to international ratings on the impact level of this phenomenon on ecology and agriculture, this drought was of catastrophic proportions.  For the entire period of meteorological observations conducted on the territory of the country, similar phenomena were observed only twice – at the end of the 19th century and in the period of 1946-1947.

The drought has exacerbated the problems in rural livelihoods and exposed a large number of farmers and vulnerable people to poverty.  In response to the crisis, the United Nations is implementing a Relief and Technical Assistance Response to the Drought, targeting the most vulnerable households and focusing initially on the short-term emergency needs, namely, winter wheat seeds, spring maize seeds, fertilizer, fuel, animal feed, food packages and cash for work schemes.

As foreseen in the project, the severity of the situation and the long term implications require the need to design and implement a wide-ranging set of measures to build the necessary coping mechanisms and improve rural livelihoods.  This will complement the initial emergency response phase of the project.

Objective of the assignment:

The overall objective of the evaluation is to provide an objective assessment of the achievements, constraints, performance, results, impact, relevance, and sustainability of the “Relief and Technical Assistance Response to the Drought in Moldova” project. The evaluation should be comprehensive and cover the outcome, outputs, activities and inputs of the project.

Responsibilities:

An overall guidance on evaluation methodology can be found in the UNDP Handbook on Monitoring and Evaluating for Results. The evaluators should come up with a suitable methodology for this evaluation based on the guidance given in this document.

During the evaluation, the evaluator is expected to apply the following approaches for data collection and analysis:

Desk review of relevant documents (project documents with amendments made, review reports -midterm/final, donor-specific, etc);

Discussions with the Senior Management and programme staff of UN agencies in Moldova;

Briefing and debriefing sessions with UN and the Government, as well as with other donors and partners

Interviews with partners and stakeholders (including gathering the information on what the partners have achieved with regard to the outcome and what strategies they have used); other donors, etc. 

Field visits to selected project sites and discussions with project teams, project beneficiaries;

 

Specifically, the evaluator/team leader will perform the following tasks:

1. Lead and manage the evaluation mission;
2. Design the detailed evaluation scope and methodology (including the methods for data collection and analysis) for the report;
3. Decide the division of labor within the evaluation team;
4. Conduct an analysis of the outcome, outputs, activities, inputs and partnership strategy (as per the scope of the evaluation described above) for the report;
5. Draft related parts of the evaluation reports; and
6. Finalize the whole evaluation report.

Requirements to candidates

The international consultant must have:

an advanced university degree in agriculture, economy, law, international development studies, or other related areas;

at least eight years of work experience in the field of agriculture and rural development, local development, participatory planning for sustainable development, including participatory monitoring and evaluation;

sound knowledge about results-based management (especially results-oriented monitoring and evaluation);

demonstrated relevant experience in the review, evaluation and assessment of early recovery humanitarian / development projects, preferably focusing on recovery from natural disasters

excellent communication skills;

excellent knowledge of English, both written and verbal;

knowledge of Romanian or Russian would be an asset.

Terms of Reference

Personal History Form (P11)

Interested persons should submit their Application Letters, CVs, P11 Form and a Financial Proposal for carrying out the tasks, with the mark “Evaluation: Drought Response Project”, by 10 June 2008 to the following address: UNDP Office, 131, 31 August str., MD 3012, Chisinau Moldova, alternatively by fax 22 00 41 or email registry.md@undp.org.

Only those short listed will be contacted.

Failure of candidates to submit a duly completed P.11 form, as well as false representations on this form, shall constitute sufficient grounds for withdrawal of further consideration of the application. All information provided in the P11 form will be treated as strictly confidential.