Consultant Service for Financial Inclusion Mapping and Analysis for Agribusiness Promotion and Women Empowerment

TERMS OF REFERENCE

Financial inclusion mapping and analysis for agribusiness promotion and women empowerment

1.            Background

SNV Netherlands Development Organisation (SNV) has been working in Vietnam since 1995. Using market based approaches as well as balancing benefit for gender equality promotion, SNV is committed to reducing poverty by catalysing environmentally sustainable solutions for the poor in agriculture, energy, water & sanitation, and REDD+.

The Enhancing Opportunities for Women’s Enterprises (EOWE) is a 5-year programme being implemented by SNV in Kenya and Vietnam. The Programme is part of the Funding Leadership Opportunities for Women (FLOW) programme funded by the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Social Development Department (DSO).

The FLOW/EOWE will be implemented in collaboration with local partners in the four provinces of Quang Binh, Binh Dinh, Ninh Thuan and Binh Thuan, leveraging existing projects and relationships to ensure more benefits for women. The Vietnam FLOW/EOWE sub-project is inheriting the successful climate smart and gender inclusive agriculture project of SNV Vietnam (Sowing Seeds of Change project) funded by the Australian Government.

The FLOW/EOWE offers support for women-led businesses and businesses beneficial to a great number of women in the agricultural sector including rice, horticulture and some other catalyst sub-sectors such as eco-tourism, pottery, etc. These woman labour intensive sub-sectors have been identified as areas in which private sector investment can deliver major impacts on poverty reduction, women’s economic empowerment and respond to development challenges in Vietnam, particularly targeting women, while also addressing gender inequality.

Under the business component, the FLOW/EOWE programme objectives:

• To enhance opportunities for women to participate in economic activities and promote innovative initiatives in the agricultural sector;
• To overcome business risks and reduce transaction costs associated with low-income people, particularly women, in value chains;
• To remove barriers and improve the operation of value chains to facilitate inclusion of low-income women in the core business of participating companies;
• To create incentives for companies to offer goods and services that are accessible and address the needs of low income women in their value chains;
• To promote a gender-sensitive, internal environments within companies;
• To promote a better business climate for women in the private sector through policy influencing and advocacy.
• To improve financial access for cooperatives/SMEs

In order to identify gaps to access financial resources from agribusiness stakeholders, especially for small holders as well as the gap in the enabling environment for women entrepreneurs to take advantages of financial inclusion, SNV is looking for consultant to conduct an assignment to address these issues..

2.            Objectives

• To identify financial resources and opportunities from both formal and informal channels which cooperatives and SMEs can have access to at local and national levels.
• To identify challenges from relevant stakeholders in the finance sector (banks, entrepreneurs, investors, funds).
• To analyse and propose recommendations for: (i) cooperatives and SMEs on how to access these financial resources; (ii) bank to increase business effectiveness and (iii) inputs for policy advocacy.

3.            Scope of work

The consultants are expected to undertake the following tasks, in close consultation with and facilitation of FLOW/EOWE team, during the period from August to December 2018:

• Desk study:
  
  • Reviewing FLOW/EOWE programme documents to understand programme’s objectives, activities and target beneficiaries;
  • Reviewing literature and stakeholders consultation on policies and mechanisms that enable/disable business environment specifically related to financial inclusion;

• Field research:
  
  • Designing questionnaires and guidelines for interviewing;
  • Interviewing about 20 key agriculture cooperatives/SMEs targeted at women-led and co-led businesses in 4 project targeted provinces to identify their expectations, difficulties in accessing financial resources at local and national levels;
  • Interviewing about 10 banking institutions, investment funds, credit funds and other social fund providers at local and national levels to identify their available services, requirements for loans provided to cooperatives/SMEs, especially to women led or co-led businesses, (loan size, loan coverage, loan term, interest rate, fee, repayment schemes, collateral methods, target clients, operation mechanism, disbursement schemes); any available services and different loan requirements targeted to the agriculture field (incentive interest rate, flexible loan term and repayment schemes according to seasonal crops, flexible collateral methods towards different legal status entities, for example farmer cooperative groups);

• Debriefing on the findings of the mapping, including recommendations for SNV, bankers and cooperatives/SMEs;

• Sharing key findings and results from each of the four provinces.
  
  • Challenges, advantages, difficulties and approaches in getting access into financial resources at local and national levels (loan size, loan coverage, loan term, interest rate, fee, repayment schemes, collateral methods, target clients, operation mechanism, and disbursement schemes).
  • Any practical experiences if any in setting up voluntarily credit groups and the management of the revolving fund.

• Consolidating inputs for policy influencing to share with SNV finance inclusion partners;

• Writing a final report of this assignment in both English and Vietnamese.

4.            Deliverables

• Debriefing note in Vietnamese on findings of the mapping;

• Presentation in Vietnamese for sharing findings and results;

• Final report in both in English and Vietnamese of this assignment.
  
  • Findings & recommendations
  • List of financial resources
  • Supporting documents including but not limited to a list of interviewees, photos,  reference documents, and questionnaires

5.            Timeframe

The following is an indicative schedule as an input for the detailed work plan to be developed by the consultant and in agreement with the FLOW/EOWE staff.

6.           Requirements

Essential qualifications:

• Vietnamese citizen;
• Background in Business Administration/Finance/Economics or related fields;
• Experience in finance and banking, familiar with financial guidance and regulations from the Ministry of Finance;
• Experience with credits and savings implemented by international program (e.g NGOs) will be preference;
• At least 5 years of experience working in financial services, and/or market and value chain development;
• Excellent analytical, communication and writing skills.

Desirable experience:

• Experience in rural trade enterprises and value chain entrepreneurs.
• Knowledge and experience in Women’s economic empowerment and gender equality;
• Experience working with cooperatives/SMEs in Vietnam.

7.            Application

Interested consultant(s) are invited to send their technical proposal and financial proposal with the title “FLOW Financial inclusion mapping and analysis for agribusiness promotion and women empowerment” by 9 September 2018 to SNV Netherlands Development Organisation, 3rd floor, D Building, La Thanh hotel, 218 Doi Can, Ba Dinh, Hanoi, Email: [email protected]

Only short-listed applications will be contacted for interviews.

The technical and financial proposals should cover the following components:

Technical proposal template

Table of contents

I. Understanding of the ToR……………………………………………………………

II. Methodology/ Approach……………………………………………………………
2.1     Activity………………………………………………………………………………………
2.2     Task…………………………………………………………………………………………

III. Deliverables …………………………………………………………………………

IV. Work-plan ……………………………………………………………………………

V. Staffing plan………………………………………………………………………

Financial proposal template

Table of contents

I. Staff cost ………………………………………………………………………………………
1.1     Name of the consultants/ position……………………………………………
1.2     Input …………………………………………………………………………………………
1.3     Daily rate………………………………………………………………………………
1.4     Total cost ………………………………………………………………………………

II. Operational costs/ other costs ………………………………………………