Consultant - Baseline Assessment for European Union Support to Early Recovery from Conflict and Resilience Building Project at Save The Children

Job ID: 190000ZS
Location: Nigeria
Employee Status: Fixed Term

Background
In Nigeria since the start of the North East conflict in 2009, more than 20,000 people have been killed, more than 4,000 people abducted and 1.7 million remain displaced, most of them in Borno State. Those caught up in the conflict have experienced brutal violence, lost family, friends and homes, lived with acute and sustained levels of stress in poor conditions, seen their communities torn apart and had little or no access to life-saving services such as health and education. Ongoing threats of attacks by armed groups and military restrictions – particularly restrictions on population movements – continue to be obstacles to trade, livelihoods and markets, leaving a substantial proportion of the civilian population specifically children dependent on humanitarian assistance..

The humanitarian crisis in Yobe state has resulted to significant loss of lives, livelihoods, productive assets and infrastructure and thousands of people killed, displaced and suffering psychosocial trauma. The joint Federal and State government, EU, World Bank and DFID Recovery and Peace Building Assessment (RPBA) conducted in 2016 found that Yobe sustained 13% of all infrastructure and social services damages in the six states in the NE region. This was in addition to damage to over 70% of the agricultural sector and the destruction of educational institutions in Damaturu, Gujba, and other LGAs. This is within a pre conflict environment where poverty was extremely high in Yobe State, with 68.9% of the population living below the US $1/day poverty line in 2010. The state currently hosts 124,909 IDPs, witnessing the steepest increment (19%), with 19,598 new arrivals compared to the previous round in February 2018. 

Children and youth are one group bearing the brunt of the crisis and are set to suffer long-term physical, social and economic consequences unless appropriate action is taken. Rural households with children were identified as being a group at particular risk of increased poverty in the RPBA, leading the World Bank to recommend targeting social protection to such households. According to the 2016-17 Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey, Yobe State has the highest rate of Global Acute Malnutrition in all Nigeria. A staggering 17.5% of children under five are clinically wasted (above the ‘critical severity’ threshold). Over three in five children (61%) are stunted.

Children are also suffering from extremely poor access to and quality of education. Gross enrolment rates for primary schools in 2015 were 53% for boys and 47% for girls (YOSERA 2016-2020). A Humanitarian Needs Overview projects that these figures will worsen from 2018 to 2019. In addition, the NE region has the worst Pupil-to-Qualified-Teacher ratio in the country (EDOREN). Prospects for older youth also remain bleak as a bulging youth population suffers from a lack of employment opportunities, again undermining prospects for a peaceful future.

Save the Children seeks to continue augmenting efforts to protect girls and boys in conflict settings. The Project “EU Support to Early Recovery from Conflict and Resilience Building in Yobe State” has an overall objective of strengthening early recovery, improving human development, social cohesion and resilience among targeted vulnerable households and communities in Yobe state. Specific objectives of the project are-

Specific Objective 1:

• Enhanced state government capacity to lead, oversee, strengthen and expand its social protection system to address basic needs and critical deprivations, alongside increased state and community capacity to facilitate reconciliation and social cohesion.

Specific Objective 2:

• Vulnerable households and communities in Yobe are more resilient to recurrent shocks and have diversified livelihoods, through effective support for market recovery, skills development and improved state capacity to provide technical assistance
• Provide an information base against which to monitor and assess an activity's progress and effectiveness during implementation and after the activity is completed.

Purpose of the Consultancy:

• The purpose of the study will be to provide baseline information on livelihoods, social protection and basic social services prior to commencing project implementation
• Information from the baseline assessment will be used as references to track progress and performance towards achieving the projects outputs and outcomes over time.

Baseline Objectives
A baseline study will be conducted in Yobe state and the key objectives of this baseline are as follows:

• Identify the benchmarks for the EU-Resilience Project intended outcomes, against a set of approved indicators (Outcome and process);
• Provide information for setting realistic and achievable targets for the three year project;
• Provide evidence on key contextual factors, particularly related to gender equality, and verify Save the Children’s understanding of the situation in the resilience intervention areas.
• Identify factors influencing access and quality to basic services with emphasis to health, nutrition, education and child protection.
• Determine the prevalence of stunting among children under 5.
• Provide information on use and coverage of mobile and digital technology use.
• Conduct a social norm diagnostic covering the following areas:
• Power dynamics at the household and community levels;
• Distribution of resources at the household level (access to and control over);
• Roles and responsibilities of women, girls, men and boys;
• Cultural and religious taboos, myths and beliefs;

Save the Children Nigeria Country Office, Save the Children UK, and the donor (the EU) will be the major users of the baseline data. In addition, key stakeholders in project countries such as government line ministries/departments, partner NGOs, local authorities, and communities are interested parties of the findings.

Methodology
The selected Research Consultant will be required to prepare detailed research methodology in Partnership with Save the Children. Baseline survey will include both quantitative and qualitative data collection methods. The baseline assessment should include, but not necessarily limited to the following methods and approaches:

• Desk reviews of relevant documents to assess current situations (national/state reports, local laws, policies and strategies related livelihood, resilience, health, nutrition, education and child protection).
• A review of the existing SCI policies such as the SCI Child Safeguarding policy, SCI humanitarian strategies etc.
• Focus groups, key informant interviews, risk mapping exercises, etc. with Government officials; Community Development/Social Welfare, Health, Education; Community leaders and members; religious leaders and a diversity of gender groups (e.g. CAAFAG, Foster parents, Child headed households, Female headed households, Adolescent Boys and Girls, Persons with disabilities etc.) within the project locations.
• Households survey including anthropometric measurements.
• Observations and any additional data collection techniques and analysis to be determined by the researcher/consultant (should be elaborated in the consultant proposal).

Data Collection Tools
Data collection tools will include:

• A quantitative household survey (incl. measurement of stunting)
• A qualitative key informant interviews with Relevant line ministries at State and LGA level and civil society members;
• Key community members.
• Qualitative analysis of social norms (to understand the power dynamics)

Sampling:

• Sample sites will be selected through a stratified multi-stage cluster sample design. Strata will be selected at the LGA level, and will include key characteristics and factors expected to impact progress towards outcome
• The proposed sample sizes will have 95% confidence interval, enabling results to be generalized to the project intervention areas
• An additional 10 percent sample of households will be included to address non-respondents or incomplete questionnaires.

Scope of Work for the Consultancy
The Consultant will be the lead technical consultant for this baseline, with a focus on:

• Planning and reporting on state level baseline data collection;
• Finalizing design and sampling methodology;
• Piloting and translating the data collection tools into Hausa
• Carrying out all recruitment, training and supervision of enumerators/data collectors and supervisors required to complete the assignment efficiently;
• Leading the implementation of high quality data collection on all PMF indicators at both the household and basic service provider facility level, with adequate field testing and supervision of all data collection and data entry;
• Overseeing data entry, cleaning and validation of household, facility data, and key informants
• Preparing clean data analysis tables of the household survey and the facility questionnaire data, with disaggregation to be determined in consultation with Save the Children, but at a minimum, by sex and age.
• Providing raw and fully cleaned and annotated quantitative datasets and analysis code to Save the Children
• Providing full transcripts from all qualitative interviews;
• Share a draft report for Save the Children’s feedback;
• Adjust Save the Children’s feedback in the draft and provide final report.
• The Consultant will report directly to the Save the Children’s Head of MEAL in Nigeria, who will be responsible for overseeing the overall baseline study process
• The Consultant will also collaborate closely with the Save the Children FSL, Social Protection, Nutrition, Child Protection, Education and Gender Advisors based in country and UK.

Roles and Responsibilities

• Present an overall sampling strategy and timeline for data collection at household, institutes, and key informants at community, LGA and State ministry level;
• Review documents, including the Performance Measurement Framework
• Ensure that all necessary research ethics approvals are obtained on time, as per country guidelines;
• Recruit translators, enumerators/data collectors and field supervisors, and data entry operators, ensuring gender balance as appropriate;
• Prepare and conduct enumerator training with support from the MEAL focal point at SCI Nigeria including co-facilitation of a gender equality, child safeguarding and child protection components;
• Ensure all tools are translated into Hausa and piloted with women, men and adolescent girls and boys prior to enumerator’s training;
• Submit an inception report, and provide country level updates on progress in data collection;
• Oversee data collection including piloting, supervision and spot checking;
• Ensure that all data collection activities are gender-responsive and respect child safeguarding principles;
• Oversee data entry as per agreed upon software and data entry protocols established;
• Review data entry to ensure data quality and consistency;
• Ensure all training materials, original data collection forms, and hard copies of raw data are maintained and submitted to Save the Children Nigeria with the final cleaned and annotated dataset and analysis syntax;

Deliverables, Time Frame and Level of Effort:

• The period of the contract will be from June to mid-August 2019, with an expected contribution of approximately 50 working days over four months as per agreed upon timeline.

Level of Effort:

• Document review of PMF and other project documentation: 3 days
• Development, adaptation and finalization of data collection tools: 5 days
• Finalization of protocol and submission to Ethics Review Committee: 5 days
• Prepare and conduct enumerators training: 7 days
• Oversee data collection activities: 15 days
• Complete data entry, clean data and analysis: 7 days
• Completion of draft report: 5 days
• Incorporation of review feedback and finalization of report: 3 days.

Qualifications

• Minimum of 7 years of experience in coordinating and administering baseline/endline studies, including gender-sensitive data collection and entry, data management and storage, preferably for international non-profit organizations or multilateral agencies with preference for studies in multi-sectorial resilience project with emphasis on livelihood, food security, nutrition education, health and child protection;
• Demonstrated experience in training, facilitation and supervising survey enumerators and data entry team to collect and enter data as per high quality standards;
• Demonstrated experience in setting up relevant data base systems;
• Demonstrated experience in quantitative and qualitative data analysis, particularly as it relates to social norms i.e. power dynamics between male and female members, decision making, and others;
• Knowledge and experience with FSL and social service issues, social norm change, policies and services systems in Nigeria;
• Knowledge of and experience with gender equality in programming;
• Fluency in English and  Hausa  (spoken and written) is a requirement;
• Ability to produce high quality work under tight timeframes;
• Ability to work jointly with the Save the Children Nigeria office and integrate feedback as required.